From: sumrn@dssv01.crd.ge.com (Robert N. Sum)
Newsgroups: rec.music.makers,rec.music.makers.guitar,alt.guitar,rec.music.synth,rec.music.makers.synth
Subject: Re: Concrete questions on music reading
Keywords: music, reading
Date: 9 Jan 93 21:44:54 GMT
Reply-To: sumrn@crd.ge.com
Organization: GE R&D, DICE Program


  I'll use the original article as a framework, but the original author's
particular questions are answered near the end.

In article <C0KJJC.C0v@constellation.ecn.uoknor.edu>,
norlin@midway.ecn.uoknor.edu (Norman Lin) writes:
|>After seeing the discussion on rec.music.synth about the "Miracle" system
|>and approaches to reading music, I have a few concrete questions to ask
|>on the subject.  First, some background about myself.  About 3 years ago,
|>I became interested in music and started playing on the piano and guitar.
|>I have never had any formal lessons, but had a one-semester introductory
|>theory course.  At this stage, I'm relatively comfortable forming basic
|>open/barre chords on the guitar (major, minor, 7th, major 7th, minor 7th;
|>the usual important ones) and can hop around reasonably deftly among 
|>various chords/inversions in the key of C on the keyboard.
|>
|>I can't read music, at least not in my sense of the word "read."  By
|>agonizingly scrutinizing the sheet music note by note, using all of those
|>silly acronyms (Every Good Boy Does Fine, F-A-C-E) for the notes on the
|>staff, I can slowly make out single notes.  By then working out the
|>rhythm separately, or by relying on my knowledge of how the song sounds,
|>I then can piece together the song.
|>
|>My general, umbrella question is:  How should I 'look at' sheet music to
|>sight read it?  I don't want to lock myself into looking at things the
|>"wrong" way, hindering myself later.  Here are some specific questions:
|>
|>(1)  Do sight readers "see" in sheet music:
|>     a.  Absolute notes, i.e., "D, F, A, C, D"
|>     b.  Relative positions within a scale, i.e., "2 4 6 1 2"
|>     c.  Intervals between notes, i.e., "D, up a minor 3rd, up a major
3rd..."
|>     d.  Logical groupings of melodic notes (movites)
|>     e.  Progressions of chords/parts of chords
|>     e.  Combinations of the above (and if so, when for which?)
|>     f.  Other?

  Basically, reading music is like reading text.  After a large amount of
practice, one simply matches visual patterns to thoughts and actions.  Music is
more difficult in that the visual patterns are much more 2 dimensional than
text, the actions can be very intricate, and the actions must happen within
rather tight time constraints.  Just as one does not read text by
agonizing over
every letter and space, music readers do not agonize over every glyph on the
page, either.

  My personal experience is that when a particularly difficult pattern is seen,
I slow down and resort to any or all of the above mentioned techniques in order
to learn the new pattern.  There is no replacement for lots of practice.  Good
sight readers simply have lots of patterns that they can match quickly.  Often,
while sight reading, one will use a pattern that's close (making a
mistake), but
still coming close to conveying the intent of the music.  The second
time that I
read a piece is very often "worse" than the first as I try to pay more
attention
to detail.  The reason why people spend hours and hours practicing scales,
arpeggios, and the like are because they are the most commonly used patterns. 
The more they become second nature, the better one becomes at sight reading.

|>
|>(2)  What is the best way to learn sight reading?  Just "practice" doesn't
|>     seem to do it.  Perhaps I am just lacking in discipline, but I suspect
|>     I am lacking in direction also.  I cannot seem to make progress simply
|>     by slowly staring down a sheet of music until, note by grueling note,
|>     the tune emerges.  For learning 2/3/4 part music, the process becomes
|>     exponentially slower (which leads to the next question).
|>
|>(3)  How do people read 2/3/4/more parts at once, keeping track of
|>     all the various rhythms, etc?  I can barely do this if I don't
|>     already know how the piece is supposed to sound.
|>
|>I guess I'm just an aspiring amateur, annoyed by this seeming impasse of
|>reading -- truly "reading" -- music.  What does one "see" in the music?
|>With written words, people don't see each letter and punctuation mark
|>individually; they see words, phrases, sentences, swallowing whole chunks
|>at once.  From what I've read, it seems that this is what true musical
|>reading should be as well, BUT I have no idea how to embark upon the
|>road to such "proper" reading of music.

  I'm only an amateur, too, but the bottom line really is practice
starting with
simple things.  It takes discipline with lots of time and patience.  I
have used
the same basic ideas for any instrument that I've played.  They have worked for
all of them.  My primary instruments are saxophone, flute, and guitar. 
Multiple
lines require familiarity with larger patterns.  I have worked with saxophone
quartets and dabbled with a piano.  (I am *not* a pianist, however.)

  I have several books of basic study for saxophone and flute that I read
through from time to time.  I have spent *hours* and *hours* on scales,
arpeggios, intervals, and other etudes.  I sometimes separate rhythmic reading
from melodic reading by using a few basic percussion books and clapping the
rhythms.  I use a metronome with all of this to make sure that the notes are
consistent in rhythm and tone quality.  A metronome is also essential to manage
growth in speed--both fast and slow.  You might view the required discipline
as including a mastery of yourself as well as of the instrument(s) that you are
playing (be it flute, guitar, percussion or your voice).

|>
|>Help!

  I hope this helps.

|>-- 
|>Norman Lin | norlin@mailhost.ecn.uoknor.edu   (preferred)   
|>           | nlin@alliant.backbone.uoknor.edu (alternate 1) 
|>           | narc@obelisk.pillar.com          (alternate 2) 
                                                      

  -- Bob

PS. I'll be temporarily disconnected from news for about a week.  Email
will wait for me.

==
  sumrn@crd.ge.com

  Robert Sum
  G.E. Corp. R. & D.
  P.O. Box 8, Rm. KW-C287
  Schenectady, NY 12301

Please note that the "Standard Disclaimer" applies here.
From: bearce@hpcc01.corp.hp.com (Phil Bearce)
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 23:45:19 GMT
Subject: Available Guitarist......
Organization: the HP Corporate notes server