The 'How' of learning?

[funkle]

[quote name='TKenrick' post='1083234' date='Jan 9 2011, 03:59 PM']I totally know what you mean about work getting in the way of serious practice. I'm a full time musician and still find that work interferes with my practicing and takes me away from the things I want to be working on.

Tom[/quote]

Thank god I'm not alone in feeling that. It's frustrating sometimes. Although at least I enjoy my day job! Becoming a full-time jazz musician still doesn't look like a terribly viable career option to bring home the income, although I'd love to do it, so if I want to play jazz I've got to pay the bills somehow...how the heck does everyone square the circle?

Pete

[Delberthot]

I would have to ask that before you start learning about chord tones, parallelograms, argepeggios and loads of other stuff that I have never heard of before reading this, what do you want to achieve? What do you want to be doing with your talent?

Personally I just played along to everything I heard and built up my speed and skill from there. If there was a song that I couldn't master I left it a couple of weeks/months then went back to it.

I am not trying to be disrespectful to the players who believe that reading, studying modes and other stuff are important its just that they've never been important to me and I don;t feel that I have ever missed out. In fact, I think I am a better player for it as I don't think in terms of chord structure and other stuff like that, I just play what sounds right.

Wait, that makes it sound like I think I am better than you all because I don;t know chords etc but what I am trying to say is that for me, not knowing what all of these things are have been beneficial to me.

If on the other hand you want to be a studio session musician or do pit work Then perhaps what has been said previously is the best thing for you to do and what i have said is complete bollocks.

the biggest thing I ever discovered is that a song can only progress so many different ways (unless its big band swing that goes all over the f***ing shop) I couldn't consciously tell you what the chord patterns are but the knowledge has come in very useful over the years both for learning new songs and playing requests live that I've never played before

Edited January 10, 2011 by Delberthot

[Doddy]

[quote name='Delberthot' post='1083819' date='Jan 10 2011, 01:05 AM']I am not trying to be disrespectful to the players who believe that reading, studying modes and other stuff are important its just that they've never been important to me and I don;t feel that I have ever missed out. In fact, I think I am a better player for it as I don't think in terms of chord structure and other stuff like that, I just play what sounds right.

Wait, that makes it sound like I think I am better than you all because I don;t know chords etc but what I am trying to say is that for me, not knowing what all of these things are have been beneficial to me.[/quote]

I'm just going to pick up on this bit.
How can not knowing things like chords be beneficial to you? I honestly don't think you can say if it
has been or not,because you have never had the benefit of that knowledge. No one who has studied it will say that it hasn't been of some
benefit to them.

Ok,so you 'don't think in terms of chord structure'. Fair enough,but how are you approaching things? By playing patterns or hunting around
for notes until you find the right one?
I also play what sounds right,but the difference is I know what notes will work before I play them.Knowing about chords takes away a hell
of a lot of guess work and allows you to play more than root notes. After all,you'd sound dodgy playing a B over a C7 chord.

Edited January 10, 2011 by Doddy

[TKenrick]

[quote name='funkle' post='1083442' date='Jan 9 2011, 07:01 PM']Becoming a full-time jazz musician still doesn't look like a terribly viable career option to bring home the income, although I'd love to do it, so if I want to play jazz I've got to pay the bills somehow...[/quote]

Jazz isn't a viable career option for me either, pop gigs/weddings/teaching pay the bills and studying/playing jazz is very much the hobby.



[quote name='Delberthot' post='1083819' date='Jan 10 2011, 01:05 AM']If on the other hand you want to be a studio session musician or do pit work Then perhaps what has been said previously is the best thing for you to do and what i have said is complete bollocks.[/quote]

I'll agree with this bit. There are players who want to really study certain aspects of music and there are players who are comfortable with the knowledge that they have - neither approach is wrong. Each to their own and all that...

[Faithless]

Ok, its the first evening I sat at the piano for the Banaco thing..

Now, while I wasn't not total deaf with guessing the notes, when I hit some 'awkward' notes (like Db or F#, I was in C tonality..) to the scale, I would instantly loose my tonality (C, that is..) Is this normal for beginner and I should just keep going?

The other thing is that I have quite good grasp of piano, and, while I try as much to really hit the random note, I sometimes 'feel', [i]where [/i]did the pencil sat on, which makes the game not completely fair, if that makes sense..

[funkle]

[quote name='Faithless' post='1084869' date='Jan 10 2011, 09:22 PM']Ok, its the first evening I sat at the piano for the Banaco thing..

