The Improviser · Lesson 4 — Bad Phrases ← Course

Bad phrases — garbage in, garbage out.

The player copies your example phrases faithfully — including their wrong notes and their mess.

Example phrases are powerful precisely because the model imitates them. But imitation cuts both ways: a shown example is copied more literally than a written instruction is obeyed, and the model never stops to check whether your phrases are any good.

Show it phrases written in three different styles and its answer comes out in three different styles. Show it one phrase that resolves to a wrong note, and it will confidently land on the same wrong note over a fresh chord. The model is not judging your examples — it is following them.

This is the flip side of the whole lesson: garbage in, garbage out. Clean, consistent, in-key phrases give clean, consistent, in-key answers. Sloppy or wrong ones give exactly that back.

Feed the player three kinds of example phrases — clean, messy, and one with a wrong note — then ask it the same chord and hear its answer pick up whatever you put in.

Same chord each time — over C, resolve it. Change the quality of the example phrases and hear the answer follow.
the example phrases you show
↓ then the same chord: “over C — resolve it” ↓
the player's answer

It imitates — it doesn't audit.

The answer is drawn straight from the shape of the example phrases. Nothing in the code checks that they are in key or consistent — that part is on you. 


      

    


    

      
Garbage in, garbage out.

      

        Example phrases are instructions by demonstration, and the model is a faithful
        mimic. Inconsistent phrases make ragged answers; a single wrong note teaches a
        wrong resolution the model will repeat with full confidence. It copies a mistake
        as happily as a good line.
      

      

        Treat your example phrases like code you are shipping: keep them in key, keep them
        in one consistent shape, and read them twice. A few clean phrases beat a pile of
        sloppy ones every time.
      


      

        
Quick check · your ear

        
One of your example phrases resolved to F#, out of key over C. What happened to the player's answer?

        

          
          
          
        

        

      


      

        Next: the maths →
        
      

    


  


  

    

      ▸ Go deeper — keeping example phrases clean optional
      

        
It imitates, it does not evaluate

        

          A model has no way to know that one of your phrases lands on a wrong note. To it,
          every example is simply “this is how it is played.” It will reproduce a clam
          with the same confidence as an in-key line — often more, because the example
          made the wrong resolution look normal.
        

        
One bad phrase poisons the pattern

        

          It only takes a single out-of-key example to bend the whole phrase. When
          few-shot answers come out sour, the first thing to check is not the model or
          the wording — it is whether one of your phrases is quietly wrong.
        

        
Consistency is reliability

        

          If you want answers in a fixed shape, every phrase must be in that exact shape:
          same notation, same spacing, same style. Any variation you play becomes
          variation you hear back. Uniform examples are the cheapest reliability you can
          buy.
        

        
Review phrases like code

        

          Because example phrases steer the playing as strongly as instructions do, they
          deserve the same care: version them, review them, and test the prompt after
          changing them. This is where good prompting quietly turns into the discipline
          of checking your phrases against the takes you already know are right — a habit
          the course leans on much later.