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Posts: 365
Location: NC | Number 1- Is there any secret to playing a Uke or do you just strum them and sing along?
Number 2- Does anyone know if there are professional musicians out there that don't read music but either play by ear or learn the piece by tab? I read tab and play it only......I am begining to understand some reading but will probably never really get the grasp.
Thank guys and gals.
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Posts: 9301
Location: south east Michigan | #1
Although I am just on the first step of the long spiritual journey to discover the uke within, I think the secret lies in a Zen like simplicity. The guy that plays uke at the open mic nights has a great singing voice. I think the uke fills in just enough to keep it from being accapella.
#2
Not even a clue. |
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Posts: 2246
Location: Yucaipa, California | ... Dona Klein, a member of my Church, is a masterful organist and a has several quality CDs on the market. She plays wonderfully. I was helping her set up one day and asked if she needed the Hymnal for the Opening Hymn... she said no thanks, I don't read music! It was only then that I noticed that her custom built organ doesn't even have a music holder on it!
Dona Klein Cd's (and others)
She can play ANYTHING just by ear.... where was I the day the talent was being handed out?... probably drooling over a banjo in the back room! :rolleyes: |
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Location: Upper Left USA | There was a time when nearly all of the furniture in my home and every birthday or Christmas present was purchased through a Hardware/Homeware stores such as Ernst or Kmart. This meant that there was no shortage of small pieces that needed to be assembled in a specific order, in a specific way, to be sucessfull.
The writer of the directions rarely spoke english as their first language!
I could:
A - set the directions aside and bluff my way through.
B - Use the pictures, when provided, and adhere to the spatial guidance.
C - Make a concentrated effort to follow the written directions regardless of wether or not I BELIEVED they would work.
D - Some combination of all of the above.
Musical notation and direction is that way for me. It is a foriegn set of instructions that I must plow through - unless I have heard the tune or had it played in front of me. It is still the language of our chosen art. You can get by, even rise to the top in some cases but it remains the language.
That's my theory and I'm stickin to it! |
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Location: Lake Hiawatha, New Jersey | I'm also in the early stages of learning to read music. My music teacher got me interested in music theory and I've kept up with it on my own. I must admit that it is difficult to do because you really need to go back to the very basics and start over again. It's a lot of work, but I want to do (and really understand) more than just strumming chords. Excuse me while I go back to plucking my single notes to "Aura Lee" and "Jingle Bells". Gotta start somewhere, right? |
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Location: SoCal | #2
Glen Campbell. Major studio player in the 60's (part of Wrecking Crew / Wall of Sound). Couldn't read a note. |
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Location: Capital District, NY, USA Minor Outlying Islands | #2
I heard BB King say words to the effect that he reads music only with great difficulty, but he can hand everyone in his band a piece and they can sight read it immediately. |
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Location: Midland, MI | I would be willing to bet that there are more 'name' musicians who can read music than there are those who can't. That does not preclude the latter from being great musicians, rather it makes their achievement more inspiring. At least to me.
I can sight read at the piano like nobody's business. That's the way I was taught. I can play the crap out of classical pieces, and even played in 'competition' when I was younger. I always got graded down, however, for lacking 'feeling.' I believe that had I been better grounded in the theory, and not just taught to play the notes as they appear, I could have 'swung' the pieces and maybe done better (not that I did poorly ).
My guitar instructor can read music, but writes stuff down for me in tab. Works for me. The amazing thing to me, though, is that we'll be discussing a genre and out of nowhere he'll say something like, 'Well, let's do a sixteen bar thing in Am, and on the second time through, make all the Vs into diminshed flat ninths and I'll comp over that with some notes out of the superlocriancalifragalistic mode, creating tension with some augmented thirds and then resolving back into the root, myxolodian, of course. Ready?' Then he'll rip off this amazing sounding stuff while I sit there stunned trying to think past the '...thing in Am' part and at the same time he's pointing out exactly what he's doing and urging me to, 'Join in with an Ebdim7aug9dec25 on the second downbeat of the next measure.' Yeah, right. How about we just pretend I'm taking lessons. I'll pay your rate, but I'll just use it as therapy and an excuse to get me out of the house.
My point being (hehe, betcha thought I didn't have one!), whether you know how to read music or not, you want to be able to play music. Does reading help? Definitely. Does knowing the theory help? Immensly. Can you make music without either? Absolutely. Whatever works for you.
Just my $0.02. :) |
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Location: south east Michigan | A good friend who plays piano can read music quite well. But he doesn't feel the music. |
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Location: Madison, Wisconsin | I've noticed the feel thing with the singers in our group. They can read perfectly and reproduce the notes with their voices usually first time through a piece but they have absolutely no feel to the music. Overall I would have to say that NOT being able to read has hindered my playing and singing which is why I'm starting to learn now. The #'s and b's can really screw you up if you not careful. |
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Location: SoCal | Matt Smith says that the key is "playing" music. It's play. But he also recommends learning how to read because that's the language of music.
