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.