The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #1

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    I don’t see much discussion in this forum about the necessity to play by ear when improvising. All the discussions about which scales go with which chord type etc are valuable but fall away when performing a tune. This is because thinking about such matters takes time and gets you out of the flow of the tune. You must, as Hal Galper says in his book Forward Motion, “fake it” in other words, play by ear.

    Do you agree that one improvises by ear? And if so, what do you do to practise this? I do solfege and transcriptions.

    At performance time I play better by ear when I hum my lines as I play them. I feel that this connects my mind to my hands. A problem with this is that when I record, my humming gets picked up, and its out of tune. I also noticed that my ears work better when I play finger style rather than with a pick.

    I’m interested in this forum’s thoughts on the importance of playing by ear, as difficult as that can be.

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    The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
     
  3. #2
    There's a section on the forum for ear training. In all honesty, it's one of the harder things to talk about in text form, which is what this forum is. That's the primary reason it may seem neglected compared to other topics.

    Rhythm and phrasing are almost certainly more important than which notes to play etc., but in the same way, it's just more difficult to talk about verbally in a lot of ways.

    There's always an idea that people are "obsessing " over modes and note choice, to the detriment of everything else. Maybe some are, but I believe a lot of this is just a misunderstanding of the kind of things people talk about - or are ABLE to talk about - on Internet forums easily.

    To be fair, being able to play melodically over a given chord without clams is a decent skill to have. That's all the mode thing is. In everything I look at online from horn players and pianists, I get the very distinct impression that they AREN'T hung up on modes being such a BAD thing, the way guitarists are. They neither talk about it as being a fatal crutch that will stifle your creativity .... nor as some magic pill that will make you be able to magically improvise. It's talked about as more like a STARTING POINT for not playing clams in a basic way.

    Traditional ear training in jazz is mostly about transcribing licks, lines or entire solos by ear, from recordings. Again, to be fair, pianists and horn players already KNOW basic scales and arpeggios thoroughly BEFORE even beginning this step. So, I don't think you can fairly say that basic melodic rudiments are of no value.

    Everything you play is ear training in a way .

  4. #3

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    I enjoy interesting questions. Much more interesting than questions about equipment! I like to learn about music. Gear I don't really care about. I don't care about what pickup or model Gibson Charlie Christian or George Benson used.

    Whatever. ..

    Makes total sense to improvise by ear. Gary Burton mentioned how we talk. It's all by ear. We learned to talk by ear. Why can't we improvise by ear? How long to learn to talk? Years right? If we practice improvising by ear for years will we be able to do it? Do we have the patience to do this for years?

    Now, a good question is: "how would you teach someone to improvise by ear?"

    Would you do as previously stated? Just do it until you learn to talk with your guitar?

    Blues guitarists, rock and pop guitarists improvise by ear all the time.

    Take a tune a try it. One with only a couple key changes to start with.

    You still have to sound jazzy when you do this.

    Next question: "What makes an improvisor sound jazzy?"

    Matt has mentioned rhythm and phrasing as one thing.
    Last edited by Drumbler; 02-25-2019 at 06:39 PM.

  5. #4

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    Theory and knowledge is there to help those ears out. Give them ideas. Broaden the language. Guide them through difficult times. But the language should obviously be spoken through those ears...People don't go around saying random words just because they know lots of words. At least, I don't see much point in that!

    Yeah, play by ear, but let knowledge help you out. And don't speak new words in public until you can use them in sensible sentences

  6. #5

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    Quote Originally Posted by Rsilver
    I’m interested in this forum’s thoughts on the importance of playing by ear, as difficult as that can be.
    I think it is super fundamental. I really don't understand how anyone can play jazz and *not* play "by ear" in some way. I think there's some confusion around the term, because historically, people have used it to mean that someone plays "by ear" to the exclusion of other things like knowing names for things, etc. I'm thinking of hearing someone say "oh, he/she plays by ear" where they actually mean, the person either doesn't know any music theory or can't read or something.

