Seems like many people idealize learning by ear as the "right way" to learn the tunes. But who actually does learn primarily or exclusively by ear? Anyone here? Stand up and be counted.
I can read music very slowly and I wanna learn the ABC stuff, but so far (35 years of playing fiddle) I've learned everything by ear. And after that long, I'm pretty dang good at it too! Now, my playing.......... that's another thing altogether.
I learn by ear, but I'm still getting comfortable with reading music. I think most of the music readers are the ones who come from classical backgrounds---it seems to be a real hurdle for them to get over the dependence on notation.
Personally, I couldn't give a fig how someone learns a tune. You have to add to it anyway because you won't get everything you need to know from the page, but that's pretty obvious if you listen to the sound of it!
One issue of learning by ear is who you learn from. At sessions around here we play a lot of tunes exactly the way the Bothy Band, Kevin Burke, etc played them. If you speed up or slow down something you are not playing in a traditional way, based on the example of the super groups.
I love the Bothy Band, Lunasa, and all the other modern groups, but I'm bored if I get stuck trying to do covers of their arrangements.
I've learned a lot by ear, and think the skill is absolutely necessary, but I also think that notation is quite useful. I've even picked up tunes from this site.
Kennedy, I know lots of trad players who never had a lick of classical training, and they're very good sight readers. Count myself among them (although I did take two semesters of violin in college just to get a different perspective on technique, but I'd already been fiddling for years).
The important thing about sight reading is to use the dots or abcs as just another aural source, another way to hear the tune in your head. You'll know you've got it when you can hear the tune by just scanning the notation, without following along on an instrument.
I can sight read abcs at least as fast as sheet music, both at about three-quarter session speed (whatever that means). And I pick up lots of tunes on the fly at sessions or when swapping tunes with other players. Sometimes I'll ask for a complex phrase slowed down and repeated a few times to make sure I'm getting the notes.
None of this is rocket surgery--it just takes practice, like every other aspect of playing music. And the more abilities you can bring to your playing, the better off (less limited) you'll be.
I like to think that most of the time I only 'learn' a tune from the dots because I've already half learnt it by ear and liked it enough to use the dots to speed up the process.
Taking this argument further, I would suggest that even when learning a tune from the dots I am still learning by ear. Because I might play it over and over again from the dots listening to the tune such as I can generate, until the music is learnt by ear. As a bonus while I am doing this my fingers are learning to find their way around the tune also.
I am not saying this is the way I like to do it. Just that if I had no-one to teach me a particular tune and I had no recording of it this is how I would be learning the tune from the dots.
Having been a music major I have no problem reading music, but it became obvious early in my experience with ITM that learning by ear is far superior. The written music is missing everything that defines ITM and distinguishes it from other genres. To get a good feel for the style, learning by ear is essential. Once you've honed your sense of the style you can interpret the written music yourself, but even then I still prefer to hear it first.
The best way I've found for learning tunes is to wait until you hear it in your head before attempting to put it in your instrument. You can accomplish this by listening often to your favorite CDs, or by listening as others play the tune in your local session.
Many times now I've started playing a tune at home without having actually sat down to learn it. Then the next time it comes up at the session I can play along with no problem. I think this is the way people in Ireland learn most of their tunes since they're likely to have a strong local session to attend. I'm very lucky to have a decent session scene here in SF that has given me the opportunity to learn tunes by osmosis in this way.
I have been learning pretty much exclusively by ear for years now on a variety of different instruments and I think it helps tremendously. I've found it helps you get a much better feel for the real rhythm and style of the tune, the type of stuff you can't really pick up off the page, and what seems to me to be the real magic of ITM.
However I'm not denying the usefulness of being able to also read music.
I can read music (although abc's are still a challenge for me), but I prefer to learn music by hearing it. I'd say, like Will, 90% I learn by ear.
I don't know why its music that sticks by hearing it. Languages certainly don't. I've been trying to learn French for years. I can read it and understand it, but I am hopeless at speaking it with any sort of recognizable accent. But I can pick up French tunes by hearing them.
I think Will has it right - reading music is just another way of getting the music into your head. Its not bad or wrong or less inspired or untraditional or anything except just another way to get the music into your head.
Scenario one:
"A stranger played this tune the other day in the pub and I loved it. He didn't have a name for it, and I only remember a snippet abcabc/abcabc etc. Does anyone know the tune? point me to a recording? have the dots? I'd really appreciate it."
Scenario two:
"I was browsing through this tune book the other day and I came across a lovely tune neither I nor any of my mates have ever come across before. Google came up blank. Has anyone heard any one play it? abcabc/abcabc etc. I'd love to hear someone else's take on it, pace, phrasing etc."
Scenario three:
"I've got such and such on a recording of such and such playing a brilliant tune. I absolutely love it and would love to learn it. Has anyone got the dots?"
I learn traditional/folk tunes by ear and allways have done. But i can read music and use those skills to either play classical/spanish guitar. Or to learn tunes from books which i have no opourtunity to hear.
I think there's a marked difference between types of music which makes ITM seem relatively easy to learn by ear( the tunes just seem to stick in your head) but makes classical music almost impossible. I've been playing classical guitar for about 17 years and i can only play one tune without the music!
I would also agree that if your can't hear a tune in your head then you can't play it! Where as if you can hear it and you know your instrument well, it should be pretty straight forward. This doesn't apply to more complex things like chords of course.
There are advantages to both methods and I think the consensus is that musicians should be able to make use of all the tools at their disposal. New players, whatever their technical skills, though will need to use their ear a lot more until they gain familiarity with the genre. The dots do have a big advantage in that the tune doesn't need to have been previously recorded or you don't need to have heard someone play it. Also once you've developed reasonable sight reading skills you can learn tunes on the train, plane or bus!
Though there are different levels of skill here. Velvet is quite right to point out that irish diddley music is relatively easy to learn by ear, I can do it no problem, but I'd really really struggle with a Thelonious Monk tune, chords and all. But there are those who can do this kind of stuff no problem. I had a mate who could tell you every note in a passage of 10 finger piano chords after only one hearing. He wasn't born that way mind, he learned it.
There are two things I always gripe about when this comes up:
The first is that - and it was mentioned above - very little of what makes the music what it is can be found on the page. Though this can have the advantage of you being able to put that stuff in, if you have the prior knowledge. However, and this happens all too often, those who don't have the prior knowledge think that what's on the paper is how it goes.
Will, I agree that reading music is absolutely worthwhile (and I'll have you know I'm working on learning abc's just so I can follow your posts!). My comment on classically trained musicians having trouble with learning by ear came from the many threads I've seen here and on other sites---I've seen so many people talk about how difficult it is for them to learn music without the tool they were trained to use. It makes sense, in a way---if you study an instrument for years and get whacked by your teacher/conductor every time you deviate from what's on the page, you're going to develop an approach that says that's the right way to do it, and coming to traditional music must be quite a shift.
By the way, I took your advice on learning octaves against open strings and copied out Brenda Stubbert's onto staff paper, and I can string the notes together now, and should have it up to speed in a month or so, It is an excellent exercise for intonation, as you said!
I also agree that reading music is absolutely worthwhile. It has to be stressed though, with this music it is not necessary. However, the ability to learn a tune by ear is. And I worry for those who come to it with the attitude that they don't need to learn to play by ear, because they can already read.
Michael, you really need to mellow out. Who are these people, exactly? And where are you meeting them? Are there really people walking into Sandy Bell's, Edinburgh's legendary session pub, who can't learn by ear? Are there people on TheSession who think they don't need to learn by ear? Because if there are, I must have missed their posts (and by now I've read years of threads from this site!).
Once upon a time, I could only learn by ear but I'm glad to be able to do both now.
"Are there really people walking into Sandy Bell's, Edinburgh's legendary session pub, who can't learn by ear?"
Yes, I'm afraid so and in many other session pubs too.
Many of the tunes I know I've learned "off the dots" but even then I've got to listen to recordings and other players to hear how they are interpreted. If I don't manage this, I'll still try to adapt them to my own style of playing (which is admittedly nothing great )
I reckon most of the people here realise that "learning by ear" is all important but I've not found this to be the case in the "real world". Many people just can't cope without "the dots" and there is even a worrying trend for people to bring in books/sheet music for tunes (and songs too for that matter) although this doesn't usually happen in Sandy Bells.
I gave up learning by notes when I realized I wasn't memorizing the tunes. Learning by ear is more efficient, even if it is hard for me. I still look at the notes for the measure or two that eludes my ear.
My theory - anyone agree?
If I learn a tune by ear then it goes direct to the brain and my fingers remember it well. Learn from the dots (I am a adequate sight reader) and the tune goes a less direct route to the fingers and although I might play it sooner, it takes longer to remember.
So learning by ear is what I'm aiming for....
I learn by ear without problem but write it down as I get that many tunes in my head, some tunes fall by the way. But if you dot them down, you can return back to them at a later date. I am sure I have forgotten more tunes than I have learned.
