How Do You Learn Hard Pieces?

[CMR Bass]

Just a quick little post to see how most people out there learn difficult pieces. What are your techniques? Do you learn by ear or read?

I guess it really just all depends on the piece. Some tunes I've learnt by ear and others I've had to sight read although very slowly. Most Weather Report & Jaco type stuff can be done by ear whereas tunes like Donna Lee & St. Thomas had to be sight read to get it right.

Look forward to read some replies.

[JapanAxe]

Make a transcription into Sibelius, using Capo software to slow down fast bits if necessary and/or tweak into concert pitch. Work on a section at a time. Identify the tricky bits, break into small sections, work out where I might be tripping up. Start slow and build up.

Keep a playlist to listen to in the car.

Also [url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/223371-my-little-brainwave-the-tricky-challenge/"]this[/url].

[Bilbo]

One note at a time.

[Dad3353]

A technique I've often suggested for longer pieces, taken from theatrical days... Start from the end. Choose a suitable 'chunk' at the end (last line, last page; whatever is manageable...) and get that down 'pat'. Then move towards the beginning with another 'chunk'. Learn this, plus the first part learnt. Once this is acquired, move forward again, and so on. As one continues to add 'chunks', one is playing more and more into 'chunks' already learnt, so confidence and fluidity increase each time. One is playing into one's 'comfort zone', and not the opposite.
Just my tuppence-worth; hope this helps.

[Myke]

Just as Dad says from the end backwards

[jazzyvee]

I usually start by learning the most difficult section of the piece and once that is done the rest tends to come into place much easier. If I can't technically play a section of the track then learning the rest is pointless.
I do all my learning by ear as my score reading is very rudimentary although I'm working on that.

Jazzyvee

Edited June 8, 2014 by jazzyvee

[Dad3353]

[quote name='Myke' timestamp='1402250114' post='2471364']
Just as Dad says from the end [s]backwards[/s] forwards
[/quote]

Fixed..?

[bluesparky]

Working from the end towards the beginning is something I've never even thought of, the more I think about it the more I think I'll use it - Great idea!
Normally when when I work on tricky pieces I'll break it down into sections, or natural groups of bars and work on a chunk at a time.
If there are only certain parts in a piece which are too fiddly, complex or fast for me to play naturally I'll try and get the whole piece down and then chop the offending section of the song into an MP3 of just that bit, complete with a four bar run in and run out, loop this on Transcribe! so I can slow it keep at it. Increase the speed by doing this over several practice sessions whilst also making sure I can nail the rest of the piece too.
This seems to work for me!
(If it's a piece that I naturally don't "get" I'll listen to it to death whilst driving, on a bus etc until I'm almost sick of it).

[RhysP]

I circumvent all this nonsense by only playing easy stuff.

[Old_Ben]

Never thought of learning the end first, always started from the beginning and gone section by section, gonna have to try that.

My usual method for hard / difficult bits is:
- Learn the order of the notes of the section without playing along to the music, and once I can remember the order of the notes without checking back I then play along to the piece, to get the timing of the section right.

Slowing down the track by 10-20bpm usually helps loads too if I'm having major problems.

Edited June 10, 2014 by Old_Ben

[jakenewmanbass]

Slowly

[funkle]

Slowly.

Lots of repetition.

No metronome.

Breaking it up into chunks.

Learn it by ear first. Worry about writing it down later.

If I can't work something out, I too will work backwards from the end of a phrase or tricky bit, then back to the beginning of it, then working towards the middle to fill in the tough bit.

Good luck!

[grandad]

I've been trying to learn 'Something' by George Harrison. There are a couple of very good Youtube videos to get the fingering & some fairly accurate tab sheets off the web.

As an amateur, this the most difficult tune I've attempted, (not musically trained). What it has done is encourage me to explore further up the fretboard by playing runs in the low & then up an octave.

It seems to be almost like a melody. The tricky part I'm at now is the line " Don't want to leave her now, you know I believe & how".

Each part seems to be played differently as it comes around again. I expect I'll get a simplified version under my belt, & then slowly swop the tricky bits as I master them.

[Dad3353]

[quote name='grandad' timestamp='1405291194' post='2500552']
I've been trying to learn 'Something' by George Harrison...
[/quote]

Good evening, Grandad...

