A bit discouraged- Seeking guidance on how to bring it all together

[FattMusiek]

I just posted a thread in this forum that was going to contain what you see below but I decided to make two separate threads.

As the topic indicates, I'm a little bummed out. I'm 22 (almost 23) years old and studying music at Northern Virginia Community College's Annandale campus under Herbert Smith and other professors. I've been playing guitar, drums and recording music for about ten years and dabble in bass and keyboard. I've made a lot of progress over the last year and a half and sometimes I feel really good about it. Other times...not so much...!

My sightreading is not very good. I currently cannot pick up melodies as fast as I would like to. I have an alphabetized binder of standard jazz tunes from the jazz ensemble I play in at school, a couple guitar sightreading books, a Freddie Green chord book, some other misc. resources like ii V I pattern sheets and of course this forum.

A few minutes ago I was looking at a lead sheet of "Nobody Knows When You're Down and Out" by Jimmie Cox. When I look at a melody on a lead sheet, it makes little to no sense to me in most cases, especially when I'm alone and have never heard the song. I eventually want to be able to play the Real Book tunes right off the bat. This of course will take a lot of work and there's no easy way to do it than to struggle for a while.

Anyway, when it comes to melodies, I usually attempt to locate all the pitches of the melody in a "time vacuum" (not worried about where the note lands in the measure, just finding the pitches). It doesn't resemble a song when I'm doing this because of the length of time it sometimes takes me to find the correct pitches.

I then try to apply the notes to the actual rhythm notated on the lead sheet. I get caught up here trying to remember the notes of the melody and trying to play them on the correct beats. I often give up after a while.

I think my ear is pretty good and if the will is there, I can figure out most songs eventually by starting and stopping the song. My girlfriend is quite a bit better than I am at remembering a melody, hearing it in her head and then producing it either vocally or on her violin. She I really feel I need to be better at those aspects of music.

Ideally, I wouldn't be typing this sob story and would have just continued to work on the melody. I'm not that type of person though so here I am!

Thanks for reading and for sharing your wisdom.

[derek]

So if I read your post correctly, you can read the notes fine, but not the rhythm as well, or at least you are not paying attention to time. Is that correct? Being able to read the notes is only half the information. I was taught to just read thru stuff at a pace I can handle without pushing.

There is no short cut, and I find if I spend 10-15 minutes daily on it, my reading improves quite a bit. I am not in a situation where I need to read, so it tends to be the first thing that I slack on, as it is the most tedious. Sounds like you are quite musical (multi-instruments), and well educated. Just set aside time to focus just on this, and it will come around. Good luck

[jeffstocksmusic]

Fatt, I don't have a lot to offer, mostly because I am simply not an expert. I will say you are certaintly not alone in feeling bummed about music. Like John Stowell say, it is the frustration that drives us to the next level.

I will offer a couple of thoughts that hopefully will be a little help. First..it almost sounds more 'mental' than physical, meaning it almost sounds like anxiety. Have you noticed how your body reacts when you try to do this type of thing? Are you holding your breath, tensing, clenching your teeth, etc? If so, it might help to work on relaxing and calming your nervous system. I am also no expert in this area but there are lots of ways...deep breathing, stretching, etc.

Second, Tommy Tedesco has a book on sight-reading that might give some tips (depending on your level). He was a legendary sight-reader. I linked his book below. Good luck and remember that music was/is/will be a fun thing.

Amazon.com: For Guitar Players Only (9780739053812): Tommy Tedesco: Books

[FattMusiek]

I'm kind of a depressive honestly. When I start feeling I can't do something, I can't; it's like this feeling I got in math class in my earlier school years where I would just shut my mind out of frustration, overcome with negativity. Although I'm wiser and more in tune with myself, I still get this feeling sometimes. What fueled this post was to a degree this same problem I have.

[adamreir]

You'r really not the only one frustrated about not progressing enough /feeling stale. But really, progress comes step by step, allways. Useulally fast at the begining, and slower after a while. What makes the best players today so good is the ability to just continue to practice when progressing seems miles away. If you do practice something you WILL get better at it, and it useulally won't come fast. But over a lot of time.