I agree, although I should add that (in a sense) you can actually be learning it by ear as you are learning from the dots without actually hearing anyone else play the tune. You are "learning by ear" from yourself so to speak so you can still be internalising the tune in your head which is what you need to do before you actually know it.
However, in such an instance, you have to be sure that you've been reading the dots and interpreting the tune correctly otherwise you'll learn it wrongly by ear too.
Basically, I'm suggesting that you never really know a tune until it becomes familiar to you and it has to "get into your head" somehow. The only way to do this is by listening, consciously or otherwise.
I'm not really sure how you would know when someone in "Sandy Bells" had learnt their tunes by ear or from the dots? Surely they play them without music either way? I have very very rarely been to a session (even a crap one) where someone has had to use music. It defeats the object of a session somewhat and makes it into a sort of play around. Northumbrian piping societies do this. They all bring books and then pick a couple of tunes each. What does everyone think of that?
100% ear. Self taught from childhood, even worse! Old patterns are hard to break, I have tried to learn to read sometimes, but always revert to ear because it's easier for me, then forget how to read again.
I think I may try to learn to read for whistle.... too many notes on a guitar, and the complication of fingerstyle is two fingers or more going at once on different strings. That's why they invented Tab though..... but honestly I have a problem with tab, though easier to read for guitar. With tab you end up literally doing a tune exactly like the person who wrote it. At least with bare bones notes you can add your own touch to the skeleton of the tune, I feel freer without notes or tab. It would be handy to at least read for whistle to decipher a tune in a book though.
Still, there are tunes I love and funny enough... I do go home and play by memory a lot.... thus a different setting.... a polite way of saying you play it wrong because your memory is bad!
A few times people have asked where this or that setting came from that I play, they like it and want to use it. A bit embarrassing, but funny too..... this must be where different settings come from.... poor memory in ear players!
Call me disturbing then. I can recognize a lot of tunes, I can usually lilt them, but I have a hard time translating what I hear into fingerings on my instrument -- there's a disconnect there, especially if the tune is too fast. I can pick up waltzes and the like by ear (on good days), but not jigs or reels. I do sometimes pull out one of a couple bound together tune books I made at our session. I don't spend all my time staring at the music, but I need it as a reminder of where my fingers go.
oh dear, "disturbing" wasn't the wisest word choice. It's so easy to unintentionally offend on a message board. Sorry about that.
Doesn't it slow you down, though? All the sessions I've been to just rip along and there is barely time to recognize the tune they're on before they chug right into the next one.
I've decided my own strategy is to learn tunes 20% faster than I want to play them, just in case I need to keep up with others around me. This is all hypothetical, of course, while I'm learning...
I can read sheet music and I can play by ear which is a skill that has improved greatly since playing in sessions. I have also discovered that I can finger-read a banjo as the tuning and fingering are the same as for a fiddle. Am I allowed a smug grin, or does that count as cheating??
Nope...it doesn't slow me down much at all. If I recognize the tune, I usually do within the first bar or two and I know exactly where it is in the book. By the time they're onto the second time through (and three times through seems to be the general rule of thumb), I'm in the game. I don't need the music for every tune, but just for ones I haven't gotten committed to memory yet. My ear is improving little by little, so sometimes I can get little snippets of tunes by ear at session but I usually can't just pick up an entire tune by ear like some others can. I was never trained that way so learning by ear is a constant struggle.
I wasn't offended, by the way. I was just really amused that someone might find me disturbing because I read music.
I know I won't be able to pick up a tune by ear at speed at a session until I have a lot more experience. I'm amazed that you can play that fast with notes in front of you, though. I imagine all that visual input would just confuse me---there's enough to pay attention to, what with listening to the music, watching everyone else, playing myself, etc.
Have you tried recording your session and trying to play along with those reels at home? That might help your ear. I've been doing that this week and it's been great because I can try things over and over again with no one watching. It's also nice to pick out the different variations everyone played.
I'm solely an ear learner. It's always been how i learn. and it's just so easy for me now- i can listen to a tune and pick it up after maybe the second time through...
Quote from kennedy:
"Are there people on TheSession who think they don't need to learn by ear? Because if there are, I must have missed their posts (and by now I've read years of threads from this site!"
Every week, with out fail some one poste a question:
"I've got such and such on a recording of such and such playing a brilliant tune. I absolutely love it and would love to learn it. Has anyone got the dots?"
I knew you would pipe up on this, Michael. Okay, fine, you're correct, there are people who feel they can't learn without written notes. Crysania admits she *wants* to learn by ear but can't do it yet, and so falls back on the page from lack of confidence and experience. Why don't you offer a few tips instead of getting angry and putting people down? You obviously know what you're talking about. Maybe you can help others learn from what you know.
As I'm still quite new to learning the fiddle I still find it hard to learn by ear. Hopefully in years to come I'll be able to do it better than now. My brain doesn't seem to be wired that way yet.
Although having said that at my fiddle lessons the teacher does teach us the tunes by ear, then gives us the sheet music and I practice until I can play without the sheet music, we are not allowed to look at the music at the lessons. Sometimes I'll record her playing the tune on my dictaphone if I've never heard it before and it's really a mixture of both. So I suppose I am learning by ear, sort of by osmosis.
The teacher didn't used to teach sheet music but has come to the conclusion that it is a good skill to have as your not limited to learning tunes one way.
I'm not up to a decent enough standard yet to even go to a session never mind play in one LOL, but maybe one day??
OK. I'm sorry, I'll take that on board.
I understand that it can be daunting. But like anything, the effort you put in is recompensed.
Start with the basics, Hear a tune in you head, a simple tune, baa baa black sheep maybe. Start by hearing it in you head. Start by listening to the intervals. Hear the root. Does it start on the root? Does it move to the fifth? ((Does the phrase "the fifth" matter?) Internalise the process of hearing it. Very importantly though, don't think of it as starting on a particular finger on a particular string or holes on a flute. Think of a root, imagine it as an abstract thing and build from it purely aurally.
One thing I can definitely do, Kennedy, is read music at speed. I really don't remember NOT being able to read music and sight-reading has always come easily to me. I don't entirely go back to the notes out of a lack of confidence -- more that I can learn more and learn it quicker if I resort to reading music rather than listening.
I know how to develop my ears -- and to a point I'm good with them. I can write down simple tunes and I can easily pick up tunes that aren't going at bat out of hell speed. I have methods that aren't too much like the last posters for learning tunes by ear: the concept of "chunking" is one I teach my students (I teach aural skills, ironically -- but those are generally played much slower than tunes are, so I can easily get those) -- hearing scalar patterns and arpeggios, knowing which outlines the tonic triad or the dominant, etc. Picking out the specific intervals between notes is a little like not seeing the forest for the trees. I find it's better to take bits of the tune and piece them together than trying to figure out one note at a time. I'm working on applying it during sessions, but sometimes it's just more fun to play tunes than it is to spend some of the time working on my ears.
Could I record session? Possibly, though I don't currently own a recording device. I've sometimes taken the time to slow down recordings I own a bit and learn from them. But it doesn't take long before I get tired of it and start to read through tunes again.
i only use dsheet music if really stuck with a certain part of a tune. so much more interesting to pick up variety of ornamentation learning by ear. i tend to find a fiddler whose style i like (eg brian conway recently) and learn a few sets from an album before moving on to someone else. you can use windows media player to play tunes at different speeds which is pretty handy too.
Buttercup: I think you may be missing a trick. Learning by ear is so useful, if you can do it, and you're at the perfect stage (just starting a new instrument) to make it your preferred method of learning.
You're "still quite new to learning the fiddle". So, MAKE yourself learn entirely by ear now, and put some effort into it, and you'll find that, after a rough month or so, you'll start to develop it as a completely natural thing to do. The years of sheer pleasure in picking up tunes wherever you go on your travels will recompense the initial effort hundreds, if not thousands of times over.
"Seems like many people idealize learning by ear as the "right way" to learn the tunes. But who actually does learn primarily or exclusively by ear? Anyone here? Stand up and be counted."
We've hashed this over so many times on this board, but there are clearly a lot of new people, so maybe this is worth repeating:
Everyone who can hear learns by ear. We all learn common songs like Happy Birthday by ear. Think of all the pop music you can hum along to even though you've never seen the dots. Most of us get songs stuck in our heads from overexposure on radio, Muzak, etc. So all I have to do to evoke certain annoyingly sticky melodies is type a few lyrics:
"Oh Mandy, you came and you gave without taking."
"We are the champions, we are the champions, we are the champions...of the world."
"She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah."
"Like a candle in the wind."
Yes, trad tunes have a few more notes and tend to run at a faster pace. You can still get them in your head with enough exposure and attentive listening. And once they're in your head, you can slow them down mentally and replay them at whatever pace you need to find them on your instrument. The better you know your instrument, the easier this will be.
With a little practice, you can also change the pitch or key of tunes in your head, play variations, even try out different rhythms and degrees of swing or pulse. The more you do this (with or without an instrument in your hands), the easier it will be to pick up tunes, and to match your actual playing with what you hear in your mind's ear.
