As a metalhead for years I've been mindlessly learning licks without understanding them. Than I got fascinated with music theory and I've started mindlessly devouring any concept I've stumbled upon. Now I learn a lick and try to analyze what is going on there musically
Great film, very clear and concise. Your analysis is spot on. I play gypsy jazz and many of the top players know zero music theory, everything is learned by immersion and spoken like a language. The most important thing in learning music is listening, then reacting musically to what you hear, developing this skill is life long but really pays off the more you do it. So many players taught the theory way never develop the ability to swing or to react to the other players in a session.
Where are those immersive experiences available? As jazz becomes less of a popular music, school becomes a supplement to provide performance immersion. It's not an either/or thing: school helps to build up your technical facility, expose you to music you might not hear otherwise, and give you a large set of common patterns (music theory) so you can pick up the actual language more quickly. It's way easier to spot a ii-V7-I , then translate it across different instruments (piano, bass, horns, etc.) when you've put a name to it than if you had to learn it independently for yourself on two or three different instruments. Many folks these days don't have the luxury of playing only one thing.
Great points and totally agree! I think that supplementing with theory can speed up the learning by immersion process by providing context to the things you are listening too. Otherwise you have to come up with your own rules and systems to make sense of it all, which can be really draining. I just caution against over-indexing theory and letting your vocabulary and ear suffer.
Agreed that music is not often enough treated as a language. Then again, language itself is often taught as a series of prescriptive rules, rather than a set of patterns. If you think of mechanically conjugating verbs like mechanically practicing common licks (that you haven't pulled from the recording yourself), then music and language are _very_ similar in how they're taught. Listening, transcribing, playing along, and performing are at the heart of music: you need to be able to hear it in your head to make the sound come out of your instrument. It's still not _easy_ , though: it takes a tremendous amount of time and energy to sit down with your instrument with hundreds of different albums you love, take them through several different keys, and distill them into your own voice. School gives you vocabulary and technical ability to do that, but you still have to do the actual work on your own. If school is guilty of anything, it's in providing a false sense of mastery: "this degree means I don't have anything more to learn."
Preach! This is such a good breakdown of the process and love this quote, "you need to be able to hear it in your head to make the sound come out of your instrument. It's still not easy , though: it takes a tremendous amount of time and energy to sit down with your instrument with hundreds of different albums you love, take them through several different keys, and distill them into your own voice." I want to quote you in my next video, so good!
To be a bit of a devil's advocate and using language analogy: argument of learning language as a child is overrated for a simple reason - it's an equivalent of learning with a private tutor who has 24/7 full attention on you. Sometimes learning a simple rule can save you hours or figuring it out by yourself. When I was studying viola my teacher often told me that the all scales, arpeggios and double-stops are just a part of our craft: they set up properly the intonation, articulation, rhythm, fix problems with both hands and in general are a base for whatever else will come in your way. You can of course push it to the wrong extreme - same as your argument with the music theory. However, it's very easy to say "just play what you hear" having already solid base under your belt... Or rather a challenge: would the "easy way" be as easy as you described if you haven't done your homework for "the hard way"? Don't get me wrong, I fully support techniques you described. I just think that both "ways" are complimentary and the trick is to find the right balance.
Totally agree that learning some theory can expedite the process, it just shouldn't be the priority. I didn't touch on developing the technical ability necessary to translate "what your hearing" into "what you are playing". This is another piece to the puzzle. But I also agree that balance is key! Thanks for bringing up these great points!
Bro, I needed this, gonna put on a backing track and just improvise on my guitar tonight. I thought I needed to learn music theory and scales for so long and kept putting it off.
My thoughts exactly. I've met so many people who think that learning by ear is too hard and that learning from a lead sheet is a short cut. I tell them it's exactly the other way round and they never believe me. Then they wonder why they don't sound authentic. Like learning French from a book and never hearing it spoken. It's all backwards. Anyway you've gained a subscriber here.
