1. Play lick #1 along with the Blues MIDI file below. Play using any rhythm that you feel fits the music, but play only the notes of the lick in the order that they are written. Then do the same with lick #2. Make sure that you end your phrase on the last note of the lick. Listen to the example to the right. It's a MIDI file and lacks a little soul...but you'll get the idea.

2. Once you feel comfortable with playing the lick as written, try playing any note more than once. Still only use the notes of the lick in the order that they are written. Listen to the example to the right.

3. Next you can repeat any part of the lick. Think of the lick as a journey to the destination of the last note. You can repeat parts of the journey, but just remember that your ultimate goal is to reach that last note. So do not play the notes of the lick backwards yet because your goal is not the first note, it's the last one. Listen to the example to the right.

Put all of these things together and you will be surprised just how much music can come out of just a couple of small ideas.

Be as creative as possible within these limitations. Remember that you are practicing improvisation. When you are practicing, you are working on a specific idea. The idea here is to play only two licks in as many different variations as possible. Even when you feel that you have exhausted every possibility, keep going.

Once you have practiced the steps above, make sure that you spend some time just exploring the minor pentatonic scale on your own. Try adding notes to the two basic licks. If it doesn't sound good try not to play it again. If it does sound good, try to remember what you did.

The next step will be to learn more licks and mutate them in the same way. There is definitely more to learning how to improvise than learning a bunch of licks, but this is a good place to start.