One of the most challenging things about musical improv is finding the song we want to sing within the scene we’re improvising. How do we make sure that we’re making choices that will lead to a fulfilling song and not a song that feels like work?
In musical improv, we call this “earning” the song.
We don’t want to stumble backwards into our songs–we want to earn them. So how do we do it? Here’s a few tips to help your scene work so that you can earn songs:
1. Make Sh*t Important
Nobody breaks into song from ambivalence. If we want to earn a song, we need to care about stuff, and not just any stuff, the stuff that’s happening right here, right now, in this scene. It can be tempting to imagine that the important stuff is somewhere out there–some future choice we’ll make later–but it’s not. It’s already here. It’s the choices we made at the top of the scene and the choices we’re making right now. Make THOSE important.
2. Avoid Future Talk*
Songs about stuff we’re gonna do or should do are the worst songs, not just because they’re less interesting, but also because they’re HARD. Singing about plans for the future requires non-stop invention and invention is difficult. You know what’s easier? Discovery. By staying in the present moment, we free ourselves from needing to invent a bunch of stuff and instead just get to explore and discover, based on the brilliant choices we’ve already made.
*If you’re familiar with musicals, you might be thinking “But, what about ‘I want’ songs? Those are about the future”. And on the surface they are, but what makes ‘I want’ songs work is that they’re firmly rooted in the character’s present moment, the deficit that exists right now. It’s not listing all these cool things they’ll do in the future, it’s about the emotional reality of having a dream and finding yourself so far from it.
3. Ask Yourself “Why”
The fastest way to turn around a scene that’s become about the future (“We need to talk to the President”, “We should start a business”, “We’ll get our revenge,” etc.) is to ask yourself “Why”. Why is it important to solve the problem or do the thing? Why does your character care so much? By redirecting the scene to the why, we get to focus on character and point of view and emotion–all much easier places from which to earn songs.
4. Figure Out What Your Scene is About
Once your scene is underway and you’re making the present important and avoiding talk of the future and exploring why you care about stuff, try to notice what the scene is about–what is actually happening right now, between these characters. That’s usually what we want to sing about. If the scene is about two people clashing over their points of view, then we’ll want to sing a duet clashing over our points of view. If the scene is about one character’s emotional experience, then they should sing a solo about that emotional experience. If the scene is about a group of people celebrating their unique way of being, then, well, you get the idea.
5. Title Your Song
Once you’ve identified the thing you want to sing about, the final step to earning a song is titling it. This can be as simple as stating a title out loud, but oftentimes requires repeating it so that your Musical Director knows you’re ready to sing. If it seems like it’s gonna be a duet or group number, the other character(s) should repeat the same title. A title can be poetic or literal, just so long as it’s short (no more than 3 - 5 words). So if the last line of dialogue was something like “I can’t believe doing the bad thing was actually good”, we can condense that idea down and offer a nice short title like “It’s good to be bad”.
6. Don’t Talk Yourself Out of a Song
As soon as your song is titled and the Musical Director is playing, now is the time to stop talking. The last thing we want to do is talk ourselves out of the song we worked so hard to earn, which can happen when we keep exploring after titling. Your MD played because they agreed the title sounded right, so let’s honor that. Newer musical improvisers can practice repeating the song title to themselves a few times, just to make sure they really internalize it.
7. Sing the Song
This may seem self-evident, but it’s important to sing the song that we earned. We’ve titled the song and in so doing created a sort of contract with the audience that they will hear a song based around that title. If we make a U-turn or try to think of something more clever or more funny, we risk breaking that contract with the audience. If you’ve set a strong song title, try to incorporate it in the song, as either the chorus or tagline.
And that’s it. Of course all of this is easier said than done, but you can start incorporating some of these pointers into your scene work and see if it helps you to earn songs that you’re excited about singing!