I was put through piano lessons when I was a kid. I say 'put through' because it was fun and I loved it, and it's been beneficial now, but it was difficult because, although I can read music, I much prefer just playing and improvising and at least finding my own way to play an instrument.

Jack Garratt

But one of the things I learned from improvising is that all of life is an improvisation, whether you like it or not. Some of the greatest scientific discoveries of the 20th century came out of people dropping things.

Alan Arkin

I don't like improvising on camera, particularly, but very often, a scene will not be working, and you rehearse it once or twice, and you realize something's missing. So I'll play with it until it makes sense.

Alan Arkin

All improv turns into anger. All comedy improv basically turns into anger, because that's all people know how to do when they're improvising. If you notice shows that are improvising are generally people yelling at each other.

Albert Brooks

There are very few actors who are truly good at improvising; that's a real skill.

Alex Kurtzman

If the same phrase in the same place created the right effect, I was perfectly prepared to use it every time. I wasn't worried that I wasn't improvising.

Alexis Korner

I love food and am very good at improvising when preparing it - it's a really creative experience for me.

Autumn Reeser

Jazz vision is the fusion of music and art a real paradox of same-yet different. Here we play in exchanges, like the hardness of the key of c# major and from the softness of Db major - capturing, reflecting and improvising.

Barbara Januszkiewicz

When I do the roles, when I'm in the room and auditioning, I'll ask the director if they're cool with me adding stuff, or just improvising while we're doing it. And I would say, like, 90 percent of the time, they say, 'Absolutely.'

Ben Schwartz

Yeah, improvising only really works 100% when you're with somebody.

Bill Hader

In the U.S., it's like, you start with a great script, and then on set - not everybody, but definitely in the Apatow group - you go off, and you're improvising on camera. So while you're on camera, you're saying things that no one else has ever heard before during the actual take.

Bill Hader

Even when I was in school shows, in elementary school doing plays, I'd always go off book and start improvising.

Billy Crystal

Every day, you have to make three hours of music, just randomly improvising, and that's a great way to weed stuff out.

Caroline Shaw

When you're writing, you're putting thought into what you want to express, and then you come up with it - it comes to you. When you're improvising, it's the same thing. You're writing. You just say it out loud right then, instead of saying, 'You think this might work?'

Catherine O'Hara

The Chili Peppers do a lot of improvising, but it's within the framework of song structures. The Meatbats is from a purely instrumental standpoint. But when you hear the term 'instrumental music' you think it's real serious stuff and everybody's playing a million notes and it's about playing fast. That's not what we do.

Chad Smith

I think it's very important to live in the present. One of the great things that improvising teaches you is the magic of the moment that you're in because, when you improvise, you're in right now. You're not in yesterday or tomorrow - you're right in the moment.

Charlie Haden

Improvising is writing, too - there was no music and now there's music. So that's composition. And any time you take any sort of a performance liberty, you're making a compositional choice. I don't know a serious performer who hasn't made compositional decisions, who hasn't engaged in the art of composition.

Chris Thile

I came up with a 'forecasting cell,' which is basically a mixed intention cell or chord that is a complete hybrid of a consonance and a dissonance, and what that does when you are improvising is lead you to where you are supposed to go.

Christian Scott

Improvising is wonderful. But, the thing is that you cannot improvise unless you know exactly what you're doing. That's a kind of paradoxical thing about improvising.

Christopher Walken

No, improvising is wonderful. But, the thing is that you cannot improvise unless you know exactly what you're doing.

Christopher Walken

When I'm on stage, it's a little world I've created where I'm sort of the thing, so I have total control over everything that happens. When we're improvising, I'm with someone I totally trust. I know things are going to work out. I don't have those guarantees in life. There are no consequences on stage.

Colin Mochrie