    I like Pat Metheny's take on the topic, which is that you should use all the information available to you when you play.

    For me, if I want to practice playing by ear, I either play along with records that have tunes that I don't know or maybe tunes I do know but in different keys or modulations (any Sinatra/Ella record is amazing for this), or, I play tunes I barely know in different keys.

  7. #6

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    Yikes, this is my first post in at least 3 years. I've been lurking in the shadows, and reading all the posts.

    I am obsessed with working on my ear so I can play what I hear.

    You can definitely discuss how to play by ear. I had an ear training thread on here years back where I was tracking my own journey. I might start it up again once things settle over here.

    In my opinion, theory is great. What's even better is if you can really hear the theory.

    Rhythm is part of ear training, so is harmony, so is phrasing, so is time feel, and so is song form. It all connects to the ear.

    I'll stop there before I start rambling. In short, ear training is my favorite topic to discuss.

  8. #7

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    One thing mentioned by Gary Burton (see video in this thread How much theory do I need before getting into jazz?) was the ability to outline the chords without having any backing.

    Think Joe Pass playing by himself.

    Can you do this by ear?

    Without knowledge of scales, chord tones or anything like that?

    How could you do it if you can't hear what to solo over?

  9. #8
    I’m glad you find this topic stimulating. Not to drop names, but many years ago I asked Jim Hall, at a jazz clinic he gave, if he’s thinking concepts when he’s performing. I can’t remember his exact wording, but he said no, no thinking allowed during performance except the flow of musical ideas.

  10. #9

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    Well ultimately the goal in Jazz is to play what you hear in your head, but to achieve that at a high level it obviously takes years of preparing the mind/ear/fingers..

    Theory trains the mind, the mind trains the ear, the ear trains the fingers. That's how I like to see it.

  11. #10

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    forget playing the changes by ear, how about singing the changes?

    I find that if I can sing the guide tones and guide tone lines of a tune, I'm better equipped to solo over it when I pick up my guitar.

    Singing the arpeggios helps as well. Internalizing the melody and being able to sing it, well that's the first step, ain't it?

    I still approach my studies through the lens of Charlie Banacos. Sing everything in one key. Use sharps or flats to the original key to express momentary shifts "out of the key".

    I use chromatic movable do when I sing.

    You'd be surprised how difficult it is to actually "hold on" to a key center, but the work is worth it in my mind.

  12. #11

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    Quote Originally Posted by Irez87
    forget playing the changes by ear, how about singing the changes?

    I find that if I can sing the guide tones and guide tone lines of a tune, I'm better equipped to solo over it when I pick up my guitar.

    Singing the arpeggios helps as well. Internalizing the melody and being able to sing it, well that's the first step, ain't it?
    this is huge. Seriously. And so overlooked.

  13. #12

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    I’ve gotten so tired of exercises and theory. Lately I’ve just been doing a little bit of warm-up and then diving into Body and Soul, playing it entirely by ear, over and over again. Sometimes with backing track, sometimes with just a drum loop or metronome, sometimes just guitar. Sometimes just the melody, sometimes comping, sometimes pure improvisation. I’m noticing that if you do this long enough, the bumps start to smooth out.

    Instead of trying to think my way into the song, I’m hearing my way into it. For example: pretty basic stuff, but tonight I sort of stumbled onto using the maj 3rd of the Bb7. Now I get it how this chord fits into the distinctive sound of the bars leading up to the resolution to Db. Earlier I would just throw whatever altered notes I could and/or whatever ornamentation I could and hope for the best. Now I am really hearing that maj 3rd as integral to making that chord fit into the ptogression.