---

I don't think you should think about an ultimat goal where you can sight reed everinthing at first sight, that's fairly complicated. But if you work a little you will get a tiny bit better, work a lot and get better

Do you think its hard to read the sheet music, or to find the notes on the fretboard? The best way to get better at sightreeding is (offcourse) to sightreed. But there are some things you should work on if you'r not good at it.

If you have a hard time reading the notes, try to search the internet for keys to remember the notes. For example every space in the regular clef (G, I don't really know what you call it in english) is FACE reading from down to up. Remember where the C notes are in the sheet.

I allso tried to create a kind of flash cards, where i simply write a note on every card, mix them up, and then try to recall the name of the note as fast as possible when I draw that card (You can allson do this with rythom, or anything else). I don't think this is nessecery unless you are really new to reading sheet music.

If you have a hard time finding the notes on your fretboard, you should try to memorize all the notes on the fretboard. There are several methods. You could start your metronome, and play a note on the low E string, then on the A string, then on the D string. etc.

A nother method is to work on one string at a time. I started improvicing kind of slow while i said the note name out loud, then you could use patterns. Play C major In triads, and say the note names out loud, C major in forths etc. All one one string at a time.

You should probably use several methods, becous they learn you different things. You shold start out with C major, to cover the natural notes, and then move to other scales. C#/Db major contains all the raised and lowered notes (you should know both).

The most imporant thing dough, is sightreading a little every day.

[fep]

The real book has many difficult tunes to sight read. The syncopation, the keys, the intervals, make the real book a more advanced level of sight reading.

I don't think that is the place to start. I believe the place to start is with beginning classical pieces. Classical music is graded, so you can work your way up the grades... just sight reading, play the tune once and move on. The tunes sound good and are fun to play.

Join the forum linked below, make a couple posts and you'll have access to lots of free graded classical music. And enjoy sight reading, it's fun.

Delcamp.us - Classical Guitar Forum • Index page

[cosmic gumbo]

Reading and recognizing the rhythmic aspect of music notation is definitely much more difficult than just reading the pitches. You have to start with simple melodies and progress from there, until you begin to recognize and feel comfortable about rhythm patterns and combinations. A tool that is valuable for some folks is a notation program like Finale Notepad, downloadable for $9.95. This would allow you to manually enter the melody from a Real Book tune, and then the program can play it back to you, so you can hear what the melody is supposed to sound like. Some midi keyboards have this feature built into them also.

[bako]

Take any tune in the Real Book and treat every note as a quarter note and play all the notes in sequence.

Then on one note play the rhythms including dynamics.

When ready combine both. Practice as slowly as necessary.

[timscarey]

In my experience, it all comes down to counting. there are basically two ways to count that I know of. The first is

1-e-and-a-2-e-and-a...ect....

the second is where you feel each rhythm for the amount of 16th notes it's worth, divided into twos and threes including rests. I've heard it called additive counting.

I have also found that counting outloud while practicing at a slow tempo will yeild good results. Clapping and counting, tapping quarter notes with my foot, and counting OUTLOUD while listening to music have all helped me tremendously.

I agree with the previous posts too about starting with simple rhythms and working your way up... reading rhythm is hard, much harder that reading notes.

[randalljazz]

what timscarey said. read rhythms away from the guitar.

[Reg]

Hey Fatt... you sound pretty normal, music is not easy... it can take a lifetime, but it's a incredible journey. As far as sight reading...rhythm is almost always most important. Don't get me wrong...obviously pitch needs to be correct, but how many notes are there. Most music, at least on guitar is only three octaves. The rhythmic possibilities... lots. One trick to sight readings is to become aware of rhythmic patterns. Percussion books break them down well. At your stage, I apologize for assuming, at least 50% of your sight reading should be rhythms studies. At some point you'll be able to recognize the rhythms and then you can start looking ahead for the notes, which is the trick to sight reading, being ahead of what your playing. If your trying to memorize tunes it's cool to slow down, get the pitches right and not play in time etc... but all that does is create bad habits for sight reading. Guitarist are notorious for this, that's why there are so many great jokes etc... I sight very well, and dig saying to a Tpt. or sax player at gigs, Hey I'll play the head or I'll take 1st solo because I can read the melody and understand the harmony if I don't know the tune. Stay with it, it's part of becoming a musician...Reg

[peterja]

A simple trick: when learning new tunes from fakebooks, try to learn the other way around, tap the rythm first, then learn the pitch.