Now, while I wasn't not total deaf with guessing the notes, when I hit some 'awkward' notes (like Db or F#, I was in C tonality..) to the scale, I would instantly loose my tonality (C, that is..) Is this normal for beginner and I should just keep going?

The other thing is that I have quite good grasp of piano, and, while I try as much to really hit the random note, I sometimes 'feel', [i]where [/i]did the pencil sat on, which makes the game not completely fair, if that makes sense..[/quote]

This is a hard game, don't worry, keep going! You're hitting some chromatic tones which are pretty awkward to hear.

I used software to do the sounding of the notes because then I would have no way to know what had been hit. The 'Ear Trainer Basic' at miles.be which I linked to above is perfect for this.

I spent a while working diatonically (in major) before adding in b3 and b6/#5 and b7. Subsequently I added in b2, b5. The hardest ones of all to sing/hear for me were b5, #5, major 6th, and strangely enough b7 - weird.

Keep going, this will take a months but the free Ear Trainer software linked to above is really helpful. I have worked on solfege over the last few years at the Players School and at home - stuff which included sight singing major, melodic minor, harmonic minor tonalities before I was ever allowed to get near chromatic solfege.

If you want to know the benefits, earlier this year, I transcribed 35 songs for a soul/funk covers gig I had to do in about two weeks (working on the charts part time) and while only some of it was done away from the instrument, all the hard work on ear training definitely made it quicker.

Delberthot has a point about getting out there and working stuff out by ear. Transcription is undoubtedly one of the most powerful tools in the musician's arsenal. I would simply say that learning all the 'extra stuff' like chord tones and chord structures, functional harmony, etc. has made playing music a heck of a lot easier for me, though.

Pete

[funkle]

I meant to say this is another great article on ear training. I'm working it through it slowly, as well as working on the Charlie Banacos exercise.

[url="http://www.miles.be/articles/7-ear-training-a-direct-and-logical-path"]http://www.miles.be/articles/7-ear-trainin...nd-logical-path[/url]

[Faithless]

I've just finished doing ear training thing using that program Funkle advised.

I was in C, guessed only between major scale tones (C excluded) in wide range (a three or so octaves I believe..) and, out of 50 guesses I went for 47 right, which makes it 94% percent accuracy.
It was relatively easy, I got to say.. I'll now go for other keys, we'll see if it's cool with those..

[funkle]

[quote name='Faithless' post='1085844' date='Jan 11 2011, 06:09 PM']I've just finished doing ear training thing using that program Funkle advised.

I was in C, guessed only between major scale tones (C excluded) in wide range (a three or so octaves I believe..) and, out of 50 guesses I went for 47 right, which makes it 94% percent accuracy.
It was relatively easy, I got to say.. I'll now go for other keys, we'll see if it's cool with those..[/quote]

That's good work. The next step is to get it going for all the 'chromatic' tones also. Then, get it to change key every time a new pair of tones are played. Enjoy!

Pete

[Joe Hubbard Bass]

[quote name='funkle' post='1082345' date='Jan 8 2011, 05:41 PM']Where to start?

Here's a link to an ear training one: [url="http://www.miles.be/articles/14-the-charlie-banacos-exercise"]http://www.miles.be/articles/14-the-charlie-banacos-exercise[/url]

Here's the link to software to help you do the above one if you don't have a piano: [url="http://www.miles.be/software/4-functional-ear-trainer-basic"]http://www.miles.be/software/4-functional-ear-trainer-basic[/url]

You'll have to move to the next step for the later parts of the above exercise: [url="http://www.miles.be/software/5-functional-ear-trainer-advanced"]http://www.miles.be/software/5-functional-...rainer-advanced[/url]

I would point out I've done a lot of solfege over the last 2-3 years and have only in the last year or so been able to do the first part of the Charlie Banacos exercise of hitting one note then another and correctly naming the interval 99% of the time. This is with the key changing every time I do the exercise, so that 'do' keeps moving. I haven't had time yet to tap into doing 3 notes yet; it's the next step.

In terms of exercises on the instrument, there are a ton. Nonetheless they are awkward to come by; you have to find someone who's studied with Charlie or with one of his students e.g. Jeff Berlin.

An 'early' one would for instance be playing approach notes to all notes of a given chord in all keys: e.g. approaching the root two half steps from below, the from two below and one above, then from two above and one below, then two above and two below, and so on. This would be then repeated for the 3rd, the 5th, the 7th, once again in all keys and for the chord tonality you desire.