This is an important video for aspiring amateurs like myself, who strive to learn jazz on any melodic or harmonic instrument! Thank you, Mr Lopez. Note on learning by ear: I listen to the phrase on repeat, until I can replicate the RHYTHM exactly over the back-track (with rhythm syllables). Then I learn to sing the PITCHES in rhythm. And lastly, before transferring to my instrument, I sing the first pitch to my tuner, and it gives me the concert note to start on. The other pitches I find on the instrument.
@ well, just simple ones I've picked up, like "da" for on beat quarter note, "duu-di" for swung eight notes, "ti-ki-ti-ki" for sixteenths, "du-de-ly" for triplets, "ham-bone" for two succesive dotted quarter notes, etc. It's not scatting, but it helps me verify, that I've understood the rhythm correctly, before I move on.
Very cool, thanks for sharing! I really like your process of repeating rhythm before singing the pitches with rhythm and would love to give you a shout out in my next video if you don't mind?
I would greatly appreciate a more in depth video about ear training, specifically for when you have a hard time singing/finding the note on your instrument! Great video by the way!!
Thanks so much! I just released a video about transcribing and learning by ear but plan to release a more in depth video on how to accurately sing the notes you are looking for in the next few weeks. Keep an eye out!
Good video - I have a feeling this is why I spent over a decade in formal music training but am terrible at improvising and feeling music in dance classes
Recently I’ve made a big change and its helped me a lot. I just think of songs I know very well while walking around and then try to figure them out by ear without my instrument. I go through which note i think is the tonal center then what all the notes are in scale degrees. Then when i get home or on my piano app i check. In just 3 weeks I’ve gotten way faster and more accurate, and my improvising has improved a ton. Can’t imagine what will happen in a few years of practicing this vs all the time i learned what will “work”. Rules don’t matter if you dont understand them sonically
Yes!! This is an amazing immersion exercise! I’m willing to bet that your ability to improvise especially with other musician will improve drastically. Thanks for sharing!
@@ChrisLoMusic Would love to hear you listen to a song, learn some licks you like, and show how you go about analyzing the context and then trying to apply it to your improvising.
100% agree. Music is a language and is best learned as such. I grew up in school being told that I was "talented" at music, but I really wasn't that skilled at music (and still am not). But what I realized is that I just have a good ear, and that's what people were commenting on. So I realized that the methods you gave for learning to get better at improvising were and still are methods that I actively use just for fun. And honestly, that's probably a big reason why I had an inclination towards music as a kid. My parents always played good music for me to listen to (classical music, classic rock, jazz, etc.), and I was always humming along to songs incessantly until I drove my brothers insane (they literally told me to stop on many occasions because I would repeat the same phrase over and over again lol). But because I was so passionate about music, that's how I got better at thinking in the language of music since I was always doing something to get better even when I wasn't practicing an instrument. Where I have failed as a musician is actually sitting down and practicing my output on my instrument. I may have a great ear, but since I never practiced a physical instrument consistently, I can't play much anything useful. But, I can still freely think in the language of music. And because I have a good ear, it basically means I can be my own teacher for music since I know what the bigger picture is supposed to sound like even though I don't know all the technical names for it. Imo, this is the best way to learn music since it doesn't feel like I'm a blind person needing someone to lead me by the hand through everything. The Suzuki method is pretty similar to this too. That method only introduces actually sight reading things a couple years into learning an instrument (I think). When you think about it, that's exactly how you learned your native language as well. That's why I love Victor Wooten's wisdom on the topic of music. He sees music as a language.
This is SO interesting! Thanks for sharing! Most people have the opposite problem from you, lots of technical ability and no ear. Now all you need to do is develop a little technique on the instrument and you'll be unstoppable!! Do you have a primary instrument?
@@ChrisLoMusic I'm glad to share and thank you so much for the encouragement! :) My main instrument is piano but I also play a bit of guitar and bass as well. I also love singing and finding jazzy ways to reharmonize things because I find that the most freeing since I can just sit for hours finding cool harmonies without needing to be technically skilled at an instrument.
Very cool, I hope to make a video in the future about developing technical facility on the instrument to allow you to follow your ear and freely express yourself. Good luck on your journey!