As an amateur, you've not chosen the simplest of bass lines to work on..! Well done. I have a pdf of this, in both score and tab which I'll try to attach below...

[attachment=166715:Beat_Some_Bass.pdf]

... There, that should do it..! It might help you.
May I recommend Guitar Pro as a useful tool for learning this sort of stuff..? It's quite inexpensive, and one may read from the score or tab, and slow down as required, playing along to the track. There are very many titles easily available on t'web (I've an extensive collection of files...). I find it very useful, being an old duffer. Just a thought.
Hope this helps.

PS: The file name gets changed by the 'system' at upload. Save it to your hard drive and rename it 'Beat_Some_Bass.pdf' for it to be recognised by your pdf reader...

Edited July 14, 2014 by Dad3353

[grandad]

Thank you Dad3353, I shall persevere.

[Dad3353]

[quote name='grandad' timestamp='1405365376' post='2501303']
Thank you Dad3353, I shall persevere.
[/quote]

You could try the 'from the end, forwards' technique with this piece. Get the bars 39 and onwards down 'pat'. Once they're comfortable to play, then move forward to bar 36. Learn to play this through to the end; this will reinforce your acquired ending bars. Once that's smooth, move again to bar 31, play through till the end, and so on. This way, you're always moving into known territory, and you'll be more and more on 'home ground' as you progress. Worth a try..?

[paul_5]

is it wrong to say 'a dep' at this stage?

[chrismuzz]

I cheat and use tabs. Guitar Pro is good

[Dad3353]

[quote name='chrismuzz' timestamp='1405370384' post='2501368']
I cheat and use tabs..
[/quote]

'Taint cheating, just different (but maybe less good than real 'dots'..! ).

[quote name='chrismuzz' timestamp='1405370384' post='2501368']...Guitar Pro is good [/quote]

[URL=http://www.smileyvault.com/][IMG]http://www.smileyvault.com/albums/CBSA/smileyvault-cute-big-smiley-animated-041.gif[/IMG][/URL]

Tab and/or dots..! Who could ask for more..?

[julietgreen]

I've been most impressed so far with guitar tab player app (does bass and all the other instruments too). Of course like all TABs you've got to take it with a pinch of salt, but the ones I've used so far have been ok with some tweaking for better fingering. Notes and tabs are juxtaposed and it plays at different speeds and pitches. All for free. Just as a test, I tried searching for some latin jazz stuff and amazingly the TAB was available.

[icastle]

No technical wizardry, just patience and perseverance.

[ezbass]

I use anything I can lay my hands/eyes/ears on. The most technical thing I've learnt in recent months is Kate Bush's Babooshka. I looked for dots and tabs, but ultimately found listening and watching a guy playing it really well on YouTube the best source of guidance (with the aforementioned score and tab as a backup). Then it was down to lots of playing it over and over until it was ready to gig. Fortunately it is a slower piece so I didn't have to slow it down to learn, this was not the case with Rhythm Stick and Rio!

[visog]

All good advice above. I'd just add, be careful about what tunes you learn as, to misquote Rush, 'playing that song that's so elusive' over and over - part by part can render it over-familiar pretty quickly.

I know sometimes it can also reveal hidden depths and all that but be careful with your faves... just saying.

Jeff Berlin usually has too much to say about most aspects of music but he's good on learning and metronomes and re. the OP, his advice boils down to NOT switching on the metronome until your head and your hands know what they're supposed to be playing. Good advice for hard pieces when sometimes we're inclined to have a bash at an unrealistic tempo and get demoralised at the resulting train wreck.

[chris_b]

I learn all numbers in the same way; from the top, slowly, section by section and I chart the cords and structure as I go.

Complicated stuff just takes longer but the same rules apply.

[beorn]

Slowly, I try to isolate blocks thath "make sense" together and concentrate on getting that right, with the right fingering, correct economy of movement, and then repeat, repeat, repeat.
It sounds boring but it ultimately works
Sometimes I use an incremental metronome to slightly speed up if I am repeating the same chunk over and over again.
Personally I prefer to have a transcription and start from there, rather than getting everything by ear, at least I simplify a bit the process
(maybe this just comes from having played lots of classical stuff when I was a kid!)