For 8 years - every Friday night on the main stage at IO West, a once in a lifetime musical is created.

OPENING NIGHT: THE IMPROVISED MUSICAL is exactly that, a Broadway-style musical that is made up on the spot, based on audience suggestion. Therefore, every night is the `Opening Night’ of a musical that has never been seen! Now in it’s TENTH YEAR, Opening Night is thrilled to continue as the show LAWeekly called, “almost too slick to be completely improvised”. It is, by the way—completely improvised.

Led by director Shulie Cowen, Opening Night’s cast combines the Chicago-style improvisation of the iO and Second City with the Broadway stylings of Rodgers & Hammerstein, Gilbert & Sullivan, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Bob Fosse, and Edith Head. Occasionally, they also borrow the helicopter from Ms. Saigon. They usually give it back.

Starring: Shulie Cowen, Josh Funk, Andrew Melton, Derek Miller, Hilary Ryan, Norm Thoeming

Visit their website at: www.improvisedmusical.com $10 admission - go to their website for a 2 for 1 discount offer.

My good friend, Mike Descoteaux, heads this music program. His work is excellent and I can’t recommend training with him highly enough! His talent and teaching skills are unsurpassed. The class descriptions below come from www.secondcity.com. 

Musical Improv 1 (8 Weeks) - The first term focuses on improving musicianship and applying existing improv skills to this heightened genre through short-form musical games and techniques. There is one 45-minute performance at the end of the term.

Musical Improv 2 (8 Weeks) - While continuing to strengthen musicianship and improv skills, students are guided through longer and more challenging forms, such as musical montages and fully improvised musicals. There is one 45-minute performance at the end of the term.
Prerequisite: Completion of Musical Improv 1.

Musical Improv 3 (8 Weeks) - In Music Improv 3, students learn to employ confidently the concepts discovered in MI-1 and MI-2. Students explore and refine techniques through a wealth of hands-on exercises, games, and improvised musicals. In addition, this term focuses on instilling a command of musical theatre styles essential to creating strong parody. The experience and proficiency gained in MI-3 provides the necessary foundation for students to begin creating scripted material in MI-4.

Musical Improv 4 (8 Weeks) - This advanced eight-week course focuses on the process of creating a musical show that will run for four weeks in Donny’s Skybox Theater. It will feature both musical improvisation and musical scenes which are developed through improvisation. This will provide students with the opportunity to further refine their musical improv techniques and to test original material in front of an audience.
Prerequisite: Completion of Musical Improv 1, 2, & 3.

Larry Rosen is teaching Musical Improv Levels 1 and 2 at The Peoples Improv Theater in New York. He has many years of experience and a great reputation. He attended a signing event that I did at the Drama Book Shop several years ago, and was kind enough to give me a fascinating, personal tour of the city. We had fun discussing our lives in music, and I’m glad to be able to give his courses a shout here. Come and enjoy some training with a very cool, talented guy!

Here is an excerpt from their syllabus - register soon, as The PIT’s classes fill up fast.

Musical Improv Level 1

You don’t have to be a good singer to create great songs-on-the-spot. (In fact, you really don’t have to sing at all.) This class breaks down the fundamentals of songwriting and shows you how to use them to easily compose instant hits. Group games and exercises make for a safe, supportive and fun environment that will have you improvising everything from hip-hop to showtunes before you know it. The term will culminate in a show at The PIT for friends and family. Prior musical and improv training are not required for this course.

Instructor: Larry Rosen
January 25 to March 15 (8 weeks)

Musical Improv Level 2

Building on Musical Improv Level 1, this class continues to explore using the fundamentals of songwriting to create musicals on-the-spot. The term will culminate in a class show at The PIT for friends and family.

Instructor: Larry Rosen
January 25 to March 15 (8 weeks)

The Peoples Improv Theater
154 W. 29th St
New York, NY 10001
212-563-7488
http://www.thepit-nyc.com

This is the only organized training program in the world for musical directors working with live comedy - a truly invaluable opportunity for musicians to experience instruction and guided practice. At the same time, they become acquainted with everyone involved in the process of getting them on the road to gigs all over the U.S. and the world! I’m proud to say that my book, “Musical Direction for Improv and Sketch Comedy” is their text, and I hope to visit Chicago during 2009 to participate in the program and see it in action.

Check it out

SHOWSTOPPER! is a completely improvised musical in an exciting and innovative new format: a writer has just one hour to create a hit show with the help of the audience! Each night the crowd provides the actors and musicians with titles, themes and ideas from which they perform an entirely made-up musical.  Visit the website.

Dates: Nov 10,17,24;Dec 1,8,15,21(Xmas special);Jan 5,12,19;Feb 2,9,16,23;Mar 2
Time: 7:30pm to 9pm (doors 7:15pm)
Venue: King’s Head, 115 Upper St, Islington, London, N1 1QN
Cost: £10/£8
Box Office: Book tickets online here or phone the box office on 0844 412 2953.

Cast:

Chris Ash
Ruth Bratt
Dylan Emery
Pippa Evans
James Lovelock on Keyboards
Sean McCann
Adam Meggido
Philip Pellew
Oliver Senten
Nathan Taylor
Lucy Trodd

Friday, December 12th, 2008 at 8:00pm
Westside Eclectic Theater
1323-A Third Street Promenade, Santa Monica, CA 90405
(in the alley between 3rd and 4th, just south of Arizona)

$10.00 at the door

HNR was born from a shadowy tryst in the sordid summer of 2006, and has expanded to two separate casts that perform regularly in the Los Angeles, CA and Denver, Co areas. And we would love to perform for you. And that means exactly what you think it means.