Take melodic minor, I think a lot of people practice the scales and arpeggios and kinda stop there. I feel like its important to turn that into music as soon as possible by improvising over chord tracks or whatever can help you connect your lines with the harmony
Wow the idea of learning music like a language has been something that has guided my learning in the last year. I started learning a language by immersion a bit more than a year ago and the amount of parallels to music are frankly absurd. Up until a year ago I couldn't play by ear or improvise AT ALL and now I'm at a really good point I feel. There's a couple of key differences with music though. First is harmony, where you can't really hear all the individual notes at once, instead hearing a new sound. This makes it different from melodies which we learn and can output through our mouth. You need an instrument to output that, and it's something you can't purely learn through listening. What I did is use some ear training apps to give me a decent foundation on all chord qualities so that when playing by ear I can at least have somewhat of an idea of the chord that is being played. There's also the issue of keys. We don't perceive music in absolute notes, but in the context of a key. While you can still learn to play by ear without knowing this, learning about keys and thinking in keys is a massive help at the beginning, similar to reading a 2 page grammar guide before immersing for the first time in a language. I think at the end, that stage where you're not thinking any theory you're just thinking in sound is the same no matter how you get to it. Theory only serves as a bit of a shortcut, but just like with language the amount you should learn before actually just immersing without trying to put everything in the context of music theory is really extremely tiny compared to what music school and college makes it seem.
Wow! That was amazingly written! Really solid point about how understanding keys can make learning by ear easier. The chord aspect is interesting too. There are techniques that can help with guesstimating chords by picking out the highest and lowest note and making educated guesses about the middle notes, but your point that chords don't necessarily translate from traditional languages is interesting. Thanks for sharing!!
Exactly! Use your theory knowledge to help you learn your favorite solos by ear. Take note of what licks are being played over what changes. Then once you've got the new licks in your head (and under your fingers), start playing them in different keys, over different changes (many licks work in different contexts, follow your ear hear), and with some of your other licks. My next video will be more in depth video of this process. Good luck!
For sure! I will talk about building vocab via transcription in my next video and then my following video will be about integrating new vocab. Stay tuned!
Great video! Thanks for the food for thought and cheers from Brazil! For anyone interested, I strongly recommend Hal Galper's "the illusion of an instrument". It's mind blowing and life changing stuff and it's available here on RUclips.
This is true, BUT frankly if you’re a music student, immersion is your responsibility, not your school’s. What the school teaches you is meant to supplement excessive listening to the greats
Yep! My profs were like: "okay, great--you know your scales, now go transcribe the recordings you love." They didn't have to twist my arm to get me to listen to the stuff I already listened to: just to get me to mix instrument and listening, which is a very different challenge than memorizing scales. _Everyone_ already has a set of recordings that are part of their psyche, whether it's Nirvana, Willie Nelson, Duke Ellington, Elton John, Ravel, or Count Basie. And the list keeps growing as you get older and meet more people. Now my problem is how to transport my record, CD, cassette, and digital collection. There's also a practical aspect to what you listen to: when you play with a group and you need to play something new, you buy the recording so you can learn it for the performance. At that point, it doesn't matter whether you like it or not--you have to know the music. You're always going to have to play stuff you don't know or don't love: the trick is to keep that to a minimum.
I totally agree! I just wish that music schools did a better job of teaching musicians HOW to build vocabulary, generalize it, and really hear it before playing it. So many musicians just move their fingers, either because they don't hear what they should play or they have nothing interesting to say. Both products of an underdeveloped vocabulary (and ear). This topic was never discussed at Berklee but I'm psyched that it's coming up here!
i joined a group where i'm the worst musician. and that's been quite a ride so far. it has forced me to improve quite a lot, because i dont wanna be holding the group back. so i have to practice more than the rest.
Expecting music theory to teach you to play music is kinda like expecting that analytical grammar is going to teach you to speak English. I don't think knowing that something is a Hypothetical Subjunctive Adverbial Clause of Unreal Condition in the Future Perfect Tense is going to help you much in communicating better...
