<p>so you want to major in jazz, yet have no experience improvising? </p>
<p>If you want to practice the technique behind improvising over a tune, its pretty simple, here’s some strategies you can practice on any tune (for an audition like that and with your experience, where its not your prepared piece I’d recomend a blues like Blue Monk or All Blues or a tune like Autumn Leaves, Fly Me To The Moon or Blue Bossa).
First, practice comping the chords (playing the chords in a rhythmically tasteful manner with good voiceleading). Maybe try sticking to “block” voicings for now and work on great rhythmic inflection (1-5-3-7 and 1-3-7-(9, sometimes 13) are my go to easy voicings, and maybe you want to listen to players like Wynton Kelly, Bill Evans (whose known for using MUCH more intricate voicings, but whose rhythm is worth listening to) and Ahmad Jamal.
For soloing, I’d recomend transcribing (learning off the record, sometimes writing down) some players you like for vocabulary and time feel purposes. Any solo by Miles Davis on Kind of Blue won’t be too dificult, maybe try Wynton Kelly’s solo on Freddie Freeloader, its full of great bluesy lines and his feel is excellent. If your ear’s arent up to transcribing, start training them now (as there is an ear training test at the berklee audition, though it’s pretty easy) and maybe work on something out of a transcription book–like the charlie parker omnibook, or a book like Linear Harmony by Bert Ligon.
As for the aspect of ‘playing the changes’ when you improvise (which is exactly what it sounds like–playing lines where the harmonic motion of the tune can be heard without any accompaniment), take it slowly and easily. Sing everything you practice, and practice playing the roots of every chord of a tune (connecting them as best you can), to get them under your fingers and in your ears. Then do the same with the 3rds, then the fifths, then the sevenths, then eventually the 9ths (a major second up from the root), 11ths (a perfect fourth up from the root) and 13ths (a major sixth up from the root). Then practice playing the arpeggios from the root, third, fifth and seventh (both up and down, so 1-3-5-7, 3-5-7-1, 5-7-1-3, 7-1-3-5 and then 7-5-3-1, 1-7-5-3, 3-1-7-5 and 7-1-3-5) and eventually, running several chorus’s of the tune arpeggiating the changes and connecting the arpeggios by stepwise motion. After that, I’d suggest running solos against a metronome, first in whole notes, then half notes, then quarter notes, then eighth notes and, if you want 16th notes, eighth note triplets and quarter note triplets (comping for yourself if neccesary, but it’s easier to make sure your hitting every change without any acompaniment for me. If i hear a play along where the changes are being layed out for me, its often harder for me to make sure I’m hitting them perfectly). Once your comfortable with that, practice playing through the form, soloing over a certain amount of measures, and resting for the same (for example, soloing for two measures in steady eighth notes and resting for two, or three and three, four and four etc. you can also do uneven groups if this bores you, like 5 and 7, 3 and 4 to really make sure your keeping the form well).
If you practice a tune like that, and do some transcription; when you get to your audition you should be able to forget everything you’ve been practicing, forget about making changes and enjoy playing and interacting musically with your accompaniest.
It will definatly be an easier audition the second time around (though Berklee isn’t crazy hard to get into, but you also can’t walk right in). You know what your in for, and have another year to practice for it. I’d also suggest getting a jazz teacher (as in, a professional jazz musician who teaches, or better yet a professor of jazz studies at your university not a classical player who took a summer course on teaching jazz) and working with him or her to prepare yourself for your audition.</p>