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I guess the title says it all....
What does everyone prefer?
I got theory down and my sight reading is supreme. I understand how theory applies to music but I find when I over think it my solos they become lacking and almost boring...
Wes Montgomery couldn't read and neither could SRV.
I don't think he could've explained it any better
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07-01-2011 12:51 AM
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Dizzy Gillespie knew his theory back and fourth. So did Miles.
And neither of them sounded boring or lacking.
If someone sounds boring, it's usually because they have nothing to say, not whether they know theory or not.
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All the theory in the world becomes meaningless if it cannot be set in motion with feeling and emotion. I will never stand for mechanical, cold, heartless playing. Music in itself is a science, but the art form of music is the release. I would rather hear three notes played with the utmost passion and intensity, than a thousand well placed notes with no feeling or sense of purpose. Math is a cold dry constant. Music transcends the math when approached correctly.
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"Math is a cold dry constant."
You've never spoken to a mathematician. Math is just as beautiful as music is.
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Couldn't have said it better myself.
Originally Posted by Shadow of the Sun
As others have already said the two aren't mutually exclusive. Most great jazz musicians have both. Even players who are self taught and don't read music would have developed their own framework of what works in different situations.
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My soul experience is that when I put my ear and heart into the song the possibilities for solos become almost endless and limitless. Theory helps me understand why and how but when I use theory for constructing a solo I feel myself drifting into a box of containment and that just doesn't feel right.
By no stretch of the imagination am I saying throw theory out the window. Even the endless universe follows basic guidelines.
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I think most of the musicians would like to play with their hearts. There is no debate here, if you think when you're playing, well you are just afraid to show what you really are. It's a protection process. You try to stay in line. Originally Posted by jazzjew7890
It all refers with how you consider yourself in front of other people, or even yourself. Which is one of my problems :-)
I don't choose to think or not. Sometimes I feel like I'm not doing anything good ; that where I start to think on how am I gonna do with my knowledge to pull me off of that situation. Vicious circle !
Sometimes, I just feel good when playing. So why bother me start to think of anything.
I do both, it depends of how I feel.
I think the most you accept yourself, the more musical you will sound.
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Some of the best advice I ever got from a teacher was to think through everything the practice, then leave the theory at home and just use your ears and emotions when on stage. If you've trained yourself with the right theory, technique, etc in the practice room, then it will come out on stage. This won't happen right away, but with time the two combine to for our own musical voices.
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I think thats some great advice. Originally Posted by m78w
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Good old debate between the theory or 'feeling'
if you like music and play it, you most probably have feeling.
so i'd say everyone has feeling.
When you start to realize that feeling is not enough, you might not hear everything you know, now be able to play a particular music, on a particular progression, or just no be able to play what you hear. then you start to think about theory and structured practice.
At this point you might sound 'dead, sterile' for a few months/years. while you want to apply things you haven't really practiced enough yet.
I think then as long as theory is not properly assimilated, if you TRY you use it and bring it into your soloing, then it sounds as the thing it is ' someone using his brain to try to make it sound as 'putanythinghere' ' which in short sounds like crap.
What it means is that you still have to think to make it happen. that particular thing is not sunk into your vocabulary, your fingers, your inconscious, or your whatever is at work while the 'feeling' talks.
THEN YOU NEED TO PRACTICE THE SAME THING OVER AND OVER AGAIN UNTIL IT IS USABLE WITHOUT THINKING!!
At that time only, you might be able to use something without thinking of it.
You're playing good music again, at a higher level.
In short, i think theory is never bad, if you praticed it long enough that it becomes natural. In all cases, you should never try to apply anything that is not assimilated and natural when you solo. if you have to, forget about it and find new exercices to assimilate that particular stuff.
I think the way you asked the question is particularly revealing a oversimplified way of thinking:'Theory or emotion'. I was in the same place for years until my teacher showed me that between the two, there is 'structured practice'.
- Theory is about knowing a particular tool exists for a particular situation (whoa, a car is very useful to travel long distances)
- Structured practicing is about understanding how to use it and make it so natural that you can use it in whatever situation and it feels natural (driving on a parking lot, then on small roads, learning to park, go into traffic, ...)