Like anything else, you have to *do* it to get good at it. But the musical rewards are well worth it.
Thanks Will. I'm at work and now I'm going to have Barry Manilow running through my head all afternoon. And seeing that poster of him I saw the other night, with his skin pulled back like shrink wrap from all the work he's had done. Thanks a lot.
I agree with whoosis above. The longer you play in sessions, the quicker you pick up fast and hitherto unknown tunes by ear - at any rate if they're played regularly. First you get the main gist of the tune, then you listen out for how the fiddler, or whoever, plays the knotty bits.
I generally learn by ear, but I also find it very helpful as a learning technique when I'm listening from a CD to do a transcription by hand. There's something about writing down all the notes that helps me to get a visual pattern of the tune and makes it easier for me to remember
But learning how to read music has helped me a lot to get tunes by ear: it's enabled me to break tunes down, as I hear them, into their measures ("dots") and bars, and thus fix them in my mind.
Kennedy wrote: "My comment on classically trained musicians having trouble with learning by ear came from the many threads I've seen here and on other sites---I've seen so many people talk about how difficult it is for them to learn music without the tool they were trained to use. It makes sense, in a way---if you study an instrument for years and get whacked by your teacher/conductor every time you deviate from what's on the page, you're going to develop an approach that says that's the right way to do it, and coming to traditional music must be quite a shift."
This is absolutely true. My studies in college involved a lot of focus on baroque, renaissance and medieval music. I was taught that since so much was left out of the notation the “dots” had to be interpreted, but I still needed to follow sheet music to play my part within the music. As a first recorder player my part was often the melody, but I was astonished after years of playing and performing the music how little of it I was committed to memory. It wasn’t that I hadn’t been memorizing any other music at the time because I studied classical music and memorized many complex compositions on piano. I also studied jazz and improvisation, which required memorization and intuition, but you needed to be able to follow charts. But with all of that experience I still couldn’t play the melodies from the early music I performed without the sheet music in front of me.
When I became interested in ITM the sessions I attended had no example of any one reading music. The concerts I went to had none as well. I realized that I would need to memorize this music if I wanted to learn it. For that reason I developed my abilities to learn by ear from the start even though I was a proficient site-reader. It was a bit of a struggle at first but well worth the effort when I saw the results. Like I said above in this thread, the ability to read the music is a great tool, but learning by ear has extraordinary advantages.
As a youngster, I was taught by band masters that musicians play from sheet music (I know, perish the thought). So the fact that I was mostly playing by ear was my secret shame. Now I play in a genre where the sheet music is the habit that is better left at home behind closed doors.
But I still like referring to sheet music, because often nice little bits and turns of phrase that get glossed over either by players I am listening to, or glossed over by my ear as the tune flies by, jump out of the written page at me. So sheet music is a nice supplement. And since I am too much of a neo-Luddite to be able to use a recording device (let alone one with handy slowing down the tune features), sheet music is my low-tech "Slow Downer."
I learn tunes both ways. My fiddle teacher teaches me by ear and then records the music onto a cassette. This keeps the tunes totally by ear. However, many of the tunes I learn by the sheet music, mostly because I do not have access to many tunes that are played slow enough to get. I would love to play mostly by ear; hopefully when I am better at the fiddle, I will be able to learn tunes played at a faster pace. Yesterday, I tried to learn a reel played at half pace, and it took at least 45 minutes to learn the first part mostly. I remember some of my fiddle lessons where my teacher had to repeat a phrase up to 10 times, very slowly before I got the rhythm, but I eventually got it. Another thing I like about learning by ear is that I tend to play the tunes I learn by ear better than the tunes I learn by sheet music.
Definitely by ear. I'm one of the slowest dot readers I know. The more I relied on learning by ear, the less practice I had with actually reading the music.
Does it get in my way? I don't think so, unless someone wants me to play Scottish country dance music and plunks a 4 tune set in front of me!
Is one way better than the other? No- I think it's really about your own learning style, what's more comfortable for you.
One thing that helps me to learn by ear is humming or singing the tune. Once it's in your head, it's easier to play.
Using dots is all about visual perception in an overwhelmingly visual culture.Reading notation is perceiving visual symbols (this dot represents this pitch which is three semi-tones above that note on the fourth line...etc.) which are then translated into conceptual patterns in the brain. These concepts have to be translated into 'aural' patterns -the tune in the head'. Finally they can be reproduced on the player's instrument.
Sounds reaching the brain directly -learning by ear- are assimilated as aural patterns and with minimal analysis can be reproduced by the competent musician as sound again. We just need to minimize our dependence on percieving in a visual manner and concentrate on the sounds. After all, we're musicians, not visual artists!
I learn tunes by ear probably 99% of the time. The other 1% is mostly filling in details that didn't stick in my ear.
Good point from Donough. For me, too, learning from dots is also ear learning. I've never been a good sight reader, so I decipher the music and memorize it. Then I actually *learn* it by hearing myself play it.
JNW, that's my point--a really good sight reader doesn't "translate" visual patterns into aural ones--they're one and the same. The black splotch on a line in a stave doesn't represent anything. It *is* a specific sound. That's the difference between a mechanical sight reader and an aural sight reader. Despite being in a visual medium, the result is purely aural. For most people, this takes years of immersion in dots and sounds. I was lucky. I learned to sight read at 7, but then spent the next 41 years playing by ear. The dots (and now abcs) have always just been sounds to me, not graphic image code for sounds.
I have dabbled about with dots and tab and never been a great reader. I never considered myself to be able to learn by ear either but somehow I would use a recording of the tune and then painfully follow the dots... but I needed to hear it first to understand the dots.
I invested a lot of time in trying to get fast at reading. I have improved but I'm still poor.
Now I have decided to stop mucking about and just 'learn to learn' by ear and it has been easier than I expected. Sometimes there's a note or two I just don't seem to get and know what I'm playing is wrong. Then I will turn to the dots for a quick prompt.
I am finding that learning by ear is rewarding, gets the tune in my head quicker and gives me the mental freedom to ornament as I see fit (rather than feel straight-jacketed by a mechanical process laid down by the dots) AND helps my reading (!). All this and it's FREE! It is also not as daunting as I first thought. It is really all just about listening carefully and NOT playing straight away. I wish I'd done this sooner.
i love learning by ear, and i do so most of the time. but if i'm at a practice session with my band and i really cannot be arsed to pick it up by ear, i'll look at the dots. at the end of the day, its just as effective.
This discussion is about 'learning' tunes, and you learn by remembering not by following. Like learning lines from Shakespeare or something: you put away the copy, whether it be printed, recorded, or whatever, and see if you can recite it. Then you take a quick look at the bit you forgot, and try again. Next day, you try without even looking at the copy. Eventually you internalize it. The difference between learning from the notes someone jotted down years ago and learning from a modern recording is that you are doing the interpreting. That way you might produce something that isn't just a clone of someone else's interpretation. You might even find some unusual tunes, and create your own sets, and surprise a few people.
I can pick up a tune at a session by ear but in order to remember it I usually find the ABC and generate a score. A very useful ear-training exercise is to take a tune you know well and play it in another key. Try this first with a relatively simple tune like Castle Kelly; it has a different character in the key of F, as an example. Doing this helps fix the structure of the tune in your head apart from the key-related mechanics of playing the tune in a particular key on your instrument, whatever it might be.
I've noticed a few times, on different threads, that there are a number of people who will just contrast learning from the dots with learning from a CD. But, personally, I would say that learning from a CD (or any recording) is really not much better than learning from the dots. The trick is to learn from real, live people.
This discussion raises something I never thought deeply about before, but probably one of the reasons I can only "kind of" read sheet music. The sheet music tells me mechanically where my fingers should go on the instrument, I don't see the note and think a sound. So there is an extra "layer" of thinking between what I am seeing and what sound I am producing.
Hmmmmmm...............
benhall's point shouldn't be lost in the other helpful clutter here. Learning a tune from another person, face to face, really is a great way to go. It becomes an interpersonal or social experience, and the tune will then always carry the fullness of that experience. Which is a big part of what playing the music is all about--connecting with other people. That's by far how I prefer to learn tunes.
Absolutely agree with you whoosis, no layer problems at all when you are side by side with someone who is giving you a new tune! Paper music can't even begin to compete with that!!!!
Benhall and Whoosis got it just right. I'm still a newbie, been learning only by ear for two years now. I had a magical moment last session when, sitting next to a great piper, I picked up two jigs at speed and played them each through by the third time. Found out that he had learned them at a session from Ronan Browne. Pass it on, that's what it's all about.
I first learned music by playing guitar with my Dad, who sang and accompanied himself on the guitar. So, I learned by imitation. Neither by ear or by dots. Playing by ear seemed like magic to me then: Either you had it or you didn't, and I didn't.
Later, I learned to read music. In my (retrospectively relatively sparse) experience with "schooled" musicians, it seemed that being a proficient sight reader was highly esteemed and considered a mark of being a great musician.