I feel like when i truly improvise it sucks. whenever my teacher says its good i usually had phrashes and stuff i have wrote or listened to in they key of what i am playing Whenever i try to come up with something on the spot its usually too much weirdness going on.
Most of what people are playing when they are improvising are memorized phrases and licks, either their own or someone else's. They have practiced these licks so many times that when it comes time to improvise, the licks are either in their head or in their muscle memory. Eventually these licks start to blend together and get rearranged into new sounding ideas but they are still just the phrases or licks they wrote or stole from someone else. This same thing happens when we learn to speak a language. My advice to you is to keep combining the phrases you write and transcribe while improvising and eventually it'll take on a new shape that is unique to your personality and tastes. Good luck!
What about question/answer format? Come up with a lick (the question) then answer it with another lick (the answer). That is musical vocabulary in practice.
Yeah, yeah, it's well known that no university is needed for the creative arts. But for some reason a huge chunk of those who went to university made it big or at least consistent. Probably due to the fact that they HAD to do work to get that degree. Making them accustomed to their task AND compete against others with it. The self taught ones often stagnate in solitude because they spend all their time 'practicing' to be able to compete with the learned ones, but not having any good judgemental audience like professors. Then they grow lonely because they have noone to play for and their friends and family just say 'it's good' cause they're family and bla bla. Ask me how I know. I do both music and drawing. All self taught. it sucks man.
Super valid. There is something to be said about the benefit of being around other good musicians and professors and constantly receiving feedback from them. That is probably the biggest thing that music school has to offer. With that said, I think that a majority of successful musicians do not have music degrees. I've spend a lot of time in my room practicing and the benefit of that does not compare to the time I've spent playing with other (better) musicians and playing gigs. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is put yourself out there, but that is where you'll see the greatest returns.
Actually, thats NOT fine even if you are classical musician. Old classical musicians were trained in improvisation. If you want to be real, hardcore classical musician you need to learn to improvise/compose in old classical styles (there are many of them). ❤
@@ChrisLoMusic Yep, there was a whole sistem of education and special method (partimento) that unfortunately they started to remove bit by bit cca. in second half of 19th century. But, we are living now in times when classical musicians are starting to rediscover that method and there are classical musicians who can improvise and compose in old styles. 🩷
As a metalhead for years I've been mindlessly learning licks without understanding them. Than I got fascinated with music theory and I've started mindlessly devouring any concept I've stumbled upon. Now I learn a lick and try to analyze what is going on there musically
Same! Thanks for sharing!
Great film, very clear and concise. Your analysis is spot on. I play gypsy jazz and many of the top players know zero music theory, everything is learned by immersion and spoken like a language. The most important thing in learning music is listening, then reacting musically to what you hear, developing this skill is life long but really pays off the more you do it. So many players taught the theory way never develop the ability to swing or to react to the other players in a session.
Where are those immersive experiences available? As jazz becomes less of a popular music, school becomes a supplement to provide performance immersion. It's not an either/or thing: school helps to build up your technical facility, expose you to music you might not hear otherwise, and give you a large set of common patterns (music theory) so you can pick up the actual language more quickly. It's way easier to spot a ii-V7-I , then translate it across different instruments (piano, bass, horns, etc.) when you've put a name to it than if you had to learn it independently for yourself on two or three different instruments. Many folks these days don't have the luxury of playing only one thing.
Great points and totally agree! I think that supplementing with theory can speed up the learning by immersion process by providing context to the things you are listening too. Otherwise you have to come up with your own rules and systems to make sense of it all, which can be really draining. I just caution against over-indexing theory and letting your vocabulary and ear suffer.
Yes! So many people lack the ability to listen and react because they are thinking about scales and theory.
thank u for sharing ur perspective, not only is the easy way more efficient but it is also more fun to learn from than the hard way
100%
Very well presented and concise video, you deserve more subscribers!
Thanks so much! 🙏
Rarely comment on videos but this managed to identify & articulate something I haven’t been able. Thank you!
That means a lot! Thanks for the feedback!