  14. #13

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    If I don’t know a tune very well I will work over the changes a lot, using chord tones and gradually building up connecting lines. This is a bit easier when you’ve been doing it for years and already know some standards, because the same small building blocks of progressions crop up in different tunes and you start to recognise them. But when I do the actual ‘playing’, I am largely doing it by ear, not thinking much. Maybe just aware of the most important chords or key centres or something. But if I really get into the flow, I’m no longer aware of even that minimal information.

    It seems to me that when I have done enough work to internalise the tune, so that I can hear the harmonies (chord tones) as a sort of stream of sound in my head (without any names or numbers attached), then I can solo ok on that tune.

  15. #14

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    Quote Originally Posted by Rsilver
    I don’t see much discussion in this forum about the necessity to play by ear when improvising. All the discussions about which scales go with which chord type etc are valuable but fall away when performing a tune. This is because thinking about such matters takes time and gets you out of the flow of the tune. You must, as Hal Galper says in his book Forward Motion, “fake it” in other words, play by ear.

    Do you agree that one improvises by ear? And if so, what do you do to practise this? I do solfege and transcriptions.

    At performance time I play better by ear when I hum my lines as I play them. I feel that this connects my mind to my hands. A problem with this is that when I record, my humming gets picked up, and its out of tune. I also noticed that my ears work better when I play finger style rather than with a pick.

    I’m interested in this forum’s thoughts on the importance of playing by ear, as difficult as that can be.
    Yes

    I think an important thing is learning to play lots of melodies al over the neck by ear.

    Also I like that exercise when you sing your lines and finger them on the guitar without playing the notes (it’s good if you mute the strings completely.)

  16. #15

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    Quote Originally Posted by Irez87
    forget playing the changes by ear, how about singing the changes?

    I find that if I can sing the guide tones and guide tone lines of a tune, I'm better equipped to solo over it when I pick up my guitar.

    Singing the arpeggios helps as well. Internalizing the melody and being able to sing it, well that's the first step, ain't it?

    I still approach my studies through the lens of Charlie Banacos. Sing everything in one key. Use sharps or flats to the original key to express momentary shifts "out of the key".

    I use chromatic movable do when I sing.

    You'd be surprised how difficult it is to actually "hold on" to a key center, but the work is worth it in my mind.
    An interesting thing I’ve found is that my formal sense of functional pitch - 1 2 b3 etc - is more or less completely unconnected to my ability to play notes and chords on my instrument by ear.

    Holding on to the key centre is a real challenge.

    Singing Barry Harris style scale outlines is a good entry point for singing changes because scales are easier to sing accurately than arpeggios.

    But I’ve come across students who can’t pitch a note in their voice but will play a phrase back to you on guitar.

    It’s a complex area!

  17. #16

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    I picked up the guitar because had the idea for playing by ear. After writing some apps and doing some exercises, I think in 4 years.. don't even remember anymore.. I could freely play on key changes just by ear(diatonic). And no, it's not magic - from that point it took a few years more to make it sound nice enough. Obviously a lot of people can do it faster and get it sound jazzy with way less effort. I'm old too, that doesn't help But yeah, it's completely possible.

  18. #17

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    Quote Originally Posted by matt.guitarteacher
    There's a section on the forum for ear training. In all honesty, it's one of the harder things to talk about in text form, which is what this forum is. That's the primary reason it may seem neglected compared to other topics.

    Rhythm and phrasing are almost certainly more important than which notes to play etc., but in the same way, it's just more difficult to talk about verbally in a lot of ways.

    There's always an idea that people are "obsessing " over modes and note choice, to the detriment of everything else. Maybe some are, but I believe a lot of this is just a misunderstanding of the kind of things people talk about - or are ABLE to talk about - on Internet forums easily.

    To be fair, being able to play melodically over a given chord without clams is a decent skill to have. That's all the mode thing is. In everything I look at online from horn players and pianists, I get the very distinct impression that they AREN'T hung up on modes being such a BAD thing, the way guitarists are. They neither talk about it as being a fatal crutch that will stifle your creativity .... nor as some magic pill that will make you be able to magically improvise. It's talked about as more like a STARTING POINT for not playing clams in a basic way.