- Feeling is when you play and everything you have practiced is able to go through into your own musical expression (you want to go somewhere, you just take the car and drive. But if you haven't learned and take a car and try to go on a highway directly, i bet there might be a bad surprise for you and the car after a few minutes)
To me it was a real shock to understand that everything has to be worked on in order to be used naturally. i have 3 university diplomas and i thought understanding was enough ('on a 7 chord, i just have to play mixolydian, ok let's go, do it') then it sounds like crap if you havent worked specifically on everything before. i felt bad and was hard on myself for years because of this. in fact i wasn't practicing anything of what i understood!!!
My teacher showed that to me, made me work on the major scale for 3 years (including modes, work on patterns harmonisation, all possible inversions, use of the scale on chords, modulations, superimpositions, etc etc) and when you are prepared, it's EASY to make music with something.
My teacher actually says the same thing in the opposite way, and i love that statement 'if you can't do something, it's not because it's too hard or because you're not good enough, it's because you're not prepared enough. Sit down, write down everything that was a problem for you, work on everyone of these things for a few weeks untile they are all simple, and try again, if it still seems hard, do the same process'.
My musical evolution and vision of my playing changed radically since i started following his lessons and way of working.
Back on the feeling vs theory thing
My teacher also told me 'if your feeling is killed by a little practice and study, then it was not very strong at the beggining' i agree with that.
it just means that it's HIDDEN by other thoughts which have nothing to do with music.
read kenny werner's book 'effortless mastery'. it's absolutely great about that subject.
my two cents, hope that helps
Peace
p.s. another great quote by my teacher that really brightened some moments when i was feeling badly about music: 'if you are aware of something, then it means this thing exists into you, even if you are not able to make it happen by yourself yet'.
So if you feel that a guy has this killer phrasing and that when you pick your guitar your phrasing sucks and you have nothing to say... in fact, you have something to say, because you percieved that killer phrasing, it means you have a sensibility for it.. maybe you just don't have the tools to do it at the moment: play a bit, sit, write down everything you don't like about your phrasing 'phrases start at obvious places on the bar, i don't play with the changes, no big interval leaps, ...' can be anything, then reverse all this 'start the phrases at non obvious places on the bar, play with the changes, using big interval leaps' that's your list of things to work on for the next month
Last edited by add4; 07-01-2011 at 09:50 AM.
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As a pretty raw beginner, I'm still trying to acquaint myself with the fundamental tools of playing jazz on the guitar. I'm kind of intrigued by a quote I read on here that basically says 'you can get more out of learning one tune really, really well than you can out of a superficial knowledge of x number of songs.' I picked 'Autumn Leaves' a couple of months ago and I've been hitting it pretty hard everyday since. I do play through other tunes - especially a couple of professional transcriptions I have - whenever I practice, but AL is the real focus of my practice..... playing through the changes and melody in different keys, working on chord tones and arps for the chords in the song, trying to learn something from every comping arrangement I can lay hands to, playing along with various iterations of the changes with BIAB..... My point is, just like anything, the more I learn about it, the more I'm able to do with it..... the more I take what I already know for granted, really internalize it through repetition, the less I have to think about it. I remember Mr. Beaumont talking about the fretboard 'lighting up' with chord tones and that has finally started to happen with a few of the chords in AL.
I can see this process going on indefinitely..... acquire knowledge, internalize concept and motor skills, build up to the next level...... I can see (at some point far in the future) getting to the point where I can turn off the cerebral aspect of improvisation and just let the instrument sing. Like others have said, I've started viewing this 'theory vs. ear' debate as simply a skill level issue. People who have put in the time to master whatever their conception of theory is are able to just play because they don't have to think about what they're doing in the same way...... I think people who play by ear have simply evolved their own 'theory' by trial and error coupled with an intimate relationship with the instrument. Anything approaching this level of play is still a long way off for me, but my own minor victories in internalizing and applying musical concepts have allowed me to imagine the possibility that I will actually get there someday.....
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This is a brilliant post which rings true on so many levels. Well said! Originally Posted by add4
Good old debate between the theory or 'feeling'
if you like music and play it, you most probably have feeling.
so i'd say everyone has feeling.
When you start to realize that feeling is not enough, you might not hear everything you know, now be able to play a particular music, on a particular progression, or just no be able to play what you hear. then you start to think about theory and structured practice.
At this point you might sound 'dead, sterile' for a few months/years. while you want to apply things you haven't really practiced enough yet.
I think then as long as theory is not properly assimilated, if you TRY you use it and bring it into your soloing, then it sounds as the thing it is ' someone using his brain to try to make it sound as 'putanythinghere' ' which in short sounds like crap.