Agreed that music is not often enough treated as a language. Then again, language itself is often taught as a series of prescriptive rules, rather than a set of patterns. If you think of mechanically conjugating verbs like mechanically practicing common licks (that you haven't pulled from the recording yourself), then music and language are _very_ similar in how they're taught. Listening, transcribing, playing along, and performing are at the heart of music: you need to be able to hear it in your head to make the sound come out of your instrument.
It's still not _easy_ , though: it takes a tremendous amount of time and energy to sit down with your instrument with hundreds of different albums you love, take them through several different keys, and distill them into your own voice. School gives you vocabulary and technical ability to do that, but you still have to do the actual work on your own. If school is guilty of anything, it's in providing a false sense of mastery: "this degree means I don't have anything more to learn."
Preach! This is such a good breakdown of the process and love this quote, "you need to be able to hear it in your head to make the sound come out of your instrument. It's still not easy , though: it takes a tremendous amount of time and energy to sit down with your instrument with hundreds of different albums you love, take them through several different keys, and distill them into your own voice." I want to quote you in my next video, so good!
My god, you're an awesome teacher! Every concept you describe is so clear and to the point! Excellent video! ❤
Wow, that's super nice of you to say! You are motivating me to create more videos! Thank you!
To be a bit of a devil's advocate and using language analogy: argument of learning language as a child is overrated for a simple reason - it's an equivalent of learning with a private tutor who has 24/7 full attention on you. Sometimes learning a simple rule can save you hours or figuring it out by yourself.
When I was studying viola my teacher often told me that the all scales, arpeggios and double-stops are just a part of our craft: they set up properly the intonation, articulation, rhythm, fix problems with both hands and in general are a base for whatever else will come in your way. You can of course push it to the wrong extreme - same as your argument with the music theory. However, it's very easy to say "just play what you hear" having already solid base under your belt...
Or rather a challenge: would the "easy way" be as easy as you described if you haven't done your homework for "the hard way"?
Don't get me wrong, I fully support techniques you described. I just think that both "ways" are complimentary and the trick is to find the right balance.
Totally agree that learning some theory can expedite the process, it just shouldn't be the priority.
I didn't touch on developing the technical ability necessary to translate "what your hearing" into "what you are playing". This is another piece to the puzzle. But I also agree that balance is key! Thanks for bringing up these great points!
Bro, I needed this, gonna put on a backing track and just improvise on my guitar tonight. I thought I needed to learn music theory and scales for so long and kept putting it off.
Get after it and follow your ear not your fingers!
My god this i freaking awesome!
My thoughts exactly. I've met so many people who think that learning by ear is too hard and that learning from a lead sheet is a short cut. I tell them it's exactly the other way round and they never believe me. Then they wonder why they don't sound authentic. Like learning French from a book and never hearing it spoken. It's all backwards.
Anyway you've gained a subscriber here.
It’s so backwards! 🙏
This is an important video for aspiring amateurs like myself, who strive to learn jazz on any melodic or harmonic instrument! Thank you, Mr Lopez.
Note on learning by ear: I listen to the phrase on repeat, until I can replicate the RHYTHM exactly over the back-track (with rhythm syllables). Then I learn to sing the PITCHES in rhythm. And lastly, before transferring to my instrument, I sing the first pitch to my tuner, and it gives me the concert note to start on. The other pitches I find on the instrument.
I love that process! Using the tuner is really smart. I'm curious, what rhythm syllables are you using?
@ well, just simple ones I've picked up, like "da" for on beat quarter note, "duu-di" for swung eight notes, "ti-ki-ti-ki" for sixteenths, "du-de-ly" for triplets, "ham-bone" for two succesive dotted quarter notes, etc. It's not scatting, but it helps me verify, that I've understood the rhythm correctly, before I move on.
Very cool, thanks for sharing! I really like your process of repeating rhythm before singing the pitches with rhythm and would love to give you a shout out in my next video if you don't mind?
@@ChrisLoMusic you're most welcome, thanks for considering it.