    Traditional ear training in jazz is mostly about transcribing licks, lines or entire solos by ear, from recordings. Again, to be fair, pianists and horn players already KNOW basic scales and arpeggios thoroughly BEFORE even beginning this step. So, I don't think you can fairly say that basic melodic rudiments are of no value.

    Everything you play is ear training in a way .
    There's a fairly obvious reason why this is so.

  19. #18

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    There's really no such thing as literally playing by ear. Everything you play, and I mean everything, has been played before.

    The player is basically repeating what he already knows in one way or another. In a very experienced player it's either applied knowledge or sheer muscle memory. When a player appears to pull something out of the bag, it's unlikely that's what he's actually done. It could be luck but it's more likely to be experience speaking or the subconscious calculating it unconsciously and the fingers doing it.

    I've done this myself, taken an unfamiliar chord sequence and gone over it 'by ear'. That's not what's happening, it's knowledge, experience and memory 'computerised' by the subconscious. When your fingers suddenly 'do it' that's the subconscious experience at work.

    Conversely, when a person tries to play over a sequence they don't know and stumble it's because they don't have the resources to cope with it. But they're 'playing by ear' as much as anyone in that sense.

    If you think of it, the term 'ear' is actually meaningless. It's what you hear, what you know, what you think, what you can do, all put together. Plus some luck too, probably :-)

  20. #19

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    Quote Originally Posted by ragman1
    There's no such thing as playing by ear. Everything you play, and I mean everything, has been played before.
    -)
    i don't agree , sorry
    yes we do play licks , of course ....
    maybe even most of the time , but not all of the time
    there are moments of newness in there too
    have you never surprised yourself with something new ?

  21. #20

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    Quote Originally Posted by pingu
    have you never surprised yourself with something new ?
    I may appear to have but, if it was analysed, I doubt it. Or it was just chance. We're not talking about a sudden phrase or note but about playing a whole tune, or a section of one. You don't play a chance note, or a few notes, 'by ear'. Playing by ear is longer than that.

  22. #21

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    I played by ear just last night.

    I was playing Donald Byrd's "Tanya" last night (from Dexter Gordon's "One Flight Up")

    If you're not familiar with it, it's a longer form--a modal A section that's almost a blues 8 bars of Ebm to 4 of Abm back to 4 Ebm, played though twice...

    And then...a series of knotty wtf changes to turn it back around. Now I didn't have a lead sheet, and I was unsure of a lot of those changes (the bass walks through 'em, very hard to pin down) but the head has a very clear, riff like melody over that part.

    So I just heard that part in my head and tried to craft a counter melody, something I could sing. Totally winged it. That's playing by ear. It's nothing magical, like people make it out to be.

  23. #22

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    Quote Originally Posted by ragman1
    There's really no such thing as literally playing by ear. Everything you play, and I mean everything, has been played before.

    The player is basically repeating what he already knows in one way or another. In a very experienced player it's either applied knowledge or sheer muscle memory. When a player appears to pull something out of the bag, it's unlikely that's what he's actually done. It could be luck but it's more likely to be experience speaking or the subconscious calculating it unconsciously and the fingers doing it.

    I've done this myself, taken an unfamiliar chord sequence and gone over it 'by ear'. That's not what's happening, it's knowledge, experience and memory 'computerised' by the subconscious. When your fingers suddenly 'do it' that's the subconscious experience at work.

    Conversely, when a person tries to play over a sequence they don't know and stumble it's because they don't have the resources to cope with it. But they're 'playing by ear' as much as anyone in that sense.

    If you think of it, the term 'ear' is actually meaningless. It's what you hear, what you know, what you think, what you can do, all put together. Plus some luck too, probably :-)
    Kind of think there's a nugget of truth in here somewhere...