And don´t worry. Feeling frustrated is a actually a part of any learning proces.

[gusgtr]

A great book for all this is "Melodic Rhythms for Guitar" published by Berklee Press. It has you practice the rhythms first,then applies them to a melody.

[FattMusiek]

Thank you all for the suggestions. I appreciate your input very much! I have no intention of quitting. I need to focus more on sightreading and applying myself in that area more.

[TommyD]

A while back, I submitted a post on how I learned to sight read single-line guitar. It's a totally practical, and not in any way pedagogical method. And it doesn't require you to memorize locations on the fretboard without sensible reference (a virtually impossible task, if you ask me!), or think in fifths, fourths, or any other intervals except octaves.
Here it is.
1. You already know every note on the two E strings. Think about it; G Maj 7th? Third fret. The root G is on the third fret, Bb is on the fifth, etc, and it's the same on both E strings. So by extrapolation, you know every fret on those 2 strings up to and through the guitar's octave fret.
2. You know every note on the A string by realizing where the root of C 6th, Eb 6th, etc. fall. All the way up. No problem!
3. Ever play Wes's octave style? Play some with the lower note on the E string since you know that string so well (and didn't know that you did!). Now you know every note on the D string. Move the lower note of Wes's octave-playing up to the A string and....
4. ...now you know every note on the G string.
5. Play Wes's octaves with the lower note on the D string. It necessitates changing your fingers; instead of the upper note of the octave being 3 frets above the lower, it's 4 frets above. Wow! Big deal! I wonder if I'll ever learn that? Hey, Now you know all the notes on the B string.

Okay, you don't know all the notes on all the frets in your bones (yet!), but start to read and play simple melodies out of the Real Book. Lock your studio door so you'll not be disturbed, and think hard while you're doing it. Choose songs you don't already know if possible. Ten minutes every day is all you need.
You'll be surprised at how soon you'll know where to put your finger down. Start with tunes like Goin' Home, Come Sunday, like that. Play them all over the fretboard in the same key.
The truth is, that learning to play a musical instrument properly is hard work. And everybody who plays well gave it a hell of a lot of effort, sweat, and thinking the problems through! It won't come just because you want it. That's spoiled Baby Boomer and X-generation thinking. Forget that s**t!

Stan Getz's uncle was my patient. One time he told me that when Stan was a little guy practicing his horn at home in the Bronx, the neighbors complained about the noise. Know what Stan's mother told him?
"Play louder, Stanley!" That's it in a nutshell! Play louder, Stanley.

Tommy/

[FattMusiek]

Originally Posted by TommyD

1. You already know every note on the two E strings. Think about it; G Maj 7th? Third fret. The root G is on the third fret, Bb is on the fifth, etc, and it's the same on both E strings. So by extrapolation, you know every fret on those 2 strings up to and through the guitar's octave fret.
2. You know every note on the A string by realizing where the root of C 6th, Eb 6th, etc. fall. All the way up. No problem!

Tommy/

Thanks for your insight. I have a couple questions for you...

When you say single line, what do you mean?

I think you meant Bb is on the sixth fret...?

Step #2 confuses me. Do you just mean the root of a C6 (Cmaj6), C? Same with Eb...the root of Eb6 (or perhaps Eb major 6th)? Or something more complicated?

And one for you all: If you are going up the fretboard like in the above fashion, do you tend to think in terms of sharps or flats? E F F# G G# or E F Gb G Ab A etc

[FatJeff]

Originally Posted by FattMusiek

I think you meant Bb is on the sixth fret...?

He must have meant that.

Originally Posted by FattMusiek

Step #2 confuses me. Do you just mean the root of a C6 (Cmaj6), C? Same with Eb...the root of Eb6 (or perhaps Eb major 6th)? Or something more complicated?

He must have meant C is on the 3rd fret; Eb is on the 6th.

Originally Posted by FattMusiek

And one for you all: If you are going up the fretboard like in the above fashion, do you tend to think in terms of sharps or flats? E F F# G G# or E F Gb G Ab A etc

You need to think in both. But mostly, flats.

[TommyD]

Originally Posted by FattMusiek

Thanks for your insight. I have a couple questions for you...

When you say single line, what do you mean?

I think you meant Bb is on the sixth fret...?

