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How can a person with no idea about musical theory be able to play and throw a lick beginning on, say, the 3rd of the happening chord? I mean, how is it possible for him/her to know that the phrase he/she wants to play should start exactly there?
I just can't imagine how that is possible, if I knew how I would immediately stop rationalizing everything and work on the ear-fingers connection as much as possible!
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09-18-2014 04:49 PM
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You answered your own question......
Originally Posted by EUrgell
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Still you would require perfect pitch , wouldn't you?
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I think you're confusing knowing theory with knowing the notes in a chord.
The player in question could just remember which note of the chord to start a phrase on, whether it be through a chord shape or knowing where each note is.
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I don't think I understand what not knowing any theory would mean. Wiki defines theory as:
Music Theory is the study of the structure of music. It includes considerations of melody, rhythm, counterpoint, harmony and form; tonal systems, scales, tuning, intervals, consonance, dissonance, durational proportions and the acoustics of pitch systems; composition, performance, orchestration, ornamentation, improvisation and electronic sound production; etc.[1]
Could you actually play jazz if you didn't understand any of that?
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Can you sing a line you think would work. Okay now transcribe what you sang, you're on you way. Now listen to lots of players to get idea, learn to sing the lines of theirs you like and start building your vocabulary. It's a long route but possible. So is learning some theory possible.
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The people who created jazz (and most forms of traditional music) had no formal music eduction. So why would formal education be necessary to play it?
Likewise if you think about the complexity and nuance of the Mandarin language you might think that it would be impossible for a 5 year old to pick it up and communicate effectively. But all over China children do just that through the process of observation and imitation.
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At some point in the history, as late as the 50s, you could have probably gotten by with no theory. Coltrane came around with Giant Steps which required some serious harmonic knowledge. Also the music of Wayne came by shortly after and really messed with a lot of peoples ears.
As a musician today, you could get by, if your goal is to play background music, etc. Where people won't judge you and you don't expect to become some sort of innovative or respected figure.
There are too many things going on right now that require deep study into music, not only jazz, but also musical styles relevant to other cultures. A big crowd of musicians are studying Indian music (Dan Weiss, Miles Okazaki, Nick Russo, Rez Abassi) and many conservatories even have Indian music instructors to teach tabla, kanjira, mridangam, etc. Other musicians are studying African Music (Adam Rudolph, Steve Coleman) and applying those rhythms to their music. Others have gone into middle eastern territory (Brad Shepik with his Balkan stuff, Amir ElSaffar, etc). As always, there's the vast amount of people who study Brazilian and Cuban music, as they're most closely related to bebop.
I tell this to a lot of people, but I feel like nowadays you need to have some sort of gimmick to get by. Very few people can become well known for just playing changes very well. And even guys who don't have a cultural gimmick, still have one that is deeply embedded in theory. Ben Monder, for example, went nuts with harmony and chord voicings to the extent that no one has, and that's why he gets hired.
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I don't think this is true. Almost all biographies I read of the great jazz musicians include mention of some formal (by which I think you mean "western classical music") training, usually lessons in their city with some of the best (classical) teachers. Check out any biography by any of the great piano players of the bebop era, for example. Originally Posted by teok
In any case, the common misperception that only classical training counts as formal education is also problematic (and in my opinion racist): virtually all great jazz musicians in the 40s and 50s were monster sight readers, understood harmony and rhythm much more deeply than most classical musicians do, knew a ton about classical music in addition to jazz, and got their "formal education" on the bandstand and from other jazz musicians. So probably the truest thing one can say is that few of them had music degrees, and they had less experience playing the classical repertoire than someone who studied at a conservatory. But after all, improvising is composition, and you can't compose without understanding how music is constructed.
The OP asked about scale degrees, but as happens frequently in this forum the term "theory" is misused to mean "elementary music notions" like what are major and minor scales and chords. Anyone who ever played jazz well understood major/minor/dominant chords and scales and much more long before they became competent improvisors.Last edited by pkirk; 09-18-2014 at 10:02 PM.
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If playing thousands of gigs with the leading jazz musicians is anything other than formal training,
then I'm not sure what is. In academia, they call this type of encounter, an internship.
By playing music over time, many sonic details come to be understood at a deep level.
Descriptive language and organizational concepts are most effective in the service of ear>finger wisdom.
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No, you just need relative pitch, which comes from basic ear training. If you can't hear it, you can't play it. You can't isolate theory from using your ears. Originally Posted by EUrgell
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What boggles me is the fact that Chet Baker (don't know for sure that he didn't know theory, but that's just an example) could play that ii-V lick in every key. How on earth could he remember the starting notes for all 12 tonalities? There must be something else...