Later on the exercises move into tensions, chord pairs, pentatonics, 'hexatonics', and a lot of other fancy stuff that I don't know how to name (see [url="http://www.charliebanacos.com/moreinformation.html)"]http://www.charliebanacos.com/moreinformation.html)[/url]. Scales also feature but are not particularly important in the way that chords are.

When I read through Some of Jerry Bergonzi's stuff, esp vol 6 from his series of books, it looks familiar. Not surprsing, he was a Banacos student. When I read through 'Forward Motion' by Hal Galper, it also looks familiar too.

I get the flavour that 'the good stuff' goes by a lot of different names, but that at the root of it most of it seems to relate to chords and working with chordal material.

I would point out that by no means am I an expert, I am simply a passionate hobbyist as opposed to a working pro. My day job eats time and gets in the way of serious practice at the moment. But I squeeze in the time/gigs where I can.

Pete[/quote]


Many of the top bassists, and musicians in the world have studied with Charlie. Alain Caron, Jeff Berlin, Jimmy Earl, Lincoln Goines, Bruce Gertz and many, many more. I studied with Banacos for ten years through his correspondence program. He really didn't do the ear training stuff in the same way that he did in-person, but he took me through several exercises near the end of my study with him. There is a great story that Charlie told me about Mike Stern when he was with Miles Davis. For the unwashed, Stern was a student of Banacos' for the better part of thirty years. The last time I attended Berklee, Stern was unknown and the most awesome player; he was truly awe inspiring and I got to see the likes of Stern and Jeff Berlin playing small jazz dives every week for a year. Anyway, Stern got the gig with Miles and they were rehearsing at Miles' brownstone in Manhatten. While they were taking a break, Marcus Miller was at the piano playing these ten note cluster voicings and Stern was naming every note from top to bottom- no problem. Miles was rather unimpressed by the whole thing, but that was just the way Miles acted. The next day when they began the rehearsal, Miles handed out charts to everyone except Stern. Stern then sheepishly asked Miles, "Where's my chart." Miles just said, "If you can really hear alll them notes, you don't need no chart." You see, that exercise from playing the cadence and then learning to hear one note progresses to eventually hearing clusters played together. Wayne Krantz told me he went through the same program as did Jimmy Earl.

Anyone who is interested in studying these types of improvisation exercises with me either in-person or via Skype, click on the link below for further info:

[url="http://www.joehubbardbass.com/study-bass-with-joe-2/"]http://www.joehubbardbass.com/study-bass-with-joe-2/[/url]

Peace

Joe

Edited January 12, 2011 by Joe Hubbard Bass

[Faithless]

I'd really like to go for those Skype lessons, but I think you have to have very fast Internet for smooth going?


BTW, for the Miles thing, I think I read it on Banaco's site, that Miles actually asked Stern for Banaco's phone number to get lessons from the man?

Edited January 12, 2011 by Faithless

[Joe Hubbard Bass]

[quote name='Faithless' post='1086793' date='Jan 12 2011, 03:24 PM']I'd really like to go for those Skype lessons, but I think you have to have very fast Internet for smooth going?


BTW, for the Miles thing, I think I read it on Banaco's site, that Miles actually asked Stern for Banaco's phone number to get lessons from the man?[/quote]

Yes, you do have to have a fast internet service to do the Skype lessons. For those of you who were not aware, Charlie Banacos died in December 2009. I wrote an article on my site about him:

[url="http://www.joehubbardbass.com/369/charlie-banacos-zen-master-of-jazz-improvisation/"]http://www.joehubbardbass.com/369/charlie-...-improvisation/[/url]

Peace

Joe

[Faithless]

Crap, just checked my Internet speed, and it's indeed low (for abroad connections at least..)

But with flights that cheap to London these days, maybe that's would be the way..

Edited January 12, 2011 by Faithless

[funkle]

[quote name='Joe Hubbard Bass' post='1086736' date='Jan 12 2011, 02:25 PM']Many of the top bassists, and musicians in the world have studied with Charlie. Alain Caron, Jeff Berlin, Jimmy Earl, Lincoln Goines, Bruce Gertz and many, many more. I studied with Banacos for ten years through his correspondence program. He really didn't do the ear training stuff in the same way that he did in-person, but he took me through several exercises near the end of my study with him. There is a great story that Charlie told me about Mike Stern when he was with Miles Davis. For the unwashed, Stern was a student of Banacos' for the better part of thirty years. The last time I attended Berklee, Stern was unknown and the most awesome player; he was truly awe inspiring and I got to see the likes of Stern and Jeff Berlin playing small jazz dives every week for a year. Anyway, Stern got the gig with Miles and they were rehearsing at Miles' brownstone in Manhatten. While they were taking a break, Marcus Miller was at the piano playing these ten note cluster voicings and Stern was naming every note from top to bottom- no problem. Miles was rather unimpressed by the whole thing, but that was just the way Miles acted. The next day when they began the rehearsal, Miles handed out charts to everyone except Stern. Stern then sheepishly asked Miles, "Where's my chart." Miles just said, "If you can really hear alll them notes, you don't need no chart." You see, that exercise from playing the cadence and then learning to hear one note progresses to eventually hearing clusters played together. Wayne Krantz told me he went through the same program as did Jimmy Earl.

