The non-jazz improvisation series is a concept that germinated in Dick Weissman's mind while he was attending music school. He wrote a 15-piece arrangement of the old square dance tune, Cripple Creek, and wanted the trombone to take a solo as part of the arrangement. When the trombonist kept playing a bebop solo that was totally unsuitable for the chart, Dick realized that - in addition to the many musicians who do not improvise - there are even jazz musicians who don't know how to improvise outside the limits of their own stylistic backgrounds. The non-jazz improvisation series mostly includes new original tunes that are intended to show how to improvise in many musical styles, including;

* Blues
* Country
* American folk
* Latin-American
* World music including South American, Eastern European and Asian
* Odd meters (playing in a variety of time signatures)
* New Age
* Classical
* Folk-Rock

In short, the books are an encyclopedia of virtually every musical style, excluding jazz. Includes access to online audio.

What you should know before starting this book

Part 1- Techniques of Improvisation

Getting started
Grace notes
Double, triple, and quadruple grace notes
Mordents. turns, and thrills
Neighbor notes, upper and lower neighbor notes
Passing tones, diatonic
Passing tones, chromatic
Slides
Tremolo
Improvising with Melodies (Summing Up)
A Bit of Music Theory
Major scales
Improvising with major scales
Jingle Bells
Minor scales: Harmonic minor scales
Improvising with harmonic minor scales
Melodic minor scales
Improvising with melodic minor scales
Improvsiing with modes
Ionian mode: Ionian Item
Dorian mode: The Drunken Sailor
Phrygian mode: The Spanish Tinge
Lydian mode: Lydia's Lunch
Mixolydian Mode: Old Joe Clark
Aeolian mode: Shady Grove
Locrian mode: Transposing modes
Specialty scales: D minor hexachord: Pretty Polly
Pentatonic scale on F: Oh Susanna (part 1)
Pentatonic scales on C: Shortin' Bread
Tetrachord: In the Pines
Doulbe stops
Improvsising with double stops: Just Lopin' Along
Double stops: The Missouri Waltz
Using an open tring as a drone: Black-Eyed Susie
Improvising with Chords
Common major chords
Common minor chords
Common seventh chords
Improvising with chords

Part 2- Tunes and Styles

Country and Western
Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie
Railroad Bill
Country waltz: Beautiful Brown Eyes

Bluegrass Fiddle
The Eighth of January
Hammering on
Little Maggie
John Hardy
Banks of the Ohio

Cajun Music
Pardon My French

Celtic (Irish) Music
The Irish Washerwoman
Straight Jig
Danny Boy

American Folk Music
Wildwood Flower
Sweet Betsy from Pike
Fly Around, My Pretty Little Miss

Ragtime
Temptation Rag

Gospel
White Gospel: Will the Circle Be Unbroken
Black Gospel: Wade in the Water

The Blues
Blues progressions
Blues scales
Blues in G
Pizzicato Boogie
Pitch Bending
Rockin' the Blues

Odd Meters
5/4, 7/8, 9/8
Five Times Four
The Other Bela
Odyssey in 9/8

Exotic scales
Whole tone scale
Klezmer Music: Misherabach: Chosen Kalle Mazel Tov
Klezmer Music: Harmonic minor: Havah Nagilah
Fraigish or Greek scale: Goodbye to Piraeus
Gypsy scale: Gypsy Fantasy
Gyspy scale: At the Gypsy Caravan
Scottish music: Highland Fling
Rumanian music: Horra
Palestinian music: Artsa Alinu
Japanese scale: The Geisha's Lament, Chinese scale: The Golden Bell

Rock and Roll
The I VI II V progression in C
The I VI II V progression in G
Back to the Fifties
The boogaloo or double-time feel

Disco
Disco Daze

Country and Folk Rock
Nevada Motels

The A tuning
Rye Whiskey
Lost Indian
Sally Goodin' 
Amazing Grace
Playing with other people
Planning your arrangements
Developing an origional Style
Fiddle Books of Interest
Fiddle Recordings of Interest
Dick Weissman
Dan Fox