Step #2 confuses me. Do you just mean the root of a C6 (Cmaj6), C? Same with Eb...the root of Eb6 (or perhaps Eb major 6th)? Or something more complicated?

And one for you all: If you are going up the fretboard like in the above fashion, do you tend to think in terms of sharps or flats? E F F# G G# or E F Gb G Ab A etc

1. Single line means single notes instead of chords - you know - melody.
2. Yeah, the 6th fret - typo (combined with no guitar present)
3. When you play a C6th chord on the third fret (frets 3,3,-2,2,-3,3) the root C is on the A string, right? That's what I'm referring to. Don't make it more complicated than it is.
4. Thinking in sharps or flats? Depends whether you're playing in a sharp key (D) or a flat key (Ab), but I for one, tend to think that Eb is Eb and not D#. It's only D# in the keys where D is raised. A Lot of jazz standards are written in flat keys, and fewer in sharp keys. Gershwin loved the sunny key of G. Tenor sax men think a lot in flat keys, alto men in sharp keys. As for 'going up the fretboard', if you're going to try my little method, you'd best think in flats instead of sharps. Nobody I know plays "The Man I Love" in D sharp.
A man was driving thru Texas and stopped to ask directions of an old guy with a beard, sitting on a rocker. After the old guy gave him directions, the driver said, "Hey, old-timer? Do you sleep with that beard under the covers or on top of the covers?"
The old guy thought for a minute, then said,
"That's city folk fer ya! Makin' trouble where there warn't none before!"
Don't do that, kid. Just play your ass off. It'll all come.
Tommy/

[Drumbler]

Approach sightreading as you would approach reading (books).

How would you teach your child to read?

You start with simple, childrens' books like Golden Books. After a couple years of that you might get into slightly more complex books that contain more words, paragraphs, etc.

And so on.

It's a gradual process. Very gradual.

It's impossible to go from illiteracy to reading War and Peace in a year. Or two. Or three. Or four...

Unrealistic expectations lead to frustration and discouragement.

[Goofsus4]

All this consternation about sight reading a melody??? That's the guitar for you. I started out playing the organ as a kid and you just open the sheet music and start playing. On the guitar? Not so much. It's infuriating.

I love how everyone talks about "learning the melody in at least two places." Are you freaking kidding me? No other musican has to worry about nonsense like that. Arrrgh!

But that whole pattern remains the same when the key shifts thing the guitar has going on totally makes up for it compared to keyboard I think.

I know, I didn't help you, just sympathizing.

[Scrybe]

Every good boy deserves fruit - the lines of the stave as notes.

I'm in a similar boat - I have whack pitch memory, especially when having to reproduce stuff around other people right now, I clam up. And I've just begun sight Reading in stupid jazz keys like Db major. Gah! It's infuriating, I tell you - I spend at least 90% of my practice time feeling like a dunce and being only too aware of how much I have yet to learn. But, I want to improvise jazz fully, to hear the music inside me before I play it and to be able to hear that music while still listening fully to the music made by others behind me while Im doing that so we can interact. So I persist with the hard slog of training my mind to speak in this new language as fluently as possible. Every day I edge a little closer, even if I don't see it or wish I was moving faster.

[FattMusiek]

Yeah...a lot to learn. I think I get too caught up in analyzing stuff...like last night, I spent about an hour dinking around in the key of C major trying to find ways to modulate half a step down to Bminor. Just going straight from a C major chord to a B minor chord sounded good, yet I was still writing out the chord spellings and stuff.

Too much? Maybe...maybe not. I dunno...

[adamreir]

Originally Posted by Goofsus4

I love how everyone talks about "learning the melody in at least two places." Are you freaking kidding me? No other musican has to worry about nonsense like that. Arrrgh!

Hehe,

No you don't have to do that on a keyboard-instrument. On a piano you have to learn it in at least two keys.

Witch is, I would say, a bit harder. Every instrument has it's difficult areas. On the guitar, learning the notes on the neck being a difficult topic, especially compared to a keyboard intrument.

But Transposing on the guitar. I don't know if you have notized, but a certain voicing for C7+5b9 is played exactly the same way as C#7+5b9, witch is played exactly the same way as D#7+5b9 etc.etc.

Every musician has to go throuh "nonsense like that", becouse learning an instrument is nonsense. Allways a lot of s**t you have to go trough that doesn't really have anything to do with music.