Please continue doing this kind of videos. Great information, bravo 👏 subscribed, see you soon here! 🎉
Thank you for the encouragement!! 🙏
I would greatly appreciate a more in depth video about ear training, specifically for when you have a hard time singing/finding the note on your instrument! Great video by the way!!
Thanks so much! I just released a video about transcribing and learning by ear but plan to release a more in depth video on how to accurately sing the notes you are looking for in the next few weeks. Keep an eye out!
@@ChrisLoMusicWill do!! Thanks a ton!
Good video - I have a feeling this is why I spent over a decade in formal music training but am terrible at improvising and feeling music in dance classes
Thank you! Yes, this is very likely the culprit.
Recently I’ve made a big change and its helped me a lot. I just think of songs I know very well while walking around and then try to figure them out by ear without my instrument. I go through which note i think is the tonal center then what all the notes are in scale degrees. Then when i get home or on my piano app i check. In just 3 weeks I’ve gotten way faster and more accurate, and my improvising has improved a ton. Can’t imagine what will happen in a few years of practicing this vs all the time i learned what will “work”. Rules don’t matter if you dont understand them sonically
Yes!! This is an amazing immersion exercise! I’m willing to bet that your ability to improvise especially with other musician will improve drastically. Thanks for sharing!
@@ChrisLoMusic Would love to hear you listen to a song, learn some licks you like, and show how you go about analyzing the context and then trying to apply it to your improvising.
Absolutely, I'll incorporate these into my next video. Thanks for the suggestions!
Good video, straight to the point!
Thanks! I'll try to keep them that way.
100% agree. Music is a language and is best learned as such. I grew up in school being told that I was "talented" at music, but I really wasn't that skilled at music (and still am not). But what I realized is that I just have a good ear, and that's what people were commenting on. So I realized that the methods you gave for learning to get better at improvising were and still are methods that I actively use just for fun. And honestly, that's probably a big reason why I had an inclination towards music as a kid. My parents always played good music for me to listen to (classical music, classic rock, jazz, etc.), and I was always humming along to songs incessantly until I drove my brothers insane (they literally told me to stop on many occasions because I would repeat the same phrase over and over again lol). But because I was so passionate about music, that's how I got better at thinking in the language of music since I was always doing something to get better even when I wasn't practicing an instrument. Where I have failed as a musician is actually sitting down and practicing my output on my instrument. I may have a great ear, but since I never practiced a physical instrument consistently, I can't play much anything useful. But, I can still freely think in the language of music.
And because I have a good ear, it basically means I can be my own teacher for music since I know what the bigger picture is supposed to sound like even though I don't know all the technical names for it. Imo, this is the best way to learn music since it doesn't feel like I'm a blind person needing someone to lead me by the hand through everything. The Suzuki method is pretty similar to this too. That method only introduces actually sight reading things a couple years into learning an instrument (I think). When you think about it, that's exactly how you learned your native language as well. That's why I love Victor Wooten's wisdom on the topic of music. He sees music as a language.
This is SO interesting! Thanks for sharing! Most people have the opposite problem from you, lots of technical ability and no ear. Now all you need to do is develop a little technique on the instrument and you'll be unstoppable!! Do you have a primary instrument?
@@ChrisLoMusic I'm glad to share and thank you so much for the encouragement! :) My main instrument is piano but I also play a bit of guitar and bass as well. I also love singing and finding jazzy ways to reharmonize things because I find that the most freeing since I can just sit for hours finding cool harmonies without needing to be technically skilled at an instrument.
Very cool, I hope to make a video in the future about developing technical facility on the instrument to allow you to follow your ear and freely express yourself. Good luck on your journey!
Would it be possible to make a video that demonstrates many of these in a specific context (e.g., a specific tune)?
Absolutely, I will make that my next video! Thanks for the suggestion!
really cool video, makes me think about how I want to keep practicing more. Some more examples for each step would be great
Great to hear! Stay tuned, my next video will break down the imitation, integration and improvisation aspects in more detail.
Take melodic minor, I think a lot of people practice the scales and arpeggios and kinda stop there. I feel like its important to turn that into music as soon as possible by improvising over chord tracks or whatever can help you connect your lines with the harmony
100%!