Members:

Rebecca Blount
Tom Farnan
Marc Lessman
Scott Passarella
Venetia Pristavec
John Ruby
Mari Smookler
Stephen Wilder

Music by Andrew Melton 
Directed by Stephen Wilder

1. The song structure is solid as can be: verse/verse/bridge/verse. No meandering whatsoever.
2. “Won’t You Be My Koala?” (the thematic line) is placed at the top of each verse and left out of the bridge. This procedure is present in one of the games I teach students to play as they learn song structures.
3. This thematic line is explored and heightened throughout the song, never veered away from or abandoned.
4. Overall, the lyrics contain constant “relevant vocabulary” to the thematic line, which the audience finds clever and funny…nocturnal, tree, branches, pouch, marsupials…even “cuddle” qualifies. Koalas are cuddly!
5. The last line is tripled, with the final line slowing down to a finish - touchdown!

Finally, Jenny improvises a lovely melody from top to bottom - as if she weren’t busy thinking about anything else..if NONE of the preceding technical virtues of this improvised song were present, her absolute commitment and energy would have pleased the audience all by itself. (Conversely, take away the commitment and energy and we’d say, “hey that was pretty good.” But put it ALL together and it’s dynamite.)

Is Jenny a genius? Sure, but being an astute applicant of technigue didn’t hurt. In my book, “Musical Improv Comedy,” I quote one of my teachers, Dick Grove, who said “Craft liberates genius.” I love that.

WON’T YOU BE MY KOALA?
Based on the audience suggestion, “koala.”
Improvised by Jenny Wynters in the culminating performance of Michael Pollock’s musical improv intensive at The Second City Las Vegas

VERSE 1
Won’t you be my koala?
Come close and hold me tight
And then, show me that you’re nocturnal
When you keep me up all through the night

VERSE 2
Won’t you be my koala?
Just climb me like a tree
Explore all of my branches, baby
Come close and cuddle me - oh yeah

BRIDGE
I look into your eyes, my love
And I think, “What should I do?”
But then I just crawl inside your hairy pouch
And there’s nothin’ wrong we can do, oh baby

VERSE 3
Won’t you be my koala? Oh yeah
Come on and hold me close
‘Cos I’m the kind that loves marsupials
And it’s that that no one needs to know - oh no baby, it’s our secret
Oh, nobody needs to know - don’t tell ‘em, they’ll think it’s sick
Nobody needs to know

Please consider the following items and comment on any that you’d especially like to see on this site as it develops and grows:

INTERVIEWS with musical improv artists (beginners, pros, celebs … performers and musical accompanists.

ARTICLES about different aspects of musical improv, written by experts.

PHOTOS of musical improv ensembles and links to their websites.

VIDEOS of musical improv performances that shine.

RESOURCES such as contact information for musical improv accompanists everywhere.

NEWS of workshops, intensives, ongoing classes.

ANYTHING ELSE you can think of! We’re eager to respond to your creative input with flying colors.

1. A “preamble,” during which Lani fishes for a catchy idea that she can turn into a chorus. 
2. Then the “chorus” materializes, followed by 
3. A “spoken interlude” which launches cleanly into 
4. the recurrence of that chorus. 
5. A “bridge” section comes along and takes us climactically RIGHT back into a final section, 
6. the chorus. This time around, the chorus becomes a soaring conclusion to the song. Overall, it’s no particular “song form” or formula; it’s just the singer using great musical sense as she goes. And we enjoy hearing these defined sections go by. 

Lani has a beautiful sense of “arc.” The song lives just long enough, it remains interesting throughout, and seems complete when it’s over. The backbone of the whole thing: perfect use of a chorus. Lani wraps her talent around musical-improv classroom disciplines and the results are great!

A DOUBLE LATTE
(A Dash of Peppermint, and You)
Improvised by Lani Shipman, with Michael Pollock on piano
Based upon the audience suggestion: “Starbucks”

(PREAMBLE)

He works behind the counter at Starbucks
I see him every night at 6:15:23
I shuffle in, I look like crap, but he always smiles at me
And I say, “Good Morning, Jose”
I’ve never been popular
Elementary school was really hard
I was always playing alone
And no one gave me a Valen’ Day’s card
I’ve never been popular
High school was even worse
But then I met Jose
And that curse was lifted

(CHORUS)

I’ll take a double latte
With a dash of peppermint, and you
A double latte
And a dash of peppermint, and you
(SPOKEN INTERLUDE)
Okay, so I’ve been working at Xerox for like, five years
And I keep thinking, what am I gonna do, how am I gonna progress?
And then I meet Jose, and I decide - “That’s my ticket”

(CHORUS)

I’ll take a double latte
And a dash of peppermint, and you
A double latte
And a dash of peppermint, and you

(BRIDGE)

Then the day comes
When we walk down the aisle
And everybody’s got a little Starbucks cap
And a Starbucks apron on

(CHORUS)

Double latte
A dash of peppermint, and you
Double latte
And a dash of peppermint, and you
(Jason enters: …Miss Lani? Got your latte!

THE SECOND CITY LOS ANGELES TRAINING CENTER
Joshua Funk and Michael Pollock’s
Advanced Musical Improv Class
in performance

LANI SHIPMAN
sings a song based on the audience suggestion: “Starbucks”