Playing from sheet/book music?

Jaim Zuber · Post by **Jaim Zuber** » 1 Dec 2005 5:37 pm

David,

You are greatly overestimating how hard it is to recognize intervals (in any key) in standard notation. As Randy Beavers mentioned, it's not hard if you know where the root note is. I learned this from a theory workbook my piano teacher made me study (probably in 3rd grade).

If you know how to get those intervals from a root note on the steel, you can put the two together.

You say it's possible in C, but it's not really any harder in G on the steel.

Think of a G Major 7 chord. It looks the same as a C Major 7 two lines up. The Key Signature (one sharp) takes care of the accidental and you treat the notated F as a Major 7th (the notated F is a F# when played).

If you switch to a Gb Major 7 chord (one of the hardest keys), the notation is exactly the same as the G Major 7 (although the key signature now has 6 flats). A piano player has to remember what notes are flatted to play this, we just move the bar one fret lower.

Hope this makes sense. I wish I could read as well as I can explain it. I better get to practicing. I get to see Dale Watson tonight, first time he's played here in years.

Michael Garnett · Post by **Michael Garnett** » 2 Dec 2005 1:47 am

David-

How do you know that most people that read music can't play by ear? They can't transpose spontaneously? Why not? Because they're not trained to, or because the thought hadn't occured to them? Give a player a lick. Then tell him to play the exact same thing up a step. There's a spontaneous transposition. It's ridiculous to think that any competent player couldn't do that. Besides, they've already done the hard part, which is learn to read in any key.

One universal key? Then I propose it should be Bb, since that's the note at which black holes and the entire universe reverberates. Also, why would you think C/Am would work best for steel players? Most steel guitars are tuned to E. Is four sharps just too hard to read? Oh, and by the way, that's the key signature of C# minor for ol' Rachmaninoff. Next time you see him, can you ask him to please pay back that $20 he owes me?

I was just playing the devil's advocate here, what happens if the piece (in our mythical 'C' notation, transposed somewhere else) lays out on the guitar in a place where the tone and voicing are completely off from the rest of the ensemble, or simply impossible because you run out of frets to the left? What does our picker do now since we've robbed him of the trained ear, plus the ability, desire, and knowledge to try to find the lick somewhere else?

Also, I'm really having trouble following the part about having keyless intervals in the key of C. Every interval is keyless, it's part of the definition of the term. How far two notes are apart. Major, minor, perfect, augmented, diminished. They're all the same, regardless of key. What's your point?

P.S. - I know the part about Rachmaninoff was meant as a joke and to point out that you actually know something about music. But think about what ol' Rach would say. (I can call him 'Rach' because he owes me money.) Rach would say, "Why don't you just learn to read music? And why the heck are you changing my piece to A minor? And what the heck is that contraption you're playing?"

Boy that ol' Serg was a great guy, huh? And, yes, just "capoing" up to a fret is still copping out.

-MG

Also interesting are the synonyms for capo. The first two I could find were "Crutch" and "Cheater".[This message was edited by Michael Garnett on 02 December 2005 at 01:59 AM.]

David Mason · Post by **David Mason** » 2 Dec 2005 3:52 am

I see intervals too, as do trillions of six-string guitar players who know anything about playing out of box positions. Reading is just another skill, however, and it's not the anti-box skill, and it's not the satanically-anti-ear skill either. When you learn to read, you will not automatically lose your ear-playing skills and be relegated to playing only toot-toot tunes off of sheet music the rest of your life! When you read music you see intervals too, you just see them on the page. Amazingly enough, those intervals on the page correspond exactly to the intervals on your instrument! Funny how that works.

My father played trumpet and he could play any song in any key, transposing off a lead sheet in any key, on the fly. He came up in the big-band era, played his way through WWII in the premier army band, and I gather that particular skill was both highly thought of and quite necessary for a top-flight horn player of that time.* I think there's even some hints on how to do this on John McGann's site? That skill has just got to be a piece of cake for a guitarist or steel player, compared to horn or woodwind fingerings (though, I sure can't do it...

) You just move the box up, right? My point being, you will inevitably get better at whatever you practice, including procrastination.

*(If he had accepted one of the job offers he had coming out of the army he might've gone on to something big, but obviously, I wouldn't be here. Fortunately {for my sake, at least}, even then a career as a jazz musician had a distinctly seedy aura.)[This message was edited by David Mason on 02 December 2005 at 04:06 AM.]

Michael Garnett · Post by **Michael Garnett** » 2 Dec 2005 7:23 am

<quote>My point being, you will inevitably get better at whatever you practice, including procrastination.</quote>

RIGHT ON, MAN!