Anyone who is interested in studying these types of improvisation exercises with me either in-person or via Skype, click on the link below for further info:

[url="http://www.joehubbardbass.com/study-bass-with-joe-2/"]http://www.joehubbardbass.com/study-bass-with-joe-2/[/url]

Peace

Joe[/quote]

Wow, great story. When I was studying with Jeff, he used to tell me stories about how he and Mike Stern spent hours by a piano testing each other with that exercise. I can't remember how many notes Jeff made it to at the same time, but I can tell you he has intimidatingly good ears.

Now I'm going to do some ear training...excuse me.. :-)

Pete

[Joe Hubbard Bass]

[quote name='funkle' post='1087185' date='Jan 12 2011, 08:32 PM']Wow, great story. When I was studying with Jeff, he used to tell me stories about how he and Mike Stern spent hours by a piano testing each other with that exercise. I can't remember how many notes Jeff made it to at the same time, but I can tell you he has intimidatingly good ears.

Now I'm going to do some ear training...excuse me.. :-)

Pete[/quote]

Yeah, I think Jeff went through that same program too. He studied with Charlie in-person when he was living in Boston. In fact, that's why he moved there. He was in New York prior to that playing with everybody and moved to Boston to study with Charlie; to invest in his own personal development. When he moved to LA, I'm pretty sure he continued studying with Charlie off and on for years.

Peace

Joe

[Bilbo]

I like the look of this ear training stuff and will look later (no access in work). I think Band in a Box has a few ear training tuition tools on it as well. I did work in this aspect using the system advocated by Mark Levine; using the notes of songs to learn intervals e.g the first two notes of Smoke on the Water are a minor third apart, the first two of My Way a sixth, Star Trek theme a flattened seventh. I have tried chordal listening but find that I am [i]much[/i] slower.

What does com eout of this discussion is the fact that these great players work damn hard on their learninig and do so for decades. They know that you can't nail it by buying a dvd and looking at Youtube clips of double thumbing.

Re: Delberthot's comments. Working on instinct not intelligence may work for some but its not something one should advocate as it gives people, particularly young impressionable people with an underdeveloped work ethic, tacit permission to avoid investing the appropriate time in studying. 'Good enough' is just not good enough

[Bilbo]

[url="http://www.good-ear.com/servlet/EarTrainer"]http://www.good-ear.com/servlet/EarTrainer[/url]

Found another free one that you can use on-line. Got me hooked!

[Tandro]

I had been trying to use this one in the past:
[url="http://www.trainear.com/"]http://www.trainear.com/[/url]

I have not done it in a while but I'll try to put a consistent 10-15 minutes a day during lunch or something. It uses the same idea Bilbo speaks of with learning intervals by relating it to songs you know. I wonder however if that is a good thing or a bad thing, as I hear an interval and I first think of the associated song then the interval. I don't know if eventually familiarity will stop me thinking of the song first and I'll 'just recognise' the interval.

[funkle]

Quick note for anyone interested. Charlie Banacos' daughter Barbara is responding to emails sent to Charlie's email and is still taking on correspondence students (in conjunction with Gary Diall). The materials are all from Charlie's legendary book of exercises. See www.charliebanacos.com.

Jeff Berlin is also doing lessons over Skype. I'm thinking of going back down this road again, since I know him well enough now.

When I see Joe Hubbard also does Skype lessons, I think that it seems we live in a time when we have an embarrassment of riches, in terms of quality materials and teaching available.

Pete

[Faithless]

Well, inspired by all this Banacos thing, last week I decided to go for it, and we've I arranged first series of one-on-one lessons (4) in London with Mr. Joe Hubbard.

I'm really looking forward to all that, and I'll keep this updated with my impressions on the lessons, for those who are interested.

For those who don't know, Joe Hubbard was a student of Charlie Banacos for a long time, and he keeps spreading Charlie's word through his lessons.

Edited January 23, 2011 by Faithless