Amazing tips man
Can't wait for the next videos
Thanks so much!
This changes everything!
Amazing to hear! Thanks for watching!
good video. will start right away with the first i.
Thank you! Enjoy the journey!
Such a great video
Glad you enjoyed it!
Great Video!!. 👍
Thank you!!
This is great information.
Would love a video on singing the notes!
Thank you and heard!
Would love to see a video on the "integrate" part! Thanks!
You got it! I'll touch on this in my next video.
@ChrisLoMusic thanks so much Chris. Much appreciated!
Loved the new perspective.. Keep going !!
Glad you loved it and thank you for the encouragement!!
This is a crucial no one talks about .
Glad to get the conversation started!
Wow the idea of learning music like a language has been something that has guided my learning in the last year. I started learning a language by immersion a bit more than a year ago and the amount of parallels to music are frankly absurd. Up until a year ago I couldn't play by ear or improvise AT ALL and now I'm at a really good point I feel. There's a couple of key differences with music though. First is harmony, where you can't really hear all the individual notes at once, instead hearing a new sound. This makes it different from melodies which we learn and can output through our mouth. You need an instrument to output that, and it's something you can't purely learn through listening. What I did is use some ear training apps to give me a decent foundation on all chord qualities so that when playing by ear I can at least have somewhat of an idea of the chord that is being played. There's also the issue of keys. We don't perceive music in absolute notes, but in the context of a key. While you can still learn to play by ear without knowing this, learning about keys and thinking in keys is a massive help at the beginning, similar to reading a 2 page grammar guide before immersing for the first time in a language. I think at the end, that stage where you're not thinking any theory you're just thinking in sound is the same no matter how you get to it. Theory only serves as a bit of a shortcut, but just like with language the amount you should learn before actually just immersing without trying to put everything in the context of music theory is really extremely tiny compared to what music school and college makes it seem.
Wow! That was amazingly written! Really solid point about how understanding keys can make learning by ear easier. The chord aspect is interesting too. There are techniques that can help with guesstimating chords by picking out the highest and lowest note and making educated guesses about the middle notes, but your point that chords don't necessarily translate from traditional languages is interesting. Thanks for sharing!!
Thank you. ....I tried learning Johnny Winter off the record. It wasn't pretty....
It's very difficult at first but keep after it! I'll be releasing a video this week elaborating on learning by ear that may help as well. Good luck!
what’s the best way to up your musical vocabulary with decent theory knowledge? learn licks and figure out where and when to apply them?
Exactly! Use your theory knowledge to help you learn your favorite solos by ear. Take note of what licks are being played over what changes. Then once you've got the new licks in your head (and under your fingers), start playing them in different keys, over different changes (many licks work in different contexts, follow your ear hear), and with some of your other licks. My next video will be more in depth video of this process. Good luck!
@@ChrisLoMusicthanks so much bro!
@@ChrisLoMusicI try this and it just never clicks for me. Hope you do a video about that.
For sure! I will talk about building vocab via transcription in my next video and then my following video will be about integrating new vocab. Stay tuned!
Great video! Thanks for the food for thought and cheers from Brazil!
For anyone interested, I strongly recommend Hal Galper's "the illusion of an instrument". It's mind blowing and life changing stuff and it's available here on RUclips.
Cheers! I will definitely check out "the illusion of an instrument", sounds right up my alley. Thanks for the recommendation!
This is true, BUT frankly if you’re a music student, immersion is your responsibility, not your school’s. What the school teaches you is meant to supplement excessive listening to the greats
Yep! My profs were like: "okay, great--you know your scales, now go transcribe the recordings you love." They didn't have to twist my arm to get me to listen to the stuff I already listened to: just to get me to mix instrument and listening, which is a very different challenge than memorizing scales. _Everyone_ already has a set of recordings that are part of their psyche, whether it's Nirvana, Willie Nelson, Duke Ellington, Elton John, Ravel, or Count Basie. And the list keeps growing as you get older and meet more people. Now my problem is how to transport my record, CD, cassette, and digital collection.