From years of exposure, my ear gradually got better. As time went on, I came to have a higher regard for a good ear than for being a good reader. Still, most of what I have learned has been from reading music. But I always preferred playing a piece from memory to reading it. My experience in both performing, and in watching others perform, is that something in the communication between musician and listener seems to be lost when the performance is read. Also, I began to notice that if I always read the music, I would not memorize it. I played in ensembles where I memorized the music, and after years of playing the repertoire together, others in the ensemble still had to have the music in front of them to play it. So, I came to regard reading as a valuable skill, but, for me, most valuable when used as a tool to learn a piece of music. If I like the music, I want to know it, not have to read it every time. If I have not played a piece for a long time, it is good to have the dots available to re-learn, re-memorize the tune.
I guess I'm going at it entirely backasswards--I re-learned to read sheet music so I could learn more Irish tunes in the few good years I have left. It was just too slow, laboriously picking them out a few notes at a time.
I know that sheet music alone cannot teach a person how to play this music properly. But it can help jump-start the learning process on a new tune.
And the more tunes I pack into my head, the better I get at picking up new ones up by ear, because I have more examples of typical phrases to draw from. So I think reading and learning by ear feed each other, in a way.
I agree with mickray. My ability to read has allowed me to play hundreds of tunes that folks only learning by ear wouldn't have access to. Hours spent playing through tune books cover-to-cover have jump-started me to better intonation and phrasing, and now also learning faster by ear.
Written music is a tool, and the ability to read is a skill that can serve you well as long as you can commit tunes to memory and break the 'need to read' habit. Once you've got it down, you have to let the tune 'morph' , anyway, to conform with the version played in local sessions.
Life is short - Anything that helps me achieve competence on the fiddle faster is worthwhile. I say if you can read, don't let folks tell you that Irish music is only learned by ear. Read, play, learn, enjoy.
Irish music IS only learned by ear.
Sure you can learn skeletons of tunes from books. But that ain't playing Irish music.
Read (if you want, though you don't have to), play, learn (...how to play properly), enjoy.
Irish music is only learned by ear, but after you've learned it you can pick up a few tunes from books and such. If you're relying on sheet music to learn your tunes you might consider reevaluating your approach. If you’re just starting out – back away from the sheet music and wait until you’ve learned about 100 tunes or so by ear. Even then you should use extreme caution when approaching sheet music since it requires such serious interpretation.
A hypothetical question: If someone who has learned a lot of tunes by ear encounters some sheet music for a new tune, might that person be able to play it somewhat properly by comparing it to similar tunes? Give it lift, put suitable ornaments in the right places, etc? It seems that there must be rules and conventions that can be learned and applied.
Me, I'm not that adept--yet. But if I keep hacking away with any and all weapons I can find (sessions, computer slowdowners, video clips of expert players, and yes sometimes the dots as well) I think I might get there someday.
I also saw members of Altan use sheet music in concert once. Mairead did apologize for it, but said, "We really wanted to play the tune for you."
But it really is a laugh to me, llig. I'd bet you money that from just listening you wouldn't be able to tell if a fiddler (someone you admire- someone who is alive today if That's possible) learned a particular tune by ear or from written music. A good fiddler knows how to play around with the tune, make it his own, etc....... he doesn't always have to have learned it by ear first. That's my opinion and you're welcome (as always) to stomp all over my opinion again like you did the last time. It's not going to change what I think or what anyone else thinks either, for that matter.
well Juliette, I can copy/paste from my postings above:
"very little of what makes the music what it is can be found on the page. Though this can have the advantage of you being able to put that stuff in, if you have the prior knowledge."
or
"I agree that reading music is absolutely worthwhile."
Or from that other "class tune" thread:
"Please don't get the impression I am against writing music down. I am against people using it as their primary reference"
But as for stomping on you opinions: Do you stand by your opinion that a player's "creative fire and passion" is as important as his ability to "play the right notes"?
1. It is not possible to learn how ITM should sound by reading music. This can only be learned by listening to the music, performed live and/or recorded.
2. It is possible to learn tunes by reading music. However, see #5 below.
3. It is possible to learn tunes by ear. There are significant benefits from learning this way and a lot of players advocate using this approach.
4. Different players have personal preferences for how they like to learn tunes -- from sheet music, from another player, from sessions, from recordings, some or all of the above -- and each of these methods has the potential to work just fine.
5. To a greater degree than when learning a tune using an ear-based method, a player must supplement a tune as learned from sheet music with the stylistic elements of ITM (ornamentation, accents, variations, etc).
llig, sir:
A person can play all the "right" notes.... whatever those are....... but if there is no creative input or feeling, then the music tends to sound mechanical rather than musical. That's just my opinion. There are lots of opinions out there - thanks very much for allowing me to express one of mine. I even apologize for getting offended!
Have good days
surrounded by music
that you enjoy.
Respectfully yours,
An actor usually learns his/her part by reading a script a sufficient number of times until it's in memory. Only then can the really difficult part of interpreting the script and bringing it to life take place - with the assistance of the director and interaction with other actors.
Learning music from the dots is similar. When it is so deep in memory that you're not aware of it, only then can you put your own interpretation on it and also bring it to life.
If you learn a tune from a recording or from a teacher initially what you will have in your head will be a copy of what you have heard or been taught. It is only later that, as the music matures inside you, you start to develop the tune and really make it your own. We all know players who learn a tune from a cd and when they've "learned" it, leave it at that. Whenever they play that tune it's fairly obvious where they got it from. The next stage of making the tune their own - which might mean some deconstruction and reconstruction - is difficult and takes time, but the end result is always worth it.
Is learning by ear lazy? Maybe not. I learn almost exclusively by ear. Those tunes I check for passages I couldn't figure out using the dots is an agonizing trial. What is even weirder is that I teach HD. Students who are dead beginners tend to learn best by ear. Often I think I'm doing them a disservice not teaching them to play with the dots. Students who have had some formal training on piano or other instrument insist on seeing the music through dots. I often got frustrated, at not their abilities but that the tune went through their eyes, through their arm to their hands without much thought between. Other observations was that classically trained students at a certain level tended to learn by ear, or at least know enough about the structure of a tune to fake it without the dots. My conclusion is that like the old math classes there were lessons to learn. If you got done early the teacher might give you the "extension" lesson, something at a higher level. I might occasionally believe that I'm messing up a student by not teaching dots but then again am I not rather teaching them the extension?
Hi jrathbun,
Do you mean hammered dulcimer?
Teaching by ear is the higher-level extension course in my opinion. You're doing your students a favor. If they want to know how to read music, you could probably teach them sight singing (since, as you well know, it helps immensely to look at the sound-board as you play).
Learning by ear
Learning by ear
Seems like many people idealize learning by ear as the "right way" to learn the tunes. But who actually does learn primarily or exclusively by ear? Anyone here? Stand up and be counted.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by timmy!
Re: Learning by ear
I do. Probably 90% of the tunes I know and through close to 30 years of playing fiddle.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Will Harmon
Re: Learning by ear
I can't read music, so I learn only by ear, and I love it!
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by m
Re: Learning by ear
I can read music very slowly and I wanna learn the ABC stuff, but so far (35 years of playing fiddle) I've learned everything by ear. And after that long, I'm pretty dang good at it too! Now, my playing.......... that's another thing altogether.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by wardelliott
Re: Learning by ear
Dot-bound and proud of it- it's the most efficient way for me to learn anything.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Greg the Piano Tuner
Re: Learning by ear
I learn by ear, but I'm still getting comfortable with reading music. I think most of the music readers are the ones who come from classical backgrounds---it seems to be a real hurdle for them to get over the dependence on notation.
Personally, I couldn't give a fig how someone learns a tune. You have to add to it anyway because you won't get everything you need to know from the page, but that's pretty obvious if you listen to the sound of it!
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
One issue of learning by ear is who you learn from. At sessions around here we play a lot of tunes exactly the way the Bothy Band, Kevin Burke, etc played them. If you speed up or slow down something you are not playing in a traditional way, based on the example of the super groups.
I love the Bothy Band, Lunasa, and all the other modern groups, but I'm bored if I get stuck trying to do covers of their arrangements.
I've learned a lot by ear, and think the skill is absolutely necessary, but I also think that notation is quite useful. I've even picked up tunes from this site.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by dwdeacon
Re: Learning by ear
half and half, depends how lazy i feel.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by rubixcube
Re: Learning by ear
Kennedy, I know lots of trad players who never had a lick of classical training, and they're very good sight readers. Count myself among them (although I did take two semesters of violin in college just to get a different perspective on technique, but I'd already been fiddling for years).
The important thing about sight reading is to use the dots or abcs as just another aural source, another way to hear the tune in your head. You'll know you've got it when you can hear the tune by just scanning the notation, without following along on an instrument.
I can sight read abcs at least as fast as sheet music, both at about three-quarter session speed (whatever that means). And I pick up lots of tunes on the fly at sessions or when swapping tunes with other players. Sometimes I'll ask for a complex phrase slowed down and repeated a few times to make sure I'm getting the notes.
