I'm in year 10 and i took music but now we have to make our own little band and i want mine to be like a Jazz/Blues band but im finding it hard to come up with a decent melody on saxophone, any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

If you have done grade 5 theory you could try using those techniques, or start on a keyboard intead of your sax.

Experiment a lot. Anything you like you need to remember and than elaborate a bit more.

Try to think of a one bar prase, then add to it or alter it slightly to get a pattern consisting of more than one bar, just one simple riff can be very effective when it is changed slightly or played by different instruments.

How many members in your band? Also what instruments?
When i compose, I think of a rhythm pattern for a short phrase, then ill add notes and chords. Or sometimes Ill think of a melody and experiment around with it. I guess it is whatever works for you.
You could also try taking some chord patterns and writing a melody that fits in with them.

Try looking at the abrsm jazz piano pieces (any grade) and experiment with the section for improvising!
Also i find that starting off with a simple bassline helps - you can just play anything along with it.
Good luck !

listen to pieces and see what makes them work. what is it you like about them? is it the bassline, the rhythm, the melody? see what the specific things you like are in about the area you like....and see how you can make it work for you. oh that didnt make sense. ah. x

start singing random stuff to yourself, and it might sound horrible and stupid when you first start but be all jazzzed up like da da dooh da doo doo! and soon you will come up with something!

there's an easy solution to everything...

Peakie_Sax,

Do you know anyone with 'Band-in-a-box'?

I'm pretty sure that with this programme you can enter your chord progressions (for example a blues progression), choose a style and then set it off to create a melody (there are all sorts of parameters you can alter before it does this). The results can be tweaked and printed, which might help spark off some interesting ideas of your own.

Regards,

Mark.

Something that came back to me after doing some jazz with a friend yesterday, having a simple structure in mind can help. For example we were doing 12 bar blues, and in 2 bar chunks did question, answer, question, answer, go bonkers, finish!

Quite simplistic I know, and for sure once you've more experience you'd play around with it a bit more, but some sort of structure to "hold on to" can help you improvise something that hangs together well.

'Go bonkers' - What a great way to think of doing 12 bar blues Sarah! It makes it more fun put like that!

It was Violinia who suggested the structure, though I don't recall if "go bonkers" was her exact phrase I expect it started as something more sensible it works pretty well though!