What it means is that you still have to think to make it happen. that particular thing is not sunk into your vocabulary, your fingers, your inconscious, or your whatever is at work while the 'feeling' talks.
THEN YOU NEED TO PRACTICE THE SAME THING OVER AND OVER AGAIN UNTIL IT IS USABLE WITHOUT THINKING!!
At that time only, you might be able to use something without thinking of it.
You're playing good music again, at a higher level.
In short, i think theory is never bad, if you praticed it long enough that it becomes natural. In all cases, you should never try to apply anything that is not assimilated and natural when you solo. if you have to, forget about it and find new exercices to assimilate that particular stuff.
I think the way you asked the question is particularly revealing a oversimplified way of thinking:'Theory or emotion'. I was in the same place for years until my teacher showed me that between the two, there is 'structured practice'.
- Theory is about knowing a particular tool exists for a particular situation (whoa, a car is very useful to travel long distances)
- Structured practicing is about understanding how to use it and make it so natural that you can use it in whatever situation and it feels natural (driving on a parking lot, then on small roads, learning to park, go into traffic, ...)
- Feeling is when you play and everything you have practiced is able to go through into your own musical expression (you want to go somewhere, you just take the car and drive. But if you haven't learned and take a car and try to go on a highway directly, i bet there might be a bad surprise for you and the car after a few minutes)
To me it was a real shock to understand that everything has to be worked on in order to be used naturally. i have 3 university diplomas and i thought understanding was enough ('on a 7 chord, i just have to play mixolydian, ok let's go, do it') then it sounds like crap if you havent worked specifically on everything before. i felt bad and was hard on myself for years because of this. in fact i wasn't practicing anything!!!
My teacher showed that to me, made me work on the major scale for 3 years (including modes, work on patterns harmonisation, all possible inversions, use of the scale on chords, modulations, superimpositions, etc etc) and when you are prepared, it's EASY to make music with something.
My teacher actually says the opposite, and i love that statement 'if you can't do something, it's not because it's too hard or because you're not good enough, it's because you're not prepared enough. Sit down, write down everything that was a problem for you, work on everyone of these things for a few weeks untile they are all simple, and try again, if it still seems hard, do the same process'.
My musical evolution and vision of my playing changed radically since i started following his lessons and way of working.
Back on the feeling vs theory thing
My teacher also told me 'if your feeling is killed by a little practice and study, then it was not very strong at the beggining' i agree with that.
it just means that it's HIDDEN by other thoughts which have nothing to do with music.
read kenny werner's book 'effortless mastery'. it's absolutely great about that subject.
my two cents, hope that helps
Peace
p.s. another great quote by my teacher that really brightened some moments when i was feeling badly about music: 'if you are aware of something, then it means this thing exists into you, even if you are not able to make it happen by yourself yet'.
So if you feel that a guy has this killer phrasing and that when you pick your guitar your phrasing sucks and you have nothing to say... in fact, you have something to say, because you percieved that killer phrasing, it means you have a sensibility for it.. maybe you just don't have the tools to do it at the moment: play a bit, sit down, everything you don't like about your phrasing 'phrases start at obvious places on the bar, i don't play with the changes, no big interval leaps, ...' can be anything, then reverse all this 'start the phrases at non obvious places on the bar, play with the changes, using big interval leaps' that's your list of things to work on for the next month
I'm not sure that "emotion" is the holy grail - I would describe it as "intent", being able to play what you want to play - or feel is appropriate to play - in the moment.
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You need knowledge and heart. Plain and simple. THis is jazz. You ain't gonna feel your way through "Giant Steps."
I don't understand why folks think these things are mutually exclusive.
I don't care that Wes couldn't read music. Reading music isn't theory. He understood music. Plus, Wes knew more than folks give him credit for, I watched a video once where he explained a song to the band, and he used numbers to denote the chords in a key, and knew where barlines would be, etc. The world likes to make heroes of people who "just play what they feel" but that number is actually a lot smaller than most of us would think, and it's very small in the jazz world...
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Emotion always trumps Intellect in music. There's nothing wrong with Theory, and it's a great tool but the connection of the human elements is always far more important then thinking about chords or scales or getting in that lick you learned.
Theory is in many ways a way to explain something after the fact. We should be striving to play from a human place as much as possible, and sometimes that isn't always available to us. Either through unfamiliar pieces, situations or not being able to tap that resource Theory provides a back up plan that can help move us to the right direction of playing from one's self and not from a book/classrom/transcription bank.