None of this is rocket surgery--it just takes practice, like every other aspect of playing music. And the more abilities you can bring to your playing, the better off (less limited) you'll be.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Will Harmon
Re: Learning by ear
I like to think that most of the time I only 'learn' a tune from the dots because I've already half learnt it by ear and liked it enough to use the dots to speed up the process.
Taking this argument further, I would suggest that even when learning a tune from the dots I am still learning by ear. Because I might play it over and over again from the dots listening to the tune such as I can generate, until the music is learnt by ear. As a bonus while I am doing this my fingers are learning to find their way around the tune also.
I am not saying this is the way I like to do it. Just that if I had no-one to teach me a particular tune and I had no recording of it this is how I would be learning the tune from the dots.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Donough
Re: Learning by ear
Having been a music major I have no problem reading music, but it became obvious early in my experience with ITM that learning by ear is far superior. The written music is missing everything that defines ITM and distinguishes it from other genres. To get a good feel for the style, learning by ear is essential. Once you've honed your sense of the style you can interpret the written music yourself, but even then I still prefer to hear it first.
The best way I've found for learning tunes is to wait until you hear it in your head before attempting to put it in your instrument. You can accomplish this by listening often to your favorite CDs, or by listening as others play the tune in your local session.
Many times now I've started playing a tune at home without having actually sat down to learn it. Then the next time it comes up at the session I can play along with no problem. I think this is the way people in Ireland learn most of their tunes since they're likely to have a strong local session to attend. I'm very lucky to have a decent session scene here in SF that has given me the opportunity to learn tunes by osmosis in this way.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning by ear
I have been learning pretty much exclusively by ear for years now on a variety of different instruments and I think it helps tremendously. I've found it helps you get a much better feel for the real rhythm and style of the tune, the type of stuff you can't really pick up off the page, and what seems to me to be the real magic of ITM.
However I'm not denying the usefulness of being able to also read music.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Tottol
Re: Learning by ear
I can read music (although abc's are still a challenge for me), but I prefer to learn music by hearing it. I'd say, like Will, 90% I learn by ear.
I don't know why its music that sticks by hearing it. Languages certainly don't. I've been trying to learn French for years. I can read it and understand it, but I am hopeless at speaking it with any sort of recognizable accent. But I can pick up French tunes by hearing them.
I think Will has it right - reading music is just another way of getting the music into your head. Its not bad or wrong or less inspired or untraditional or anything except just another way to get the music into your head.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by John Culhane
Re: Learning by ear
I have been learning eclusivly by ear for a while.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Why Bother?
Re: Learning by ear
With a handle like 'Unseen' you would have to learn by ear
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Donough
Re: Learning by ear
Great thread, thanks everybody.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by timmy!
Re: Learning by ear
Scenario one:
"A stranger played this tune the other day in the pub and I loved it. He didn't have a name for it, and I only remember a snippet abcabc/abcabc etc. Does anyone know the tune? point me to a recording? have the dots? I'd really appreciate it."
Scenario two:
"I was browsing through this tune book the other day and I came across a lovely tune neither I nor any of my mates have ever come across before. Google came up blank. Has anyone heard any one play it? abcabc/abcabc etc. I'd love to hear someone else's take on it, pace, phrasing etc."
Scenario three:
"I've got such and such on a recording of such and such playing a brilliant tune. I absolutely love it and would love to learn it. Has anyone got the dots?"
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
I learn traditional/folk tunes by ear and allways have done. But i can read music and use those skills to either play classical/spanish guitar. Or to learn tunes from books which i have no opourtunity to hear.
I think there's a marked difference between types of music which makes ITM seem relatively easy to learn by ear( the tunes just seem to stick in your head) but makes classical music almost impossible. I've been playing classical guitar for about 17 years and i can only play one tune without the music!
I would also agree that if your can't hear a tune in your head then you can't play it! Where as if you can hear it and you know your instrument well, it should be pretty straight forward. This doesn't apply to more complex things like chords of course.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by velvet
Re: Learning by ear
There are advantages to both methods and I think the consensus is that musicians should be able to make use of all the tools at their disposal. New players, whatever their technical skills, though will need to use their ear a lot more until they gain familiarity with the genre. The dots do have a big advantage in that the tune doesn't need to have been previously recorded or you don't need to have heard someone play it. Also once you've developed reasonable sight reading skills you can learn tunes on the train, plane or bus!
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Bannerman
Re: Learning by ear
Though there are different levels of skill here. Velvet is quite right to point out that irish diddley music is relatively easy to learn by ear, I can do it no problem, but I'd really really struggle with a Thelonious Monk tune, chords and all. But there are those who can do this kind of stuff no problem. I had a mate who could tell you every note in a passage of 10 finger piano chords after only one hearing. He wasn't born that way mind, he learned it.
There are two things I always gripe about when this comes up:
The first is that - and it was mentioned above - very little of what makes the music what it is can be found on the page. Though this can have the advantage of you being able to put that stuff in, if you have the prior knowledge. However, and this happens all too often, those who don't have the prior knowledge think that what's on the paper is how it goes.
The second is pure bone idle laziness.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
Will, I agree that reading music is absolutely worthwhile (and I'll have you know I'm working on learning abc's just so I can follow your posts!). My comment on classically trained musicians having trouble with learning by ear came from the many threads I've seen here and on other sites---I've seen so many people talk about how difficult it is for them to learn music without the tool they were trained to use. It makes sense, in a way---if you study an instrument for years and get whacked by your teacher/conductor every time you deviate from what's on the page, you're going to develop an approach that says that's the right way to do it, and coming to traditional music must be quite a shift.
By the way, I took your advice on learning octaves against open strings and copied out Brenda Stubbert's onto staff paper, and I can string the notes together now, and should have it up to speed in a month or so, It is an excellent exercise for intonation, as you said!
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
I also agree that reading music is absolutely worthwhile. It has to be stressed though, with this music it is not necessary. However, the ability to learn a tune by ear is. And I worry for those who come to it with the attitude that they don't need to learn to play by ear, because they can already read.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
Michael, you really need to mellow out. Who are these people, exactly? And where are you meeting them? Are there really people walking into Sandy Bell's, Edinburgh's legendary session pub, who can't learn by ear? Are there people on TheSession who think they don't need to learn by ear? Because if there are, I must have missed their posts (and by now I've read years of threads from this site!).
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
Once upon a time, I could only learn by ear but I'm glad to be able to do both now.
)
"Are there really people walking into Sandy Bell's, Edinburgh's legendary session pub, who can't learn by ear?"
Yes, I'm afraid so and in many other session pubs too.
Many of the tunes I know I've learned "off the dots" but even then I've got to listen to recordings and other players to hear how they are interpreted. If I don't manage this, I'll still try to adapt them to my own style of playing (which is admittedly nothing great
I reckon most of the people here realise that "learning by ear" is all important but I've not found this to be the case in the "real world". Many people just can't cope without "the dots" and there is even a worrying trend for people to bring in books/sheet music for tunes (and songs too for that matter) although this doesn't usually happen in Sandy Bells.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Johnny Jay
Re: Learning by ear
Hmmm. Okay, I admit, that's disturbing. I have yet to see anyone pull out a book at a session, so I guess I had a hard time believing it.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
I gave up learning by notes when I realized I wasn't memorizing the tunes. Learning by ear is more efficient, even if it is hard for me. I still look at the notes for the measure or two that eludes my ear.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Kheelch
Re: Learning by ear
My theory - anyone agree?
If I learn a tune by ear then it goes direct to the brain and my fingers remember it well. Learn from the dots (I am a adequate sight reader) and the tune goes a less direct route to the fingers and although I might play it sooner, it takes longer to remember.
So learning by ear is what I'm aiming for....
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by minijackpot
Re: Learning by ear
I learn by ear without problem but write it down as I get that many tunes in my head, some tunes fall by the way. But if you dot them down, you can return back to them at a later date. I am sure I have forgotten more tunes than I have learned.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by geoffwright
Re: Learning by ear
I agree, although I should add that (in a sense) you can actually be learning it by ear as you are learning from the dots without actually hearing anyone else play the tune. You are "learning by ear" from yourself so to speak so you can still be internalising the tune in your head which is what you need to do before you actually know it.
However, in such an instance, you have to be sure that you've been reading the dots and interpreting the tune correctly otherwise you'll learn it wrongly by ear too.
Basically, I'm suggesting that you never really know a tune until it becomes familiar to you and it has to "get into your head" somehow. The only way to do this is by listening, consciously or otherwise.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Johnny Jay
Re: Learning by ear
I agree fs.
That also matches my training as an ESL teacher in which new vocabulary is learned faster by demonstrating it than by giving a translation for it.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Kheelch
Re: Learning by ear
I'm not really sure how you would know when someone in "Sandy Bells" had learnt their tunes by ear or from the dots? Surely they play them without music either way? I have very very rarely been to a session (even a crap one) where someone has had to use music. It defeats the object of a session somewhat and makes it into a sort of play around. Northumbrian piping societies do this. They all bring books and then pick a couple of tunes each. What does everyone think of that?