    There's a sort of dichotomy implied here between 'experience' and 'playing by ear' and actually we all tend to hear much better things we have heard, or played in the past. So a lick I play all the time, I will pick out right away on a record.

    So if rag means 'playing by ear' in the sense of playing a solo just one note at a time, by ear, I would agree I don't think it's that common.

    But that's not to say it's not done. I actually know a (small) number people who play music this way, melodies, solos, everything, no concept of theory.

    This is obviously much easier with a key centric approach - make up a good melody in Bb (based intuitively on your listening to your favourite players) and it will work on the A of rhythm changes. It just will. Soloing on Giant Steps this way is harder, obviously.

    (That said, you might hear Em7b5 A7b9 in a tune, and play lines based on your knowledge of that progression. You are still using your ears, but in a very different way.)

    OTOH if you play a solo based on the correct scales but it isn't audiated on some level - the soloist wouldn't be able to sing it - it will always sound a bit disconnected and noodly.

    That's not to say you can't audiated patterns and licks as a whole. When music gets fast, the hearing of it becomes more 'chunked' so to speak.... You hear more notes at a time...

    So this idea of audiation - the aural imagination - you know I don't know about others, but I've always found accurately audiating phrases to be the hardest step in working our melodies or solo lines. Once I can audiate it clearly, the next step is not a problem, just put it on the guitar, usually first time unless it's very weird. That said, I'm a lot better at hearing certain musical ideas than others. I'm best, of course, at hearing things I'm familiar with.

    I tend to write music by ear once the creative process is engaged and I don't fundamentally see why improvisation is any different to composition. Pretty much the same thing.

  24. #23

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    I think of "playing by ear" as learning new material by listening/transcribing rather than reading. My ability to do this has always been better than my sight reading, so that's mainly how I've learned tunes (filling in bits I can't quite catch from a chart), especially melodies. I think it's helpful, especially since having a new tune thrown at me at a jam (or even a gig) is something that happens quite often, and I would not be able to survive situations like that without being able to learn by ear. But if you're never in situations like that, it might not be essential,

    But the OP seems to be using "playing by ear" to mean "improvising without thinking explicitly about the theory and rules ." That's not only "essential" to jazz, it IS jazz. On the bandstand, music flies by too fast and with other players throwing in sub, re-harms and alterations of one kind or another; I don't know anybody who thinks about the theory of what they're doing in the midst of that, except in occasional moments where the conscious mind wakes up a little, or when one has to actively think about the changes to a tune one hasn't really learned yet.

    One doesn't see much discussion of this mode of playing because it's extremely difficult to describe -- it's a flow state, a mode of being, not a mode of conscious, structured action. One sees a lot of discussion of how to prepare and practice for this, and that can be very useful. But a lot of the time, we're on line talking about this stuff for the sake of being online and talking about this stuff, and we can only do that by talking about the stuff we can actually talking about. I can't tell you what I'm thinking when another player reaches the end of his solo and it's my turn to play, because I don't know what I'm thinking; I'm just hearing and playing.

    John

  25. #24

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    A lot of ear training should be aural mindfulness during practice time. Paying attention to and being engaged with what you play aurally rather then just passively listening to what comes out of the instrument. One can get a lot more ear training out of practice habits by asking questions like:
    - I'm playing a sixth, how does that sound against the chord.
    - Can I pick out the third and sign it when the next chord plays.
    - Can I hear the 9th of the following chord in my head without it being played, then play it and see if what I heard in my head was right.
    - Can I sing this part of the melody a major second higher. Can I even sing it in the current key.
    - Can I sing the roots of the tune against the metronome and nail it.
    ...
    There are endless ideas. Solfege, intervals etc. should be learned but they are often out of context and useless until you do stuff like above. Ear training is a mental attitude towards how you practice. It's not a separate activity.

  26. #25

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    There are a few people here who advocate for playing by ear. When you play by ear with the record, you learn to emulate the player on the record, which means you pick up on his/her rhythm.