-MG

Erv Niehaus · Post by **Erv Niehaus** » 2 Dec 2005 7:40 am

I'm convinced that sight reading music for the steel guitar is based on chords. You give me a sheet of music with the chords and I can usually play it in any key in any tuning.
When I do tabs, I always include the notation and the chords. After you have played these type of tabs long enough, you begin to see the connection between the notes, chords and the places to find them on your guitar.
Even Buddy Emmons has stated that he has missed out on some playing jobs with not being able to read music good enough.
Erv

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 2 Dec 2005 8:06 am

Zaim, I agree, G and F aren't much harder than C, but beyond that I begin to get bogged down. Sure I could learn keys with 2 or more sharps or flats, but I would have to quit my day job, throw my kids out, and dump my girl friend, quit gigging, and woodshed for months. I guess if I were a pro, I would have learned it long ago. But now, it's tough.

Michael G., let me try to explain. I read music on piano and sax. But outside of the key of C I don't have the scale number associated with the scale notes. Sure I can stop playing and count up and figure it out. But I'm talking about sight reading while playing, although maybe at half speed. One can read and play very complicated music without knowing either the scale notes or numbers for the key you are playing in. See the note on the page, play the note on the instrument (piano or sax). I have no clue what number of the scale the notes are while I am playing, even in the key of C. For C I can think of the number quickly, because it is the first key everyone learns, and has no complications from sharps, flats or black keys. But I do not automatically think of the numbers while I read and play. Even when I was forced as a child to learn scales in all 12 keys, I learned them as notes, not numbers (and quickly forgot them). I am not thinking scale notes or numbers as I read a piece of music. I guess it is like typing without knowing the words (I touch type). I can type a German or Spanish text book, without knowing a word of it. Even in English, I see the letter on the page, and hit the correct key. I have no clue what number of the alphabet each letter is.

On steel it is the opposite for me. I know the scale numbers, but not the notes. At least in the open pedal position, I can quickly tell you the scale number played by each string, pedal and lever. For the key of C, I have the numbers and notes fairly well associated. So If I am at the C fret, I can mentally translate the numbers into the notes and thereby know what note I am playing. Seeing a piece of music in the key of C, I can reverse the process, and slowly play simple melodies and chords by consciously translating the written notes into the scale number and finding that scale number on the guitar. Also, in the key of C I recognize the basic chords when I see them on the page. So if I see a C, F or G chord, I recognize them as the I, IV and V chords, and can play those chords on steel.

C is the only key I can do this in on the fly. Even for G or F, I don't automatically associate the notes and scale numbers, and I don't recognize the chords as quickly as in C. I have to stop and count up. Maybe we are talking about two different things. If the music is stopped, given enough time, I can take any written note from any key, and starting from some reference note I know on the steel, I can find one or more places to play the note. But outside of the key of C, I can't do that on the fly while playing the music, even at a slow tempo. Can you do that? I have heard of only three or four steelers who can do that. If you can, that makes five (I'm not defending our collective ignorance here, just being realistic).

Now, about whether most music readers can transpose on the fly. In my experience, people who can read music very well from high school band or orchestra, or private piano lessons in grade school and high school, don't learn to transpose on the fly. I've known hundreds of music readers for which this is the case. They learn this only if they go pro as an adult, or go to music school. On most instruments, transposing on the fly is much, much more difficult than merely sight reading music. Maybe if you only play guitar or steel you don't understand this. On keyboards and horns, there are no movable bar chords, no capos, and no movable "boxes." For each key on piano, the pattern of white and black notes is different. To play the fourth note of the scale, you have to know whether it is a white key or black key, and which one. For the 12 keys there are 12 entirely different patterns that have to be learned. If you transpose up three whole tones from the key of C, the root changes from a white key to a black key. But the fourth goes from a white key to another white key. You have to know that different pattern for each of the 8 notes of all 12 keys. The same with horns. There are certain main keys or finger holes that correspond to the white keys of the piano, and other side keys, or configurations of the main fingers that create the "black notes." Each key has a completely different fingering for each note of each scale. You don't just move up a certain number of positions. Each time you move to a different key, the whole pattern changes, not just the position. Ask b0b. He's learning this now on marimba. [This message was edited by David Doggett on 02 December 2005 at 09:22 AM.]

Ron Sodos · Post by **Ron Sodos** » 2 Dec 2005 9:26 am

Yes My comment was intended at being humorous but, the theory has come from history. I have played all kinds of music. I read fluently for trumpet and guitar at 8 or 9 years old and on. I played Jazz and rock in the 70's and have played with very accomplished players. I did a gig for a while with the jazz bassist Brian Bromberg and many others. I also had a friend who was a concert classical pianist on world tour. Anyway the joke came from the inability of most classically trained musicians because the formal training and regimented method of those people that were trained to read first caused an inability to improvise or "jam". Of course this is not always the case. But in my experience individuals that learned to read first had a difficulty in being creative and playing their own music.

My daughter was trained in the Suzuki method of violin. She was 4 years old when she started and didn't really start reading for a number of years. She could play and had a good ear and was creative without reading. Reading was introduced later and it just seemed to us that this is a much smarter way to develop talent. Anyway there is no disagreement that reading music can be of great benefit but can also be a hindrance if creativity is stifled by too much dependance on the written music.