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by ruthjball
Re: Learning by ear
100% ear. Self taught from childhood, even worse! Old patterns are hard to break, I have tried to learn to read sometimes, but always revert to ear because it's easier for me, then forget how to read again.
I think I may try to learn to read for whistle.... too many notes on a guitar, and the complication of fingerstyle is two fingers or more going at once on different strings. That's why they invented Tab though..... but honestly I have a problem with tab, though easier to read for guitar. With tab you end up literally doing a tune exactly like the person who wrote it. At least with bare bones notes you can add your own touch to the skeleton of the tune, I feel freer without notes or tab. It would be handy to at least read for whistle to decipher a tune in a book though.
Still, there are tunes I love and funny enough... I do go home and play by memory a lot.... thus a different setting.... a polite way of saying you play it wrong because your memory is bad!
A few times people have asked where this or that setting came from that I play, they like it and want to use it. A bit embarrassing, but funny too..... this must be where different settings come from.... poor memory in ear players!
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by irisnevins
Re: Learning by ear
Call me disturbing then. I can recognize a lot of tunes, I can usually lilt them, but I have a hard time translating what I hear into fingerings on my instrument -- there's a disconnect there, especially if the tune is too fast. I can pick up waltzes and the like by ear (on good days), but not jigs or reels. I do sometimes pull out one of a couple bound together tune books I made at our session. I don't spend all my time staring at the music, but I need it as a reminder of where my fingers go.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Crysania
Re: Learning by ear
oh dear, "disturbing" wasn't the wisest word choice. It's so easy to unintentionally offend on a message board. Sorry about that.
Doesn't it slow you down, though? All the sessions I've been to just rip along and there is barely time to recognize the tune they're on before they chug right into the next one.
I've decided my own strategy is to learn tunes 20% faster than I want to play them, just in case I need to keep up with others around me. This is all hypothetical, of course, while I'm learning...
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
I can read sheet music and I can play by ear which is a skill that has improved greatly since playing in sessions. I have also discovered that I can finger-read a banjo as the tuning and fingering are the same as for a fiddle. Am I allowed a smug grin, or does that count as cheating??
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by bowburner
Re: Learning by ear
Nope...it doesn't slow me down much at all. If I recognize the tune, I usually do within the first bar or two and I know exactly where it is in the book. By the time they're onto the second time through (and three times through seems to be the general rule of thumb), I'm in the game. I don't need the music for every tune, but just for ones I haven't gotten committed to memory yet. My ear is improving little by little, so sometimes I can get little snippets of tunes by ear at session but I usually can't just pick up an entire tune by ear like some others can. I was never trained that way so learning by ear is a constant struggle.
I wasn't offended, by the way. I was just really amused that someone might find me disturbing because I read music.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Crysania
Re: Learning by ear
I know I won't be able to pick up a tune by ear at speed at a session until I have a lot more experience. I'm amazed that you can play that fast with notes in front of you, though. I imagine all that visual input would just confuse me---there's enough to pay attention to, what with listening to the music, watching everyone else, playing myself, etc.
Have you tried recording your session and trying to play along with those reels at home? That might help your ear. I've been doing that this week and it's been great because I can try things over and over again with no one watching. It's also nice to pick out the different variations everyone played.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
I'm solely an ear learner. It's always been how i learn. and it's just so easy for me now- i can listen to a tune and pick it up after maybe the second time through...
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by BE
Re: Learning by ear
Quote from kennedy:
"Are there people on TheSession who think they don't need to learn by ear? Because if there are, I must have missed their posts (and by now I've read years of threads from this site!"
Every week, with out fail some one poste a question:
"I've got such and such on a recording of such and such playing a brilliant tune. I absolutely love it and would love to learn it. Has anyone got the dots?"
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
I knew you would pipe up on this, Michael. Okay, fine, you're correct, there are people who feel they can't learn without written notes. Crysania admits she *wants* to learn by ear but can't do it yet, and so falls back on the page from lack of confidence and experience. Why don't you offer a few tips instead of getting angry and putting people down? You obviously know what you're talking about. Maybe you can help others learn from what you know.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
As I'm still quite new to learning the fiddle I still find it hard to learn by ear. Hopefully in years to come I'll be able to do it better than now. My brain doesn't seem to be wired that way yet.
Although having said that at my fiddle lessons the teacher does teach us the tunes by ear, then gives us the sheet music and I practice until I can play without the sheet music, we are not allowed to look at the music at the lessons. Sometimes I'll record her playing the tune on my dictaphone if I've never heard it before and it's really a mixture of both. So I suppose I am learning by ear, sort of by osmosis.
The teacher didn't used to teach sheet music but has come to the conclusion that it is a good skill to have as your not limited to learning tunes one way.
I'm not up to a decent enough standard yet to even go to a session never mind play in one LOL, but maybe one day??
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by buttercup chucklechunks
Re: Learning by ear
OK. I'm sorry, I'll take that on board.
I understand that it can be daunting. But like anything, the effort you put in is recompensed.
Start with the basics, Hear a tune in you head, a simple tune, baa baa black sheep maybe. Start by hearing it in you head. Start by listening to the intervals. Hear the root. Does it start on the root? Does it move to the fifth? ((Does the phrase "the fifth" matter?) Internalise the process of hearing it. Very importantly though, don't think of it as starting on a particular finger on a particular string or holes on a flute. Think of a root, imagine it as an abstract thing and build from it purely aurally.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
One thing I can definitely do, Kennedy, is read music at speed. I really don't remember NOT being able to read music and sight-reading has always come easily to me. I don't entirely go back to the notes out of a lack of confidence -- more that I can learn more and learn it quicker if I resort to reading music rather than listening.
I know how to develop my ears -- and to a point I'm good with them. I can write down simple tunes and I can easily pick up tunes that aren't going at bat out of hell speed. I have methods that aren't too much like the last posters for learning tunes by ear: the concept of "chunking" is one I teach my students (I teach aural skills, ironically -- but those are generally played much slower than tunes are, so I can easily get those) -- hearing scalar patterns and arpeggios, knowing which outlines the tonic triad or the dominant, etc. Picking out the specific intervals between notes is a little like not seeing the forest for the trees. I find it's better to take bits of the tune and piece them together than trying to figure out one note at a time. I'm working on applying it during sessions, but sometimes it's just more fun to play tunes than it is to spend some of the time working on my ears.
Could I record session? Possibly, though I don't currently own a recording device. I've sometimes taken the time to slow down recordings I own a bit and learn from them. But it doesn't take long before I get tired of it and start to read through tunes again.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Crysania
Re: Learning by ear
Nice lesson, Michael. I'll come to Edinburgh one of these days for another one in person. Any excuse to come to Scotland!
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
i only use dsheet music if really stuck with a certain part of a tune. so much more interesting to pick up variety of ornamentation learning by ear. i tend to find a fiddler whose style i like (eg brian conway recently) and learn a few sets from an album before moving on to someone else. you can use windows media player to play tunes at different speeds which is pretty handy too.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by blaenclydach
Re: Learning by ear
Buttercup: I think you may be missing a trick. Learning by ear is so useful, if you can do it, and you're at the perfect stage (just starting a new instrument) to make it your preferred method of learning.
You're "still quite new to learning the fiddle". So, MAKE yourself learn entirely by ear now, and put some effort into it, and you'll find that, after a rough month or so, you'll start to develop it as a completely natural thing to do. The years of sheer pleasure in picking up tunes wherever you go on your travels will recompense the initial effort hundreds, if not thousands of times over.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by ethical blend
Re: Learning by ear
"Seems like many people idealize learning by ear as the "right way" to learn the tunes. But who actually does learn primarily or exclusively by ear? Anyone here? Stand up and be counted."
I do.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by DrSilverSpear
Re: Learning by ear
We've hashed this over so many times on this board, but there are clearly a lot of new people, so maybe this is worth repeating:
Everyone who can hear learns by ear. We all learn common songs like Happy Birthday by ear. Think of all the pop music you can hum along to even though you've never seen the dots. Most of us get songs stuck in our heads from overexposure on radio, Muzak, etc. So all I have to do to evoke certain annoyingly sticky melodies is type a few lyrics:
"Oh Mandy, you came and you gave without taking."
"We are the champions, we are the champions, we are the champions...of the world."
"She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah."
"Like a candle in the wind."
Yes, trad tunes have a few more notes and tend to run at a faster pace. You can still get them in your head with enough exposure and attentive listening. And once they're in your head, you can slow them down mentally and replay them at whatever pace you need to find them on your instrument. The better you know your instrument, the easier this will be.
With a little practice, you can also change the pitch or key of tunes in your head, play variations, even try out different rhythms and degrees of swing or pulse. The more you do this (with or without an instrument in your hands), the easier it will be to pick up tunes, and to match your actual playing with what you hear in your mind's ear.