I've been working on Bach's "Jesus, Joy of Man's Desiring" for church at Xmas, and possibly a concert in which our band is going play. I've found that I play better standing up with a strap on the guitar than I do sitting down. Standing allows me to move with the music. Probably make one helluva an interesting sight to people who are used to classical guitarist's sitting very prim and proper.
Also drive people like Wong nuts because I play it on a Country Artist and use a flat pick and fingers. |
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Location: Upper Left USA | "They can read perfectly and reproduce the notes with their voices usually first time through a piece but they have absolutely no feel to the music"
Try introducing a Mac Powell or Third Day song to a group of Sight Readers! Some tunes require a lot of "feel" to carry them through.
And in comparison I have frustrated many a note reader with what I thought I heard from the radio!
There needs to be a healthy balance in there somewhere. |
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Location: NJ | Lemme get this straight . . .
. . . y'got a bunch of people singing in church without "feeling" the music . . . ? ?
"White people" . . . . go figya'! . . .
Helpful Hint:
Never underestimate the power of a half a joint . . . |
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Location: Upper Left USA | Cliff,
You know that not much is being said about CRD, or Caucasian Rythmic Dysfuntion these days. What with the upcoming elections and all, they are, frankly, afraid to step forward.
Of course, figuring out which foot to step out with may be part of the problem! :eek:
No problem in my lineage though, several of my forefathers and foremothers were either traded for blankets or given the choice of emmigration or death. Viva la diversity! |
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Location: Lake Hiawatha, New Jersey | "Ebdim7aug9dec25"
I busted a gut on this one!
Johnny |
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Posts: 14127
Location: 6 String Ranch | I can't read music, but slowly I can translate those little dots to letter notes and then figure out where they are on the fretboard. The sharps and flats usually just fu#@ everything up and I go back to playing something I already know.
Lots of really good pros can't read music but Matt Smith is right. So there you have it, it can work both ways. |
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Location: Florida | I've known two people who could do that... play anything by ear. Hear it once and get it just about perfect, hear it a few times and without "working it out" they had it all down... it just was amazing.
One of those guys was the theory teacher we had in high school, the other was Ray Lyon, an very accomplished jazz keyboard artist, studio owner, and producer. |
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Posts: 863
Location: Central Florida | I can read a chord chart, but that's about it. Frankly, it hasn't hindered my playing all that much that I can tell. Would love to be able to read, but I don't have the patience nor the discipline to go back to square one at this point. Besides, I figure those of us that don't read are in pretty good company. As Paul M mentioned, Glen Campbell can't read a lick; and regardless of whether or not you care for his music, as a player, they don't hardly come any better. BTW, I know four other well known guys that couldn't read a note; their names are John, Paul, George and Ringo! Like I said, not bad company...
Jeff |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | I love this subject, and as Scott has said, I tend to pontificate at these hours of the AM, but I am tired so I will come to the point.
My brother was a contest winning fiddle player who could play guitar and accordian and fiddle by ear well enough to work in a house band at a Cleveland TV station that hosted many country stars. He confided in me in great secrecy (he's dead now, so it won't bother him) that he took violin lessons from our home town violin teacher in the early 60's, a man we would generally consider not too manly, and it was worth the time and money he spent because of the improvement in theory and technique. It is probably why he could be a featured player with the Erie, PA symphony orchestra when they wanted to venture into folk/bluegrass before he died.
Bailey |
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June 2004
Posts: 365
Location: NC | I am trying to learn it.............got to admit, getting numbered tab for all my sheet music on a piece I want to learn is easiset and quite frankly I like it. Immediate reproduction for me. Anyone know where I can get some great X-Mas music in numbered tab for easy playing to cheer up the holiday season? I will keep trying to learn it...... :D |
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Posts: 2246
Location: Yucaipa, California | ... if you can manage it, at least learn to read/play a single melody line... add that line to your fingerpicking and watch the eyebrows raise... you will sound just like a banjoist! :cool: :rolleyes: |
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Location: Midland, MI | The only problem I have with tab is that it doesn't provide tempo/pacing/note duration whatever you want to call it. At least I haven't been able to figure it out from tab.
If I don't already know the tune, I have to go and get a copy of it somewhere so I can emulate the rhythm. This is why I like sheet music that has regular notation as well as tab. I get the easy fingering from tab and the other stuff from the notation.
As far as tab sources, you can try OLGA, the Online Guitar Archive or Powertabs Archive. For the Powertabs, though, you'll need the free Powertab program. I have also had some success with MIDI files (SMF). I find that I can bring them into Sonar, switch into piano roll view, turn on the tab display, then print out 'sheet music' that has both notation and tab. This has the added benefit that I can then play back the MIDI file, either from the PC or from the PocketStudio and play along with what I have in front of me. Unfortunately, it's hit or miss on the quality of the MIDI files. |
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May 2004
Posts: 295
Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada | My mother was taught piano in her youth, and so knows theory and can read music. However, recently when we were talking music I was surprised, if not flabbergasted, to learn she can't play without music in front of her to read. I, of course, am just the opposite - no formal training, can't read a note.
It just seems so hard to believe - that someone can't play unless they have written music to guide their fingers. |
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2 Questions?
