The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #1

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    Veratasium can be a bit touch and go, but this is a good video, and sort of stuff I've been blathering on about


    the idea of chunking is extremely important to what we do

    Also 'repeated experience with feedback'

    Learning LOTS of music is one way we do this.

    It's why simply knowing the rules of chess will not teach you chess, while studying openings and games will make you a better player (so I'm told, I'm terrible at chess.)

    Several other interesting points in the video. (As always with YouTube pop science it should be taken with a degree of skepticism.)

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    The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
     
  3. #2

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    The four habits of highly effective experts who don't sweat the small stuff and feel the pain but do it anyway. They never tell us that successful people are often deeply unhappy obsessives who can do nothing but that one thing for which they are known. Try spending time with chess masters, business leaders or visionaries. They are no fun.

    Besides, you can spend your ten thousand hours practising your thing and still be not that good. The real gift probably is knowing when to give up, and appreciating what you really enjoy.


    Alan Coren wrote a collection of essays called Golfing for Cats. On the front cover was a swastika. The reason for the title and design, Coren said, was that his publisher told him the best selling books were about golf, cats and the Second World War. In a very real sense, we can all learn from that.

    This is why its important to learn lots of repertoire and study solos-golfing-cats-jpg

  4. #3

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    I'm halfway through the video. Very interesting so far

  5. #4

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    Yea good reminder of what should be obvious.

  6. #5

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    ...the similar question I got repeatedly in the last decades, why it is useful to learn math (in school). Of course practically no one will use trigonometry and logarithm in real life. But now I see grown up people without basic understanding of *text*. I mean syntax, not even the content.

    My idea is we learn math, to learn *learning*, and to learn *understanding* and to learn *thinking*. We do this by example, because this is the most efficient way. We learn literature (which is also questioned, many times, "why poems") to learn feeling, and to learn how to understand other people feeling. We do this via examples because this is the best way.

    We learn standards to learn how melody works, and learn impros to learn how (again) melody works and to learn how musical expression works. This is the way :-). After this it is not prohibited to analyze, make abstractions, or go extrapolate, but just after...

  7. #6

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    Great video...a lot confirmed what I already believe, but I like the bit near the end where it's reminded that we need to practice deliberately, and at the edge of our ability. That second part is huge.

    Its also a big part of Czikszentmihaly's writings on creative flow-- getting in the creative zone requires some discomfort, and getting into a zone where the task requires our full attention and ability...and in those moments, we can actually achieve MORE than what we thought we were capable of, that's where we just do, not think--kind of what the Chessmaster was getting at.

  8. #7

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    This jumped out at me:

    "At it's core, expertise is about recognition. Magnus recognizes chess positions the way we recognize faces. And recognition leads directly towards intuition. When we see an angry face we've got a pretty good idea about what's gonna come next. Chess masters recognize board positions and instinctively know the best move."

    Magnus: "Most of the time I know what to do. I don't have to... figure it out."

    It reminds me of Joe Diorio talking about how there's no time to think when you're playing. And when you're improvising with others it's even more: you have to have a pretty strong idea about what's going to happen next and be there when it does. That's intuition in jazz.

    Nice post Christian!

  9. #8

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    Csikszentmihályi's flow is a very fundamental truth. It is interesting that although it seems an obvious truth, but it is hard to discover and phrase it as a rule.

    I experience it my work, unfortunately rare, and comes and goes in waves, few days maybe week periods, then sometimes sad multiple months elapse to meet again the feeling. A honest thought about jazz guitar, I never experienced flow when learning guitar...

  10. #9

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    Quote Originally Posted by ccroft
    It reminds me of Joe Diorio talking about how there's no time to think when you're playing. And when you're improvising with others it's even more: you have to have a pretty strong idea about what's going to happen next and be there when it does. That's intuition in jazz.

    Nice post Christian!
    Funny Hal Galper quote (iirc) about needing to have strong intuitive ideas while playing. He says someone once asked Dizzy Gillespie, "Hey Diz, when you're soloing, what are you thinking about? Are you hearing the solo: 'dah bah doo da doo deedoo dah?" Dizzy goes, "No! I'm thinking DAH BAH DOO DA DOO DEE DOO DAH!!!!!!" [yelling]

    And Hal summarizes the moral of the story: "You've got to hear it loud and clear! If you can't hear it, you can't play it! All practice is ear training and all playing is playing by ear."

    Interested to check out this video tomorrow.