Practice and Theory are often times not applied properly. In my opinion they are both nothing more then Ear training, and a way to lessen the gap between what one hears/feels in their head and the ability to excecute it on the instrument. Some people hear harmony very well, others a strong sense of melody or rhythm or feel or articulation. We all have a strength and we gravitate towards it. In practice we strengthen those bonds and we add to our vocabulary and through Theory we find a way to communicate it verbally and grasp a stronger left side brain version of what is going on.
People who use theory as the end as opposed to a means to an end often sound like they're playing from the index of a scale book. So be it, and if they enjoy what they are playing then more power to them. But music (any music) that doesn't come from an emotional place isn't music that I personally want to make.
We all have had to or are going through periods of development where we are confused or frustrated and don't know how to power through them. Thinking in terms of theory is a way to get through it, a good way I'd say. However, like Matt said... when it comes time to play you just have to play.
When I get a student in a lesson (and this always happens eventually) where they are frustrated with their progress, they practice and they don't feel like they are getting any better I explain it to them like this.
Every Musician lives in two personalities as a Musician... the one that is here right now sitting across from me and can do "A". He can do what he does, and he needs to accept that and do it to the best of his ability. This is the Musician that is limited but he's making music and he's going to make it because he has to do it, because it's like a calling.
The other Musician is the man/woman in a practice room. He is self critical and he must be. He can do "A" but he's working on "B". He is able to do things in the practice room that he cannot do in the real world, he's still trying to learn it. He gets frustrated when he's in the real world "A" situation because he cannot do "B" yet even though he wants to. The problem is that when he goes for "B" it's not a part of him yet, there's no emotional/personal connection strong enough to it that it becomes part of his "A" team of concepts, ideas and abilities as a real world Musician.
Eventually aspects of B start to trickle into A and he won't even notice it until one day down the road he'll hear a recording of a jam session, or someone he looks up to tells him that he's sounding good, and then he feels validated
and then the process will start all over again.
the process never stops.
Because that Musician, Musician A, the real world musician who can do what he can do now is emotionally connected to what he's doing, and thus it's more honest, he cares about it more and he accepts the fact that that "B" musician is always going to be changing and keeping "A" fresh, exciting and full of joy and change.
and that might not have come across in Text.
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Knowledge is power. Plain and simple. Knowing how to wield that power is a separate concept. True art is the marriage of both knowledge and ones intrinsic self. It takes countless hours of practice to bring either to the table in an expressive way. Knowledge without feeling is an exercise in futility, as an artist. Feeling without knowledge becomes a two dimensional dead end. Have them both in balance and the universe is at your command.
Know the truth, and the truth will set you free.Last edited by brwnhornet59; 07-01-2011 at 10:12 AM.
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Your in dream land if you think your heart and soul are going to make you improvise music worth hearing. Maybe more than simply using luck... but not much more. Playing jazz is not religion, world peace or when it comes down to it... really not doing that much to help the world.
Any good jazz player has the skills to make most believe their improvisation is 100% emotional and from the heart.
Is there like a switch which goes on to tell the world... hey, I'm playing from the heart and with emotion... it doesn't mater what I play now, it's all good now. This is the real shit, I'm struggling to get these notes out... do you feel it...
We all play with emotion... we all say throw the theory away when we play.... but if you don't have emotion or theory... it's pretty hard to use or throw away.
You do have control over what you practice...
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When babies verbalize before they've developed vocabulary... it's just babbling.
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I have came to realization a while ago, identifying great musicians who were not formally trained in music as playing by 'emotion' or 'feeling' is kind of a non-sequitur...just because they don't know the names of the scales, or how exactly to construct a chord doesn't mean they are playing by 'feeling' or 'emotion'.
If you take a peak at the biographies of people who were not traditionally educated in music, they just learned a different way, by their ears; by watching a million shows, listening to a million records...
Just because they didn't know in technical terms what they were doing, they still knew what they were doing musically.
Not to mention that playing completely by 'emotion' is kind of an esoteric notion - I think that only a few people in the history of the world could do something like that. I think most people - even the greatest improvisors and musicians of all time - are likely to intersect 'knowledge' with 'emotion' for the most part.
