im sure everyone does when practicing and playing alone…
but i have never played in a session before and was wondering if you (session players) sometimes purely improvise ?
im not talking about variations of tunes… but a purely new born on-the-spot melody tune.
I improvise a lot, not because I can’t play any tunes,
but because at some sessions, people want to join in,
but don’t know the tune etc.
Also, if I play a popular tune that ‘gets them going’
they want it going for 10 minutes or so, which I don’t like doing.
So…
Somebody starts - anything - then people join in as they are able.
We use mainly pentatonic scales, because they sound good whatever you do. Especially when different instruments play e.g. guitar, drums, bells,
clapsticks, fiddles etc.
I use mainly low D whistle, playing pentatonic scale G, i.e. lift fingers 4&5 together.
Pent’ G seems to go down better than pent’ D (lift fingers 3&4 together).
You can use the above for any 6 hole whistle, and the relative pentatonic scales work.
Practice at home. I’m sure you’ll like it 
HTH
I play occasionally in an acoustic jam–we go around
and everybody gets to introduce a tune. Often
it’s rock and roll, country and western, celtic,
Linda Ronstadt, blues, you name it. After the
tune is established we go around again and
each of us improvises while the others
play softly. It’s great fun and I
learn a lot. I’m the only woodwind, usually.
Banjos, mandolins, guitars, fiddle…
Best
I came to whistle with a background in many styles of music but mainly blues, rock and jazz. My principal instruments were guitar and saxophone. Improvisation comes naturally to me on all the instruments I play with the exception of concertina.
How well improvisation goes in Celtic music is another question. I really like Moving Hearts but I think their style was a sort of Irish/jazz fusion and, as I think Kila show, there is still plenty of scope for developments in this direction. I’ve been a bit surprised that neither Moving Hearts nor Kila seem to generate much interest on this board.
I’ll improvise only if I know the tune really well and and it fits the moment (in other words, they’ll hear me. I want some credit, after all 
).
I don’t think improvising would go over very well in any of the sessions I have been to (very few). I do play variations now.
It would depend upon your definition of a session/people you are playing with, though.
Before I can play the variations, the basic tune has to be under my fingers and burned into my brain.
There is no way I would just blow away in a session. You either play or listen. In most sessions, I listen a lot, but might join in on some that I have down pat and can relax and play and still listen to the individual players. If a session has too many odds and ends thrown in, the tune can get lost in the cacaphony of guitar bangers and goat beaters and harmony players.
After about 7 years playing on the whistle, playing variations clicked and they just started coming out.
After 6 years on the UPs, it is finally happening a tiny bit, mostly when I get “in the zone” playing at home or with close friends.
This is one of my problems with sessions.
Maybe I’ll like them better when I go to
more good ones. But I prefer things more
free wheeling and open, with more
possibilities for improvs and harmony.
The sessions I attended were the "Celtic Week"at the first Swannanoa Gathering, and I went to 3 weeks at Elkins, WV at the Irish week. I have been to one Mississippi River Tionol and a “piper’s party” hosted in Chapel Hill, NC by one of Pat Sky’s friends. I am very impatient for the tionol we are having in Chapel Hill, NC.
Of course, when I gather with musician friends of other persuasions (kitchen session, campfire/party session, etc), we try to find something we all know, or listen a time or two through what one is doing and then seeing if you can join in and sound good/bad, it doesn’t matter, it’s a party type thing. I don’t exactly call those sessions, but if you want, the session definition can be stretched to what you want. The group determines what rules go. “When in Rome, shoot Roman candles” (Robert A. Heinlein, RIP)
If at a bluegrass session, you are expected to play bluegrass, at an Irish session, you are expected to play Irish stuff, etc.
At least, that’s how I define it.[/url]
Do I improvise? It’s almost all I do on the whistle! I play in a small band of 4 people (we do a lot of praise music, but some instrumental stuff as well) all acoustic instruments, a very unplugged sort of thing (except for the singer who has a mic). Basically, rather than have a sax player, or other such intrument, we have a whistle player (me!) (we also have an accordian which my friend plays more like an air-powered keyboard, but that is another story). I don’t really play that many trad tunes; I don’t even know that many, sadly.
Here’s to non-traditional whistling!!!
Thanks,
Micah