  11. #10

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    The video is very insightful and applies to many areas of expertise - music as well as financial, political and others. It sure does seem like "experts" in many fields are absolutely clueless. This provides a reasonable explanation. Thanks for sharing!

  12. #11

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    Quote Originally Posted by stylo
    Funny Hal Galper quote (iirc) about needing to have strong intuitive ideas while playing. He says someone once asked Dizzy Gillespie, "Hey Diz, when you're soloing, what are you thinking about? Are you hearing the solo: 'dah bah doo da doo deedoo dah?" Dizzy goes, "No! I'm thinking DAH BAH DOO DA DOO DEE DOO DAH!!!!!!" [yelling]

    And Hal summarizes the moral of the story: "You've got to hear it loud and clear! If you can't hear it, you can't play it! All practice is ear training and all playing is playing by ear."

    Interested to check out this video tomorrow.
    Interestingly one can interpret slightly different, what you are intend to conclude. Dizzy is replacing in his answer the question word "hearing" to the word "thinking",

    ...which in my interpretation means, first of all, the musician must have something to say, some content, some message, some feeling to communicate. Some thought. That is why the word hear is changed to the word think. Then while improvising, he and his music become one with this thought. You can have the world best ear, and (theoretically) capable to anything execute on your instrument what you hear in your inner ear, if your head is empty, or something simple mediocre.

    The real question, what will the artist head fill with content, and what process will create from that content to something remarkable when improvising. Surely not the inner ear, what is just a tool in this process.

  13. #12

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    Super interesting topic, and so applicable to jazz guitar which seems so difficult to learn.

    I've wondered about the quality of the feedback loop and thought about how knowing what sounds good is so applicable to learning. If you are starting out and someone says to practice the altered scale and that's the only reason that you are practising it then you have no 'valid environment' as it's stated in the video. Since you need to have an idea of what sounds good in order to know whether you are achieving anything. Seems to be a huge problem with jazz guitar instruction which can be so focused on practicing something without clearly knowing it's relevance. And probably explains the value of learning from records since it has a clear feedback loop. (if you can play it so it sounds like the record then you have succeeded otherwise keep practising)

  14. #13

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    Quote Originally Posted by dmorash
    Super interesting topic, and so applicable to jazz guitar which seems so difficult to learn.

    I've wondered about the quality of the feedback loop and thought about how knowing what sounds good is so applicable to learning. If you are starting out and someone says to practice the altered scale and that's the only reason that you are practising it then you have no 'valid environment' as it's stated in the video. Since you need to have an idea of what sounds good in order to know whether you are achieving anything. Seems to be a huge problem with jazz guitar instruction which can be so focused on practicing something without clearly knowing it's relevance. And probably explains the value of learning from records since it has a clear feedback loop. (if you can play it so it sounds like the record then you have succeeded otherwise keep practising)
    Yeah. If you are self teaching (and IME ALL good jazz players engage first and foremost in self teaching regardless of how many hours they’ve clocked at school or with private teachers) then understanding the criteria by which you can evaluate your practice and learning activities is critical.

    Im a fan of really narrow, measurable outcomes. This might seem limited - and I’m not denying the value of creative open ended practice and learning - but having these measurable activities is incredibly important

    As a teacher I would say I place higher value on students playing music than improvising with theoretical concepts at the early stages. Playing licks and so on is a good way to go.

  15. #14

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    Quote Originally Posted by dmorash
    ...I've wondered about the quality of the feedback loop and thought about how knowing what sounds good is so applicable to learning. If you are starting out and someone says to practice the altered scale and that's the only reason that you are practising it then you have no 'valid environment' as it's stated in the video. Since you need to have an idea of what sounds good in order to know whether you are achieving anything. Seems to be a huge problem with jazz guitar instruction which can be so focused on practicing something without clearly knowing it's relevance. And probably explains the value of learning from records since it has a clear feedback loop. (if you can play it so it sounds like the record then you have succeeded otherwise keep practising)
    All good stuff. I'd also add that the highest quality 'feedback loop' I've encountered is playing in an group. In rehearsal you get immediate feedback in a 'valid environment', and again when performing.

    It may be at the bottom of why almost everyone recommends finding real life playing situations like bands and jams, especially if you can find some better and more experienced players who will tolerate you, and aren't afraid of giving some solid feedback.

    Can't remember the tune or chord or anything, but sure remember a very well known piano player shouting "Don't play C # there!!"