There's also a practical aspect to what you listen to: when you play with a group and you need to play something new, you buy the recording so you can learn it for the performance. At that point, it doesn't matter whether you like it or not--you have to know the music. You're always going to have to play stuff you don't know or don't love: the trick is to keep that to a minimum.
I totally agree! I just wish that music schools did a better job of teaching musicians HOW to build vocabulary, generalize it, and really hear it before playing it. So many musicians just move their fingers, either because they don't hear what they should play or they have nothing interesting to say. Both products of an underdeveloped vocabulary (and ear). This topic was never discussed at Berklee but I'm psyched that it's coming up here!
I love phish.
😂 Trey certainly knows how to improvise
Sick
🙏
i joined a group where i'm the worst musician.
and that's been quite a ride so far.
it has forced me to improve quite a lot, because i dont wanna be holding the group back. so i have to practice more than the rest.
That is a great situation to be in and the epitome of learning by immersion! Enjoy the ride!
Expecting music theory to teach you to play music is kinda like expecting that analytical grammar is going to teach you to speak English. I don't think knowing that something is a Hypothetical Subjunctive Adverbial Clause of Unreal Condition in the Future Perfect Tense is going to help you much in communicating better...
😂😂😂 Agreed!
I feel like when i truly improvise it sucks. whenever my teacher says its good i usually had phrashes and stuff i have wrote or listened to in they key of what i am playing Whenever i try to come up with something on the spot its usually too much weirdness going on.
Most of what people are playing when they are improvising are memorized phrases and licks, either their own or someone else's. They have practiced these licks so many times that when it comes time to improvise, the licks are either in their head or in their muscle memory. Eventually these licks start to blend together and get rearranged into new sounding ideas but they are still just the phrases or licks they wrote or stole from someone else. This same thing happens when we learn to speak a language. My advice to you is to keep combining the phrases you write and transcribe while improvising and eventually it'll take on a new shape that is unique to your personality and tastes. Good luck!
You look a lot like RUclipsr Jaime Altozano who analyzes music and does interviews in Spanish.
That's funny! I'll have to check it out.
What about question/answer format? Come up with a lick (the question) then answer it with another lick (the answer). That is musical vocabulary in practice.
That's a great exercise! I'll play around with that. Thanks for sharing!
tam-tam-tadam-taaam
😂
Ear training video please
Great, I’m on it!
Yeah, yeah, it's well known that no university is needed for the creative arts.
But for some reason a huge chunk of those who went to university made it big or at least consistent.
Probably due to the fact that they HAD to do work to get that degree. Making them accustomed to their task AND compete against others with it.
The self taught ones often stagnate in solitude because they spend all their time 'practicing' to be able to compete with the learned ones, but not having any good judgemental audience like professors.
Then they grow lonely because they have noone to play for and their friends and family just say 'it's good' cause they're family and bla bla.
Ask me how I know. I do both music and drawing. All self taught. it sucks man.
Super valid. There is something to be said about the benefit of being around other good musicians and professors and constantly receiving feedback from them. That is probably the biggest thing that music school has to offer. With that said, I think that a majority of successful musicians do not have music degrees.
I've spend a lot of time in my room practicing and the benefit of that does not compare to the time I've spent playing with other (better) musicians and playing gigs. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is put yourself out there, but that is where you'll see the greatest returns.
Actually, thats NOT fine even if you are classical musician. Old classical musicians were trained in improvisation. If you want to be real, hardcore classical musician you need to learn to improvise/compose in old classical styles (there are many of them). ❤
I love that! I bet Bach could improvise like none other.
@@ChrisLoMusic Yep, there was a whole sistem of education and special method (partimento) that unfortunately they started to remove bit by bit cca. in second half of 19th century.
But, we are living now in times when classical musicians are starting to rediscover that method and there are classical musicians who can improvise and compose in old styles. 🩷
Great video btw.!!!! Everything you said is similar to how they learned music in 17th, 18th century...🩷🎵
Thank you!! That’s fascinating, I’ll have to learn more about these methods. Thanks for turning me on to this!