Reading music without guitar
Antal Abel
Rather than just sit there, I thought I could do something more useful
with my time. I'm trying to working on my reading lately, so I just
open a page on a few guitar books I own and try to imagine what I
would play and I go without stopping.
Now I'm wondering, has anyone ever done this and has it made a big
impact on your reading? I feel like my sight reading skills are
improving and my ability to read up in 7th or 9th position is getting
better. I've gotten pretty obsessed with doing this, any music I see,
I'll be thinking on how I would play that and what It would sound
like.
Anyone go through phases like this? How beneficial was it?
Thanks
ThirtyOne
I did something like this when I was first trying to improve my
reading and fretboard knowledge. I made flashcards with four bars of
music on one side and the tab on the other. Then on my lunch break I
would go through the cards and write out the tab and check my answers.
It helped me, but it sounds like you are already way beyond that.
Another thing I do away from the guitar is use ear training software.
Greger Hoel
> Another thing I do away from the guitar is use ear training software.
Such as?
--
Sendt med Operas revolusjonerende e-postprogram: http://www.opera.com/mail/
tonyde...@gmail.com
Next thing you will realize is that you can *write* music without the
instrument where ever you may be on the planet. Just be sure to bring
a writing tool while asking for extra napkins. And if you dig a little
harder, you will be able to improvise in your head while seeing
yourself execute the notes on your axe. You can thus write *those*
notes down, as well. With a little chutzpah almost anything may become
second nature. There is just no end to it all.
-TD
ThirtyOne
<greg...@spameggssausagespamandsparm.crap> wrote:
> På Sat, 10 May 2008 14:59:13 +0200, skrev ThirtyOne <lrouf...@yahoo.com>:
>
> > Another thing I do away from the guitar is use ear training software.
>
> Such as?
>
> --
> Sendt med Operas revolusjonerende e-postprogram:http://www.opera.com/mail/
I use Functional Ear Trainer from here: www.miles.be
charles robinson
"Antal Abel" <antal...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:325b7e44-f34e-44ed...@26g2000hsk.googlegroups.com...
One that starts happening if you do that a lot is that you will begin to
hear the music without playing the guitar. It happened for me with things
written in the key of C at first. I didn't realize it until I was looking
through a classical guitar book in a store and started humming what was
written.
Charlie
KenK
Hi Antal,
I"m working on classical guitar, a lot of people in the cg world
recommend reading
w/o a guitar not only to improve your reading, but also as a way to
learn pieces.
The people who do this swear by it.
I tried it w/ 2 pieces over a 3 day vacation when I didn't bring a
guitar.
It worked pretty well. Learning entire pieces w/o th instrument is
something I should do more of, but I haven't tried it since.
I regularly read scores w/o guitar to memorize scores or as a kind of
pre-read study, but I haven't tried the intense visualization needed
to actually learn a piece that way.
I should make it a regular thing.
I could only help.
KenK
Joey Goldstein
Yep. That's all good to do.
Try to be as specific as you can about what you're visualizing.
What finger (finger stretch or no?), what fret (fret number and position
number?), string dampening (with left hand or right hand), up stroke or
down stroke (to sweep/rake or not?), what's the thumb doing?, etc., etc.
I used to do this type of stuff poolside, when I was taking my
correspondence lessons with Charlie Banacos and trying to work out
fingerings for his "non-tertian bi-tonal pendulums" (God I love saying
that) while I was on vacation and was away from the guitar.
When I finally had the guitar in my hands, I couldn't simply nail the
pattern and play it perfectly (he had me playing some hard patterns),
but they did come a lot faster than if I had never done the
visualization work.
I find that when I do this though, that I have to wiggle my fingers
around in the air in mock fingerings. At the pool I could hide my hand
underneath the cot. I might have looked like a psycho if I was doing
that on a bus though. Bring a newspaper and cover it over your lap?
Hmmm. They might think you're doing doing something even weirder then.
--
Joey Goldstein
<http://www.joeygoldstein.com>
<http://homepage.mac.com/josephgoldstein/AudioClips/audio.htm>
joegold AT sympatico DOT ca
Joe Finn
news:325b7e44-f34e-44ed...@26g2000hsk.googlegroups.com...
This is a basic musicianship issue apart from your guitar playing, or
playing any other instrument. A lot of students are required to take lessons
in sight singing. This is engineered in such a way that it will gradually
improve the student's ability to recognize intervals and rhythm patterns and
sing them at sight. It is very beneficial regardless of what instrument the
student plays.