[adamreir]

One more thing. FattMusiek:

How much have you improved (generally, all over) for the last year? last six month?

Try to look back, and remember how much you've learned for a period of time. If you tink of that progression, and look forword, lets say a year, how much better do you think you can be then?

Improving is not the only important point, but allso recognize you improvement. You'r not going to wake up one day and suddenly be much better (at least not very often). Improvement comes over time, so look over time. Helps me anyway

[itsall4you]

Regarding sightreading being hard because of lots of positions.

I think it was a post on this forum by a member.

He said he was complaining to a sax player that he has too many positions so he is slow at reading.

The sax player simply replied "Lucky, I only have ONE position".

If you look at it this way - There are more possibilities on the guitar (tonal characteristics etc.) than any other instrument.

So, the best thing to do, is to learn them! You have to work your ass off like everything else in life

[adamreir]

Well yeah, you´r right, it is hard to learn to sightread on guitar, becous the guitar has no visual logic concerning piches and note names, compared to the piano - BUT, transposing it is easy, compared to say the piano or a sax.

Every instruments are easy on some areas, and difficult in others. Thats my point, butt yeah, i agree, sightreading is very difficult on the guitar. I play some piano as well, and that is SO much easyer.

[Reg]

Hey man... It's not that hard to sight read on guitar...don't talk yourself into making it hard... it's not. Tons of average people learn all the time. If your in a hurry, pick one or two positions, 5th and 8th for example...learn the notes so you don't have to watch your hands and start reading. You should put 2/3rds of your time at the beginning on rhythms. At first just try to read the notes your playing. In about a month start trying to get ahead by a beat or two. Ex. try to be reading beats 3&4 while your playing 1&2. You need to read every day for at least a 1/2 hr. That's a min. There tons of books full of material. Berklee's Melodic Rhythms is great, Advanced Rhythms by Joe Allard, Charles Colin Pub. Do the research and check it out.
Small children learn how to read. It's not Quantum Mechanics...Reg

[bako]

Originally Posted by Reg

Small children learn how to read. It's not Quantum Mechanics...Reg

That made me laugh.
Maybe there's something in the air at elevations 4 feet above the ground and higher or maybe it's just something in the grownup belief system that makes things feel so hard. Makes one wonder what other knowledge and experiences we deny ourselves.

[TommyD]

You don't even need a book! You need to apply the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair, pick up the guitar and start working.
Sometimes buying a music book aimed at learning a skill takes all the steam out of your desire. You get the book, look through it at all the work he's got lined up for you, and think, "Wow! I'll never learn all this!"
Forget books. Often, they just provide another excuse to keep you from doing what you have to to make it happen. Develop your own little system for reading, and GO FOR IT!
Everybody here is telling you the same thing! What's the damn mystery?

Tommy/

[Scrybe]

Real Book. Take All The Things You Are - it's an Abmaj but the rhythm's as basic as it gets aside from the triplet quarter note passages. Read that. Isolate the triplets phrase if you have to. Then read another one that looks rhythmically similar, maybe quarter notes n a couple of quavers. Read it straight. Then try swinging it. Rinse. Repeat. Keep upping the ante slightly each time.

I'm currently Reading at 120bpm from the real book, but I did some Reading from classical guitar books before that. 120bpm for me makes the slow stuff a bit more challenging, while making the mad crazy bebop not quite so impossible for me - the key signatures are mostly new tho n I keep having to remind myself to pay attention cos the Real Books, while wonderful, are shoddy in their notational formality (eg not putting the key sig at the start of each line, or squiggling the chord names in the middle of a stave so you're squinting to read it). But that's what I'm likely to be facing in any gigging situation, so the downfall of the Real Books is even a blessing in disguise - I'd never submit a score to another musician so shoddily marked up, but I know I'll be receiving plenty, so my sight Reading material fortunately includes that kind of stuff. Even less to make me balk while "on the job".

Read the entire head at sight, don't stop if you make a mistake, try to find your place n keep going. Then comp it. Then isolate/note any rhythms/voicings/forgetting the key problems you had and work on those after youve finished sight Reading. Then go back to the tunes you faced those problems in and play them again, to make sure you that the problem-solving-in-isolation has been solid enoughto allow you to execute it in context. Rinse. Repeat.