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This is so vitally important. I studied guitar diligently for 10 years never thinking I was good enough,overly self critical (even though in retrospect I was pretty damned decent) to gig at all. I bought a bass and formed a band on a lark. I was studied enough in music to know what to do, but since I could only 'get through the gig' and was not a bass player anyway, didn't worry about a thing. I was learning bass on the bandstand, doing what I could to get through the gig. We were doing 150 gigs a year by my second year playing bass. I had no mental blocks, I would do gigs, have fun, come home and practice music and learning tunes. I even did a few jazz gigs on bass. Originally Posted by Jake Hanlon
Now I'm back to guitar. The first gig I felt high pressure, that was relieved when I slipped on ice and fell down the steps and broke a rib, club owner saw it... free pass on a gig with busted up hands too, but I survived. What I didn't get before, and the fall helped, You get me where I am in my development. I felt like I could trick the world when playing bass, but that's not true, people will not tolerate bad playing.
Be happy with "A" and use it for gigging, make the instrument sound good. Often times on the gig "C" will happen, what you never practiced (but are prepared to do) and didn't know you had in you comes out. That is magic.
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See, maybe I'm cynical, but I don't think there's any "magic" to it. When you really "know" something it can come out naturally in the flow of things.
The following being directed to the guitar playing world in general, not any specific posters here--There has to be work first...now, it doesn't necessarily have to be work on theory/musical language (which a lot of the "I play by feel, man" players think, for some reason, is the opposite of "feel"--these folks need a brush up on synonyms and antonyms, but I digress) but it's work all the same.
You need to work hard and know your shit well enough to actually say something with it...that's the "feel" part.
Most guitarists want to use "feel" as an excuse not to work.
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Theory is key and when I play with emotion I'm only feeling the music. Theory comes out in my playing, its the only thing that comes out but I sometimes just don't realize how theoretical I'm TRULY playing.
I think improvisation and people's approach to improvisation is done differently by everyone and some people realize how much theory they put into it and some don't but a good jazz musician is always using theory, sub-consciously or consciously.
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But also when I think about it to much I limit myself.
A double bladed sword perhaps?
Either that or I'm just a babbling idiot.... and thats about 85% of it.
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I was just going to say the same exact thing. It's a pointless debate. If anything, having good chops and having a second-nature knowledge of theory opens up an infinite amount of doors to you to play what you feel. I love SRV's playing, but to say that because he doesn't know too much theory his "feeling" hasn't been compromised is totally ignorant. How can one honestly say SRV plays with more feeling than, say, John McLaughlin, simply because they express themselves differently? Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
I agree with beaumont, many times this "theory compromises emotion" nonsense is used as an excuse not to work. On the other hand, if what you want to do with your music doesn't necessarily require extensive knowledge of theory, that is perfectly okay; but to think that learning theory will make you sound mechanical is again ignorant. No doubt it can (I can think of countless players with fine chops that sound completely cold and stiff), but only if you let it. If used positively, theory and chops simply expand the range of possibilities, and let you express yourself more fully. Both Charlie Parker and Bill Evans said something to the effect of: "Learn everything, and then forget it."
Please note I am not putting words in anyone's mouth here, I am merely echoing what I have heard personally from different people on this debate, not in this thread, but from personal experience.Last edited by Extrapolation; 07-02-2011 at 12:45 PM.
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SRV was an awesome player. I did not see anyone say that his playing was compromised.
I did not see anyone say that learning theory would make them sound mechanical. I did see that theory without emotion is an exercise in futility.
The point is that both knowledge and feeling in balance, are required to express ourselves to the fullest. As a serious artist, that is the standard that I apply to myself. It is also a requirement in the music that I listen to.
I am sure that we are all looking for the same thing. Making the most of what have by using everything we have learned, to it's fullest extent. Formal or informal, acquired knowledge comes in many forms. I believe that is why artist's with true feeling can take themselves closer to their full potential with very little knowledge, as opposed to someone who has not honed their expressive side and went for the formula's only. Ever see someone who sight reads really well but can't improvise? That is a good analogy. But let that cat learn how to express himself by putting the time into it, then watch out.
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Yes I was not quoting anyone in this thread, but rather what I have heard from personal experience from people about this. No one said SRV's playing was compromised, but rather I have been told that learning theory somehow compromises the "feel" in one's playing. No one in this thread said that theory makes you sound mechanical, but that is an excuse made by some people who would rather not work. Originally Posted by brwnhornet59
Bold: I think you hit the nail on the head there. And yes I have seen incredible sight-readers that can't improvise, they are called classical musicians.Last edited by Extrapolation; 07-02-2011 at 02:06 PM.
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