So by all means continue with what you are doing. It will make you a better
musician. ....joe
--
Visit me on the web www.JoeFinn.net
Gerry
> So to get to my work I gotta take an hour and a half long bus ride.
> Rather than just sit there, I thought I could do something more useful
> with my time. I'm trying to working on my reading lately, so I just
> open a page on a few guitar books I own and try to imagine what I
> would play and I go without stopping.
>
> Now I'm wondering, has anyone ever done this and has it made a big
> impact on your reading?
Oh yeah. I have championed this approach forever.
> I feel like my sight reading skills are improving and my ability to
> read up in 7th or 9th position is getting
> better. I've gotten pretty obsessed with doing this, any music I see,
> I'll be thinking on how I would play that and what It would sound
> like.
The first time, I too was stuck on a bus for about 2 hours a day. I
was reading clarinet etudes. Bought the Bona rhythmic etudes but at
that time they were too much for me, so I went back to clarinet. I
could feel my reading chops come up. One of the best experiences for
me. I did use the Bona etudes and got some use out of them, by the
way, but at that time it was only for tapping out the rhythm.
A couple of years later I was stucking *driving* a bus for about three
months. I drove a school bus to and from a college campus from an
apartment complex once an hour. I drove to campus, waited 20 minutes.
Drove back, waited 20 minutes. All day. Most of my day was waiting. I
got a Hohner Melodica, which is configured like a keyboard. I would
play bop heads out of a fake book while waiting. When the bus began
fill up, I stopped suppling air, and would only finger the pieces.
Another great reading experience.
The next year I got a job as a janitor at the school during the
evenings and worked unattended. In reality most of my time was spent
holed-up on the janitor's closet practicing the clarinet. Late one
night Lefty, the main janitor over about 6 buildings, opened the door
to my room while I was playing. He shook his head and said, "Damn that
sounds really good".
"Thanks, Lefty." A pause.
"You're fired." Another long pause. "You should thank me again."
"Hey, thanks."
We then talked about clarinet and alto sax for about an hour. Turned
out he had bought an alto about three years before but couldn't figure
out how to play it.
--
Dogmatism kills jazz. Iconoclasm kills rock. Rock dulls scissors.
Joe Finn
>
> ................ I got a job as a janitor at the school during the
> holed-up on the janitor's closet practicing the clarinet. Late one night
> Lefty, the main janitor over about 6 buildings, opened the door to my room
> while I was playing. He shook his head and said, "Damn that sounds really
> good".
> "Thanks, Lefty." A pause.
> "You're fired." Another long pause. "You should thank me again."
> "Hey, thanks."
> We then talked about clarinet and alto sax for about an hour. Turned out
> he had bought an alto about three years before but couldn't figure out how
> to play it.
That's a great story!! Thanks, Gerry!! ........joe
rpjazz...@gmail.com
A well known chromatic harmonica player told me that he used to
practice on BART (commuter railway in SF). He said he could practice
so quietly that it didn't bother anybody.
Another idea: a small portable electronic keyboard with headphones.
Or a laptop with ear training software (I use earmaster and it's
helped).
BIAB or G7 could be useful away from the guitar in several ways.
In terms of pencil and paper, the most it's helped me is in figuring
out fingerings to chord melody arrangements that are written out in
standard notation. Sometimes it takes a while to figure out how the
stuff was fingered, even with the little finger numbers.
pth...@optonline.net
> Anyone go through phases like this? How beneficial was it?
one who can look at a piece of sheet music and 'hear it', tell how it
sounded and be able to sing the melody, play out the rhythms under
stand the orchestration ect.” All with out picking up and instrument.
Yes his standers were high.
tonyde...@gmail.com
>
> - Show quoted text -
At least you had a pool. Some kids had to mock fingerings in front of
the fire hydrant. I am sure that had an interesting affect on them
polytonal quartals.
-TD
ThirtyOne
<greg...@spameggssausagespamandsparm.crap> wrote:
>
> > Another thing I do away from the guitar is use ear training software.
>
> Such as?
>
> --
> Sendt med Operas revolusjonerende e-postprogram:http://www.opera.com/mail/
I have an ipod touch and I am interested in what these guys are
doing. Not really practical but I think I could waste some time on a
bus tinkering with it:
rpjazz...@gmail.com
a Chico Pinheiro tune, Samba De Gaucho, when I thought about your
post.
Now I wish I had a couple of hours on a train.
