Popular pieces such as "Maple Leaf Rag" gradually had their melodic lines replaced with various clever riffs, and their bass patterns became more melodic.

Tonight she improvised frequently, playing jazzy harmonies and clever riffs, allowing the music to carry itself, the notes soaring and regrouping, then flying to risky altitudes.

He is a shrewd satirist, and manages to enliven the familiar investigative process of chasing down leads with some truly clever riffs on everything from comedy clubs to modeling agencies.

A few adventurous souls run clever riffs on the trite and true.

American chefs and foodies flooded it this summer for Mr. Adria's parade of tiny courses, his clever riffs on tapas and his outrageous pairings like bone marrow and caviar.

One reads "Lingerie," the other "Earplugs," a reference to the variety of items stocked at Target and a clever riff on city living.

It was toasted circles of brioche (which he had baked), topped with a quail's egg and caviar, a clever riff on three eggs: chicken, quail and sturgeon.

DVD Movie Guide's Colin Jacobson characterized "Trapper Keeper" as "a clever riff" on Terminator and the controversy of the 2000 election.

What makes "Well" much more than a clever, deconstructed theatrical riff is the way it keeps surprising itself with glimpses of an emotional depth, both murky and luminous, that goes beyond any tidy narrative.

There are broad satires on modern life, relentlessly splenetic opinions and clever linguistic riffs that he may well have included for his own amusement.