Still I think that what jtizzle said is very sensible regarding the nowadays demand for innovative players. However, what I meant generally was whether they can play great without having conceptualized everything they know (For sure they all had that theory ingrained in their brains but my question is: Can these abilities be formed by means of oral absorption and not rational study?)
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Yer! Wes did!!.... Originally Posted by ColinO
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On the other hand, true innovators (in any field) often defy convention and may claim that it helps not to be bound by the theoretical contexts of the current day. Originally Posted by jtizzle
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Playing jazz without musical theory ?
Imagine .....
You wake up in the morning (starts like and ol' blues) and you have to walk to the tub ...
You need to think about lifting first you left leg, say 5 cm, together with giving a slight angle in your left knee and pushing your foot something like 40 cm in front of you, not too fast. Oh course, your ankle has to bend also accordingly, within a certain limit, otherwise you may sprain it....
Of course, you don't do that
But you can walk !
If you want to be world champion or beat 100m world record, you'll have to think in this way during training
I feel it is very similar with playing jazz
You can have fun with very little theory
You have to master the theory if you want to be a champion
(and what is frustrating to us, common human beings, is that some gifted peolple even do not need that !!!)
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Oral absorption is a very rational study method.Can these abilities be formed by means of oral absorption and not rational study?)
Musicians who have mastered the intricacies of this method are schooled at the highest order.
Improvisation in a group setting calls upon us to listen and respond in real time.
Theory can help us organize what we hear and point towards new sounds for oral absorption.
What we play is important, the detail in which we can describe it is secondary.
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Musical theory - including classical and jazz - is not all that difficult if you have playing experience and are competent on your instrument. At least until you reach the realm of current classical music composition with serialism and the music of George Crumb or Olivier Messiaen. Coltrane's music is certainly not difficult to understand nor to play if you can read well and have command of your instrument. I'm talking here of the bulk of his work as with Red Garland or Miles Davis.
Today's musicians do tend to have formal training, though it has little to do with post-Bop or pre-Bop, imo. More to do with the promulgation of formal degrees at schools like Berklee and Julliard, University of Indiana, etc. The point is that formal training helps one understand the structure of the music, but if you played jazz standards in a good band for years that is where the rubber meets the road. Understanding theory and playing well are related but still distinct. Joe Pass understood enough theory to talk quite intelligently about chord construction, progressions, extensions, etc., but couldn't care less about CST or modes. I don't believe any really good player "thinks about" modes in the middle of performance with the exception of a handful whose life seems bound up in that stuff. In the end it is the ears that count. Stan Getz is a great example, as well as Wes. If you are talking classical composition at the most modern cutting edge, the story is a little different.
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Strange comparison! All the theory in the world wont make a champion (running is not rocket science ) unless you have what it takes ( ability). If you don't, it's a life of the perpetual tyro and a mountain books on so called theory you'll have to resign to. Anyway how much theory does it take to play jazz guitar, it's not classical music, it' supposed to be improvised (made up as you go along) not copied. Originally Posted by 339 in june
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Just not true (assuming you mean Wes didn't understand any of that). Wes understood everything listed. Even electronic sound production, since as Ted Greene points out, Wes had the greatest jazz guitar tone, especially on those Originally Posted by larry graves
creed taylor recordings.
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can you play "twinkle twinkle little star" on your instrument starting from any pitch? same thing. Originally Posted by EUrgell
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Do a deer, a female deer. Originally Posted by EUrgell
Re a drop of golden sun...
Mi a name I call myself. ---hey can you hear mi? or do and mi that tune at that point? How'd you do that?
DavidLast edited by TH; 09-19-2014 at 03:51 PM.
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The whole process of learning to play music seems to be
getting the stuff that's already in you , out onto the instrument ..........
I do this method which is working for me
1 take something you like , a lick , chord movement , a tune , anything
2 find it on the guitar ......one note at a time is necessary (important do not read it)
3 play the sh1t out of it , and any variations of it you like
Repeat 3 here a lot
[I just found out the other day that the French for rehearsal is "repetition" ..... that is spot on]
4 analyze what is going on with the tune and changes you dig
with some kind of number type system (roman numerals /music theory/intervals whatever you want)
not too much of this though ........ a little goes a long way
It figures to me that the more of the above you do
the better/faster you become at doing it
so that eventually you can hear an idea in your head and just play it out in real time ....
and that this is improvisation
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So in answer to the OP's question
for me , yes use theory
but only a little ..... its like salt and pepper
you can spoil the dish with too much
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Dang. I thought I was just supposed to play what was in my head.
Edit: Ooops... sorry pingu.Last edited by zigzag; 09-19-2014 at 11:26 AM.
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No worries , same thing Originally Posted by zigzag
You're answer is just much more succinct !
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Theory can be learned, a natural good set of ears hardly...
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