Improvisers Quotes & Sayings

What has impressed me the most about the Italians whose tables we've sat at is that they are traditional cooks but also outrageously innovative. These people are wild improvisers. — Frances Mayes

When hiring, mix Harvard Nerds with Chicago Improvisers and stir. — Tina Fey

September morn Do you remember how we danced that night away Two lovers playing scenes from some romantic play September morning still can make me feel this way. — Neil Diamond

We're lucky enough, especially in these 'Madagascar' films, to be working with some of the best people in the industry, who are not only great actors, but great comedians and improvisers and filmmakers. And they then become a part of creating their characters. — Eric Darnell

During the so-called Jazz Age, most of the music's key exponents focused their creative energy on soloing not bandleading, on improvisation not orchestration, on an interplay between individual instruments not between sections.
[...] Commercial pressures, rather than artistic prerogatives, stand out as the spur that forced many early jazz players (including Armstrong, Beiderbecke, and Hines) to embrace the big band idiom. But even in the new setting, they remained improvisers, first and foremost, not orchestrators or composers. — Ted Gioia

Rahm Emanuel seems to think he knows Israel very well, and that the way to treat that country and its democratically-elected government is the way he treats all opponents in politics: by attacking and attacking. — Elliott Abrams

In life, most of us are highly skilled at suppressing action. All the improvisation teacher has to do is to reverse this skill and he creates very 'gifted' improvisers. Bad improvisers block action, often with a high degree of skill. Good improvisers develop action. — Malcolm Gladwell

In a scene [where the improvisers must interact] without the letter S, the audience is waiting for you to lose - so they can laugh at you. Don't try to win. — Keith Johnstone

Make it your moment-to-moment aim to recognize the difference between being aware of your thoughts, and being carried along by them. — Guy Finley

Coming out of Dallas and doing commercial work in Dallas - if you had improv background in Dallas, then you were instantly shot to the top of the list of commercial bookings because they loved improvisers because you could elevate the material. — Allison Tolman

Within the space of a few shows you can hear the band morph between their various identities as savvy arena rockers, intense starship pilots, vaudeville nostalgists, modest American folkies, boundary-dissolving improvisers, roots-conscious spiritualists, and mind-fucking pranksters. — Richard Gehr

A smile is the most affordable way of giving someone an expensive gift. — Matshona Dhliwayo

A lot of improvisers mistakenly assume stand-up is awful, because there are a lot of stand-ups in the world that did not appeal to me. It was so easy to make a blanket statement when I was improvising only: 'Stand-up's terrible.' It's so ignorant and stupid to do that. But it's easy to do that. So that's where I came from. — Kurt Braunohler

I'm married now, but back when I had girlfriends, you were always wondering if they liked you, and if you liked them enough. You're together, but the smallest thing could make one of you go 'You know what? This isn't working!' — Jeremy Sisto

I love when people improvise as long as they're great improvisers, what I mean by that is people can improvise within their characters and within the scene. — Scot Armstrong

Italians are great improvisers. If something unforeseen happens, they throw up their hands, and they adjust. — Max Von Sydow

I kept on buying records and listening to them. Finally, I was able to hear the relationship between the jazz improvisers' solos and the underlying structure that it's based on, the chord progression. That was pretty easy to do in the swing era, y'know, when jazz was, like, pop music, you know. It had made the charts and everything like that. — Harvey Pekar

I don't want to see an experiment. Experiment at home - when you show up on stage, I want to see a result. I think a lot of improvisers, you'll see them some nights and they just stink, and they go, "Well, we're just improvising." Like that's a license to have a shitty night! — Z'EV

Good improvisers seem telepathic; everything looks pre-arranged, This is because they accept all offers made - which is something no 'normal' person would do. — Keith Johnstone

I realized that improvisers should probably always have time off. But musicians are always gigging and never have a chance to stop for a minute - unless something drastic occurs. — Keith Jarrett

I could easily fill up each week with going to see debuts of friends' compositions alone. When you add in all of the bands I'm interested in catching and all of the improvisers that I still love, it gets almost impossibly daunting. I try to do as much as I can. — David First

For many decades now - and certainly during my adult life in academe - the Western intellectual world has not been convinced that theology is a pursuit that can be engaged in with intellectual honesty and integrity. — Arthur Peacocke

Improvisation, it is a mystery. You can write a book about it, but by the end no one still knows what it is. When I improvise and I'm in good form, I'm like somebody half sleeping. I even forget there are people in front of me. Great improvisers are like priests; they are thinking only of their god. — Stephane Grappelli

Personally, I've found one of the more stimulating ways of playing in recent times has been to kind of move outside the free improvised area and work with people who are probably improvisers but they have a particular way of working. — Derek Bailey

Bad improvisers block action, often with a high degree of skill. Good improvisers develop action.(p.115) — Malcolm Gladwell

When you hear Bach or Mozart, you hear perfection. Remember that Bach, Mozart and Beethoven were great improvisers. I can hear that in their music. — Dave Brubeck

John Hughes loved improvisers. — Edie McClurg