What you REALLY need to play the changes

[grahambop]

Hmm. I'm not sure how much that has to do with 'big ears'. Learning stuff by listening rather than from a chart is more about getting the tune INTO you I think. Of course I wasn't there at these Monk sessions - if he refused to describe the chords then I could see that getting a bit more into the ears things, but learning a song by having someone play it and sort of describe it to you? I think that's just pretty normal. Also most pros do in fact have super good ears and so learning tunes by ear is pretty easy for them. Cool story either way though.

Bear in mind many of Monk’s tunes are difficult, i.e. intricate melodies, weird chord progressions and voicings, irregular numbers of bars in different sections, etc. It doesn’t sound as if he gave them any verbal descriptions of anything, just bashed it out on the piano.

Also he used to hire sidemen and give them a sort of ‘baptism by fire’ on the gig. There were no charts or rehearsals, he would just launch into his tunes with no introduction and they just had to figure out what to play by ear. Often they had never heard the tune before.

[Marinero]

" but Mozart was said to have had perfect musical memory. He could hear a piece and go home and write it down with all the counterpoint parts. I don’t know if it’s true." rintincop


Hi, R,
It was true of many musicians including Wagner, Beethoven, Mozart, Saint-Saens, and ,I'm certain, many more throughout the history of music. I've worked with some musicians in the past who could hear a song once and play it(mostly pianists) exactly. It is a gift from the gods and, most certainly, 100% genetic. Good playing . . . Marinero

[pauln]

" but Mozart was said to have had perfect musical memory. He could hear a piece and go home and write it down with all the counterpoint parts. I don’t know if it’s true." rintincop


Hi, R,
It was true of many musicians including Wagner, Beethoven, Mozart, Saint-Saens, and ,I'm certain, many more throughout the history of music. I've worked with some musicians in the past who could hear a song once and play it(mostly pianists) exactly. It is a gift from the gods and, most certainly, 100% genetic. Good playing . . . Marinero

Music is highly redundant so you just need to know the "unique" and "first time" instances...

Repetition of the verse-chorus song form - need to know one cycle (unique instance)
Repetition of the song form parts like A A B A (but sometimes A1 A2 B A1) - need to know each unique instance
Repetition within the A B parts (chord loops, descensions and ascensions, two-fives,etc.) - need to know each unique instance

For example, Louis Armstrong's recording of C'est Si Bon:
Three cycles of verse-chorus (needing to know one of three is 1/3)
Song form is A1 B A2
A1 is four redundant cycles
A2 includes almost two of these same cycles
Using the length of that cycle as a unit, the full form is ten units, 3/5 of which are this cycle

So instead of knowing all of the song, you need to know the unique instances within the song
The verse-choruses are 2/3 redundant
The song form cycle is 1/2 redundant and fully so after the first instance

For the total 30 units of the tune, only 5 of them are unique and first time instances, 1/6 or 16.6% of the song, so this three minute and thirty second long song is learned by knowing only the 35 "unique" and "first time" seconds of it

[rintincop]

Yeah, you need to know the A and the B sections.

Ever tried soloing over "Lush Life" by ear without knowing the tune or the changes? I would need to do my homework first for that type of tune. When Oscar Peterson would call a tune at rehearsal that Ray Brown didn't know, Ray would say let me "do my homework for that one and we'll do it next time"

[ccroft]

Been thinking on this thread for a bit. Being able to hear is one part. You need something inside that the hearing connects with. Like:

Sad to say, we need something extra. More than just good ears.

Check out Jimmy B's lesson on what you can do with a major scale. He's not hearing anything he hasn't heard a zillion times before. But listen to what flows out of him. The music is totally 'baked in'. 100% authenticity and conviction. To put it mildly, as Mark says in the thread "He has a gift for melody".

Jimmy Bruno: Power of a Major Scale

So the big question is how do you get that? Innate musical talent. A lot of work. And a ton of experience.

And you Better Git It in Your Soul if you want to play this stuff.