Like anything else, you have to *do* it to get good at it. But the musical rewards are well worth it.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Will Harmon
Re: Learning by ear
Thanks Will. I'm at work and now I'm going to have Barry Manilow running through my head all afternoon. And seeing that poster of him I saw the other night, with his skin pulled back like shrink wrap from all the work he's had done. Thanks a lot.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by kennedy
Re: Learning by ear
I agree with whoosis above. The longer you play in sessions, the quicker you pick up fast and hitherto unknown tunes by ear - at any rate if they're played regularly. First you get the main gist of the tune, then you listen out for how the fiddler, or whoever, plays the knotty bits.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by nicholas
Re: Learning by ear
I generally learn by ear, but I also find it very helpful as a learning technique when I'm listening from a CD to do a transcription by hand. There's something about writing down all the notes that helps me to get a visual pattern of the tune and makes it easier for me to remember
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by munchko
Re: Learning by ear
But learning how to read music has helped me a lot to get tunes by ear: it's enabled me to break tunes down, as I hear them, into their measures ("dots") and bars, and thus fix them in my mind.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by nicholas
Re: Learning by ear
Kennedy wrote: "My comment on classically trained musicians having trouble with learning by ear came from the many threads I've seen here and on other sites---I've seen so many people talk about how difficult it is for them to learn music without the tool they were trained to use. It makes sense, in a way---if you study an instrument for years and get whacked by your teacher/conductor every time you deviate from what's on the page, you're going to develop an approach that says that's the right way to do it, and coming to traditional music must be quite a shift."
This is absolutely true. My studies in college involved a lot of focus on baroque, renaissance and medieval music. I was taught that since so much was left out of the notation the “dots” had to be interpreted, but I still needed to follow sheet music to play my part within the music. As a first recorder player my part was often the melody, but I was astonished after years of playing and performing the music how little of it I was committed to memory. It wasn’t that I hadn’t been memorizing any other music at the time because I studied classical music and memorized many complex compositions on piano. I also studied jazz and improvisation, which required memorization and intuition, but you needed to be able to follow charts. But with all of that experience I still couldn’t play the melodies from the early music I performed without the sheet music in front of me.
When I became interested in ITM the sessions I attended had no example of any one reading music. The concerts I went to had none as well. I realized that I would need to memorize this music if I wanted to learn it. For that reason I developed my abilities to learn by ear from the start even though I was a proficient site-reader. It was a bit of a struggle at first but well worth the effort when I saw the results. Like I said above in this thread, the ability to read the music is a great tool, but learning by ear has extraordinary advantages.
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning by ear
As a youngster, I was taught by band masters that musicians play from sheet music (I know, perish the thought). So the fact that I was mostly playing by ear was my secret shame. Now I play in a genre where the sheet music is the habit that is better left at home behind closed doors.
But I still like referring to sheet music, because often nice little bits and turns of phrase that get glossed over either by players I am listening to, or glossed over by my ear as the tune flies by, jump out of the written page at me. So sheet music is a nice supplement. And since I am too much of a neo-Luddite to be able to use a recording device (let alone one with handy slowing down the tune features), sheet music is my low-tech "Slow Downer."
# Posted on November 7th 2006 by AlBrown
Re: Learning by ear
I learn tunes both ways. My fiddle teacher teaches me by ear and then records the music onto a cassette. This keeps the tunes totally by ear. However, many of the tunes I learn by the sheet music, mostly because I do not have access to many tunes that are played slow enough to get. I would love to play mostly by ear; hopefully when I am better at the fiddle, I will be able to learn tunes played at a faster pace. Yesterday, I tried to learn a reel played at half pace, and it took at least 45 minutes to learn the first part mostly. I remember some of my fiddle lessons where my teacher had to repeat a phrase up to 10 times, very slowly before I got the rhythm, but I eventually got it. Another thing I like about learning by ear is that I tend to play the tunes I learn by ear better than the tunes I learn by sheet music.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by enirehtac
Re: Learning by ear
Definitely by ear. I'm one of the slowest dot readers I know. The more I relied on learning by ear, the less practice I had with actually reading the music.
Does it get in my way? I don't think so, unless someone wants me to play Scottish country dance music and plunks a 4 tune set in front of me!
Is one way better than the other? No- I think it's really about your own learning style, what's more comfortable for you.
One thing that helps me to learn by ear is humming or singing the tune. Once it's in your head, it's easier to play.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by rck
Re: Learning by ear
Using dots is all about visual perception in an overwhelmingly visual culture.Reading notation is perceiving visual symbols (this dot represents this pitch which is three semi-tones above that note on the fourth line...etc.) which are then translated into conceptual patterns in the brain. These concepts have to be translated into 'aural' patterns -the tune in the head'. Finally they can be reproduced on the player's instrument.
Sounds reaching the brain directly -learning by ear- are assimilated as aural patterns and with minimal analysis can be reproduced by the competent musician as sound again. We just need to minimize our dependence on percieving in a visual manner and concentrate on the sounds. After all, we're musicians, not visual artists!
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by JNW
Re: Learning by ear
I learn tunes by ear probably 99% of the time. The other 1% is mostly filling in details that didn't stick in my ear.
Good point from Donough. For me, too, learning from dots is also ear learning. I've never been a good sight reader, so I decipher the music and memorize it. Then I actually *learn* it by hearing myself play it.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by Bob himself
Re: Learning by ear
JNW, that's my point--a really good sight reader doesn't "translate" visual patterns into aural ones--they're one and the same. The black splotch on a line in a stave doesn't represent anything. It *is* a specific sound. That's the difference between a mechanical sight reader and an aural sight reader. Despite being in a visual medium, the result is purely aural. For most people, this takes years of immersion in dots and sounds. I was lucky. I learned to sight read at 7, but then spent the next 41 years playing by ear. The dots (and now abcs) have always just been sounds to me, not graphic image code for sounds.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by Will Harmon
Re: Learning by ear
I have dabbled about with dots and tab and never been a great reader. I never considered myself to be able to learn by ear either but somehow I would use a recording of the tune and then painfully follow the dots... but I needed to hear it first to understand the dots.
I invested a lot of time in trying to get fast at reading. I have improved but I'm still poor.
Now I have decided to stop mucking about and just 'learn to learn' by ear and it has been easier than I expected. Sometimes there's a note or two I just don't seem to get and know what I'm playing is wrong. Then I will turn to the dots for a quick prompt.
I am finding that learning by ear is rewarding, gets the tune in my head quicker and gives me the mental freedom to ornament as I see fit (rather than feel straight-jacketed by a mechanical process laid down by the dots) AND helps my reading (!). All this and it's FREE! It is also not as daunting as I first thought. It is really all just about listening carefully and NOT playing straight away. I wish I'd done this sooner.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by JonB
Re: Learning by ear
i love learning by ear, and i do so most of the time. but if i'm at a practice session with my band and i really cannot be arsed to pick it up by ear, i'll look at the dots. at the end of the day, its just as effective.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by Scrappy the Godo
Re: Learning by ear
This discussion is about 'learning' tunes, and you learn by remembering not by following. Like learning lines from Shakespeare or something: you put away the copy, whether it be printed, recorded, or whatever, and see if you can recite it. Then you take a quick look at the bit you forgot, and try again. Next day, you try without even looking at the copy. Eventually you internalize it. The difference between learning from the notes someone jotted down years ago and learning from a modern recording is that you are doing the interpreting. That way you might produce something that isn't just a clone of someone else's interpretation. You might even find some unusual tunes, and create your own sets, and surprise a few people.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by RichardB
Re: Learning by ear
I can pick up a tune at a session by ear but in order to remember it I usually find the ABC and generate a score. A very useful ear-training exercise is to take a tune you know well and play it in another key. Try this first with a relatively simple tune like Castle Kelly; it has a different character in the key of F, as an example. Doing this helps fix the structure of the tune in your head apart from the key-related mechanics of playing the tune in a particular key on your instrument, whatever it might be.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by Layers
Re: Learning by ear
I've noticed a few times, on different threads, that there are a number of people who will just contrast learning from the dots with learning from a CD. But, personally, I would say that learning from a CD (or any recording) is really not much better than learning from the dots. The trick is to learn from real, live people.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by ethical blend
Re: Learning by ear
This discussion raises something I never thought deeply about before, but probably one of the reasons I can only "kind of" read sheet music. The sheet music tells me mechanically where my fingers should go on the instrument, I don't see the note and think a sound. So there is an extra "layer" of thinking between what I am seeing and what sound I am producing.
Hmmmmmm...............
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by AlBrown
Re: Learning by ear
Al -- that extra layer is something that you can minimize through practice.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by timmy!