Oversimplified:
Fm6 / G7alt /
F#7#11 Fm6/9
D7alt / G7alt /
Suppose you take each one of these chords as being from melodic minor
harmony. That means, for example,
that Fm6 can be played as Fmin/maj Gsusb9 Abmaj7#5 etc all they way to
Ealt. All the same chord.
Same type of thing for the others.
What I'm working on is getting a reasonable selection of these
voicings together in every key. There's a couple of hours of pencil,
paper and thought.
Stephen Calder
I have experienced using visualisation -- not the right word because it
involves "feeling" it (imagining muscular movement) as well -- to
practice without an instrument, and then finding it much easier to play
a difficult passage.
Studies have shown that this kind of "imaginary" practice in which
perfect performance is envisioned can be as useful as actual practice in
improving performance in athletes and sportsmen.
--
Stephen
Ballina, Australia
Jonathan
It supposedly worked for Glenn Gould.
I think he claimed to have practiced mostly away from the
piano...through mental visualization.
tonyde...@gmail.com
>
> - Show quoted text -
It works.
-TD
Des Higgins
I would be open about it. If you try to hide it, you will look
furtive and weird. I saw a guy a few months ago on the train reading
music and fingering furiously. I guessed he was fingering an alto sax
from the actions. It looked very impressive and he blithely ignored
everyone. I guess guitar might look like air guitar playing if you
are not careful.
Anyway, this is all good to hear. I am going through the Bach 2 part
inventions book (Galbraith/Aebersold) with my teacher; they are a wall
of 16th notes and I have only managed to get through the first part of
the first one so far and reading it in bed helps a lot (I wait until
the missus is asleep before doing the fingerings; otherwise, she finds
it distracting.
Des
>
> --
> Joey Goldstein
> <http://www.joeygoldstein.com>
> <http://homepage.mac.com/josephgoldstein/AudioClips/audio.htm>
> joegold AT sympatico DOT ca- Hide quoted text -
tonyde...@gmail.com
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Why that? I practice that way with my eyes closed and without moving a
muscle. Same thing with reading without the axe, although I tend to
keep my eyes open. The whole idea is to do it unanimated (hands at
your side or fork/spooning spaghetti). It also makes a champ form of
meditation.
-TD
RickH
Here you go, if the link below does not work, just google the word
shredneck, samash has them.
Fuzztone, Ammo
my custom Staff-and-Tab manuscript paper and a pencil with a big
eraser on it. ;-)
My top student was looking for suggestions on Tapping technique. He
reads Tab very well, but is mystified about note names, intervals,
scales and staff reading.
I designed four exercises for him with examples of Seventh intervals,
tenths in two octaves, Tritone patterns and Dominant chords. One page
(five double staves) with notes on staff, fingerings on Tab, text,
chord blocks, examples, etc. Took me five hours.
He practices all the time with Guitar Pro, I think it's called, and
the last exercise I produced use Finale, with staff and tab and chord
blocks was identical, he says, to the kind of chart that his music
program makes for him. So I'm hoping he will respond to this page I've
written out for him.
The best response would be if he started writing out his own
discoveries using the custom staff-and-tab manuscript paper that I
designed for him.
Ammo
maxle...@gmail.com
I'm reading a book by Oliver Sachs, Musicophilia, and he says Yes, big
time, as to being useful. Sachs plays good piano, too, so he's hip,
quite apart from quartering cerebelli.
Des Higgins
ok; I will try that!
Ta
Des
Des Higgins
Was he the bloke who wrote "The Man who mistook his wife for a
diminished arpeggio"?
The human mind is a strange place.
Des
patmp...@gmail.com
Sometimes it is more useful. There was once a windsurfing maneuver I
wanted to learn that I could not do. On a vacation away from the
board I did it in my mind over and over. First I would fall in
imagination, gradually it improved. When I got back to the real board
I could do it. So it was better than doing it wrong over and over.
I've read something by a surfing champ (Tom Carroll?) where he said he
spends about all his time away from the board thinking about surfing.
I had my basses stolen and didn't play for three years. I didn't mind
because I was sick of my own sound anyway. I went into a shop looking
for a keyboard and gave a bass a try and I was so much better than I
had been that I bought the thing. All the cliches I'd been stuck in
a rut with were gone.
I have taken up keyboard and flute and must say that it is much easier
to read music with those instruments. I think my keyboard single note
reading is already better than it is on bass. The hardest though is
to sight read some random notes like twelve tone with voice. I doubt
I shall ever put in the effort to learn that.