Improvisations in jazz is done over the song itself, typically. However, I don’t hear the theme in plenty of recordings, the harmonies and solo are so far away that I can’t see the connection to the theme that they’re soloing over.

When I play myself, solo piano, I run into the same problem. I lose track of the theme and the improvisation typically becomes some kind of abstract mess that ends in confusion, heh. How do I clean this up? How do I make sure I don’t lose the “frame”?