Orchestra bass tabs. Bit confused here...

[Stub Mandrel]

1 hour ago, TimR said:

 

Do you know the fretboard (or at least all strings up to 7th fret) inside out.

 

If someone was to say play C# could you immediately put your finger on it (or them) without thinking?

 

If not, then that's the first thing you need to do before even looking at the dots. Using tabs won't ever get you there.

 

I think music teachers will try and teach you "this dot is this fret on this string", which I think might not help you. 

 

 

 

Err... yes. Of course, I know the fretboard. I know lots of scales and modes, and I know lots of intervals, chords and their inversions. All makes me a better player. Not sure what the dots would do other than make it easier to play from notation.

 

Doesn't help with the dots.

 

Thank you for your helpful guidance.

[Downunderwonder]

4 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

 

Err... yes. Of course, I know the fretboard. I know lots of scales and modes, and I know lots of intervals, chords and their inversions. All makes me a better player. Not sure what the dots would do other than make it easier to play from notation.

 

Doesn't help with the dots.

 

Thank you for your helpful guidance.

With that much theory you are streets ahead of me. But I can read dots.

 

I don't actually read the dots though. I think this may be where you are at a disconnect.

 

I read the accidentals and the rhythm pattern. The accidentals tell me I have work to do to escape the scale finger pattern and follow the funky chord.

 

A good teacher should be able to take all your known theory and use that to help you see the patterns in the dots. I reckon you would become a reading machine once the penny drops 

[Stub Mandrel]

8 hours ago, Downunderwonder said:

With that much theory you are streets ahead of me. But I can read dots.

 

I don't actually read the dots though. I think this may be where you are at a disconnect.

 

I read the accidentals and the rhythm pattern. The accidentals tell me I have work to do to escape the scale finger pattern and follow the funky chord.

 

A good teacher should be able to take all your known theory and use that to help you see the patterns in the dots. I reckon you would become a reading machine once the penny drops 

 

I've slways hoped that, but even Twinkle Twinkle Little Star is beyond my pay grade.

 

I think it's because notation is so illogical. Dots are neither always the same note nor the same degree of a scale. If the staff represented doh-re-mi etc. you could then easily read what you are doing and transpose into thecrequired key. Each chord would have the same symbols in the same place regardless of key. 

[nekomatic]

16 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

I understand the theory, it's just the note positions mean nothing to me, I believe my condition is termed dysmusia and has nothing to do with pitch skills (I don't't have perfect pitch, but I can whistle an A or a C within a few tens of cents).

 

Dyslexia and dyscalculia are recognised conditions and I believe we're getting past the assumption that people who have them 'just aren't trying hard enough' or 'just haven't been taught properly', so it would be no surprise that a similar thing exists for musical notation.

 

It's intriguing that you seem to get this for notation but not for tab. But then the brain is an intriguing and incompletely understood thing.