Re: Learning by ear
Good points and advice, whoosis, al and crazy_fingers. Thank you. Time to get to work on minimizing those layers.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by JNW
Re: Learning by ear
benhall's point shouldn't be lost in the other helpful clutter here. Learning a tune from another person, face to face, really is a great way to go. It becomes an interpersonal or social experience, and the tune will then always carry the fullness of that experience. Which is a big part of what playing the music is all about--connecting with other people. That's by far how I prefer to learn tunes.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by Will Harmon
Re: Learning by ear
Absolutely agree with you whoosis, no layer problems at all when you are side by side with someone who is giving you a new tune! Paper music can't even begin to compete with that!!!!
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by AlBrown
Re: Learning by ear
Benhall and Whoosis got it just right. I'm still a newbie, been learning only by ear for two years now. I had a magical moment last session when, sitting next to a great piper, I picked up two jigs at speed and played them each through by the third time. Found out that he had learned them at a session from Ronan Browne. Pass it on, that's what it's all about.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by zoetrope
Re: Learning by ear
Some first hand experiences and observations:
I first learned music by playing guitar with my Dad, who sang and accompanied himself on the guitar. So, I learned by imitation. Neither by ear or by dots. Playing by ear seemed like magic to me then: Either you had it or you didn't, and I didn't.
Later, I learned to read music. In my (retrospectively relatively sparse) experience with "schooled" musicians, it seemed that being a proficient sight reader was highly esteemed and considered a mark of being a great musician.
From years of exposure, my ear gradually got better. As time went on, I came to have a higher regard for a good ear than for being a good reader. Still, most of what I have learned has been from reading music. But I always preferred playing a piece from memory to reading it. My experience in both performing, and in watching others perform, is that something in the communication between musician and listener seems to be lost when the performance is read. Also, I began to notice that if I always read the music, I would not memorize it. I played in ensembles where I memorized the music, and after years of playing the repertoire together, others in the ensemble still had to have the music in front of them to play it. So, I came to regard reading as a valuable skill, but, for me, most valuable when used as a tool to learn a piece of music. If I like the music, I want to know it, not have to read it every time. If I have not played a piece for a long time, it is good to have the dots available to re-learn, re-memorize the tune.
# Posted on November 8th 2006 by ceciltguitar
Re: Learning by ear
I guess I'm going at it entirely backasswards--I re-learned to read sheet music so I could learn more Irish tunes in the few good years I have left. It was just too slow, laboriously picking them out a few notes at a time.
I know that sheet music alone cannot teach a person how to play this music properly. But it can help jump-start the learning process on a new tune.
And the more tunes I pack into my head, the better I get at picking up new ones up by ear, because I have more examples of typical phrases to draw from. So I think reading and learning by ear feed each other, in a way.
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by John Galt
Re: Learning by ear
I agree with mickray. My ability to read has allowed me to play hundreds of tunes that folks only learning by ear wouldn't have access to. Hours spent playing through tune books cover-to-cover have jump-started me to better intonation and phrasing, and now also learning faster by ear.
Written music is a tool, and the ability to read is a skill that can serve you well as long as you can commit tunes to memory and break the 'need to read' habit. Once you've got it down, you have to let the tune 'morph' , anyway, to conform with the version played in local sessions.
Life is short - Anything that helps me achieve competence on the fiddle faster is worthwhile. I say if you can read, don't let folks tell you that Irish music is only learned by ear. Read, play, learn, enjoy.
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by jleedee
Re: Learning by ear
Irish music IS only learned by ear.
Sure you can learn skeletons of tunes from books. But that ain't playing Irish music.
Read (if you want, though you don't have to), play, learn (...how to play properly), enjoy.
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
Irish music is only learned by ear, but after you've learned it you can pick up a few tunes from books and such. If you're relying on sheet music to learn your tunes you might consider reevaluating your approach. If you’re just starting out – back away from the sheet music and wait until you’ve learned about 100 tunes or so by ear. Even then you should use extreme caution when approaching sheet music since it requires such serious interpretation.
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning by ear
A hypothetical question: If someone who has learned a lot of tunes by ear encounters some sheet music for a new tune, might that person be able to play it somewhat properly by comparing it to similar tunes? Give it lift, put suitable ornaments in the right places, etc? It seems that there must be rules and conventions that can be learned and applied.
Me, I'm not that adept--yet. But if I keep hacking away with any and all weapons I can find (sessions, computer slowdowners, video clips of expert players, and yes sometimes the dots as well) I think I might get there someday.
I also saw members of Altan use sheet music in concert once. Mairead did apologize for it, but said, "We really wanted to play the tune for you."
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by John Galt
Re: Learning by ear
Oops, sorry Button, that's exactly what you said. I got so distracted by trying to walk on eggshells around this, I kinda went around in a circle.
Hello everybody, my name is mickray, and I'm a discuss-aholic. It has been, oh, 12 hours since my last ill-considered posting.... ;>}
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by John Galt
Re: Learning by ear
Ah, that explains why Michael wouldn't have chosen Altan for the postage stamps.
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by GaryAMartin
Re: Learning by ear
(tee he)
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
But it really is a laugh to me, llig. I'd bet you money that from just listening you wouldn't be able to tell if a fiddler (someone you admire- someone who is alive today if That's possible) learned a particular tune by ear or from written music. A good fiddler knows how to play around with the tune, make it his own, etc....... he doesn't always have to have learned it by ear first. That's my opinion and you're welcome (as always) to stomp all over my opinion again like you did the last time. It's not going to change what I think or what anyone else thinks either, for that matter.
# Posted on November 10th 2006 by nonesuch
Re: Learning by ear
well Juliette, I can copy/paste from my postings above:
"very little of what makes the music what it is can be found on the page. Though this can have the advantage of you being able to put that stuff in, if you have the prior knowledge."
or
"I agree that reading music is absolutely worthwhile."
Or from that other "class tune" thread:
"Please don't get the impression I am against writing music down. I am against people using it as their primary reference"
But as for stomping on you opinions: Do you stand by your opinion that a player's "creative fire and passion" is as important as his ability to "play the right notes"?
# Posted on November 11th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
Can we agree on these things then?
1. It is not possible to learn how ITM should sound by reading music. This can only be learned by listening to the music, performed live and/or recorded.
2. It is possible to learn tunes by reading music. However, see #5 below.
3. It is possible to learn tunes by ear. There are significant benefits from learning this way and a lot of players advocate using this approach.
4. Different players have personal preferences for how they like to learn tunes -- from sheet music, from another player, from sessions, from recordings, some or all of the above -- and each of these methods has the potential to work just fine.
5. To a greater degree than when learning a tune using an ear-based method, a player must supplement a tune as learned from sheet music with the stylistic elements of ITM (ornamentation, accents, variations, etc).
# Posted on November 11th 2006 by timmy!
Re: Learning by ear
llig, sir:
A person can play all the "right" notes.... whatever those are....... but if there is no creative input or feeling, then the music tends to sound mechanical rather than musical. That's just my opinion. There are lots of opinions out there - thanks very much for allowing me to express one of mine. I even apologize for getting offended!
Have good days
surrounded by music
that you enjoy.
Respectfully yours,
# Posted on November 11th 2006 by nonesuch
Re: Learning by ear
An actor usually learns his/her part by reading a script a sufficient number of times until it's in memory. Only then can the really difficult part of interpreting the script and bringing it to life take place - with the assistance of the director and interaction with other actors.
Learning music from the dots is similar. When it is so deep in memory that you're not aware of it, only then can you put your own interpretation on it and also bring it to life.
If you learn a tune from a recording or from a teacher initially what you will have in your head will be a copy of what you have heard or been taught. It is only later that, as the music matures inside you, you start to develop the tune and really make it your own. We all know players who learn a tune from a cd and when they've "learned" it, leave it at that. Whenever they play that tune it's fairly obvious where they got it from. The next stage of making the tune their own - which might mean some deconstruction and reconstruction - is difficult and takes time, but the end result is always worth it.
# Posted on November 11th 2006 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Learning by ear
yep
# Posted on November 11th 2006 by ...
Re: Learning by ear
Is learning by ear lazy? Maybe not. I learn almost exclusively by ear. Those tunes I check for passages I couldn't figure out using the dots is an agonizing trial. What is even weirder is that I teach HD. Students who are dead beginners tend to learn best by ear. Often I think I'm doing them a disservice not teaching them to play with the dots. Students who have had some formal training on piano or other instrument insist on seeing the music through dots. I often got frustrated, at not their abilities but that the tune went through their eyes, through their arm to their hands without much thought between. Other observations was that classically trained students at a certain level tended to learn by ear, or at least know enough about the structure of a tune to fake it without the dots. My conclusion is that like the old math classes there were lessons to learn. If you got done early the teacher might give you the "extension" lesson, something at a higher level. I might occasionally believe that I'm messing up a student by not teaching dots but then again am I not rather teaching them the extension?
# Posted on November 13th 2006 by jrathbun
Re: Learning by ear
Hi jrathbun,
Do you mean hammered dulcimer?
Teaching by ear is the higher-level extension course in my opinion. You're doing your students a favor. If they want to know how to read music, you could probably teach them sight singing (since, as you well know, it helps immensely to look at the sound-board as you play).
# Posted on November 14th 2006 by nonesuch