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Is it really necessary for me to start thinking and speaking in terms of Solfege? I’m not sure that, as someone who really only cares for instrumental stuff, it would be of much use to me.
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10-23-2017 11:51 PM
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Sounds like you think solfege is for singers, it's for any musician. If you don't use solfege syllables then you can use numbers that the other system people use. Both are a way to sing scale, melodies, lines, anything to get the sound into your ear. Solfege and numbers help in ear training so you can recognize the sounds you hear and get them on your instrument. Being able to sing, growl, hum, is important for transcribing for singing ideas over some changes, the ultimate goal is to get to where you can play anything you can sing.
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Hi! I've been trying to apply solfege to guitar for the past few months. I use movable do. It has some benefits:
- I find learning scales easier
- specifically, with time you will internalise the relationships and relative positions
- transposing is a piece of cake. Just move the root and have the same relationships.
What doesn't work very well:
- chords. because now you are in movable do, chords names don't relate to the scale you are playing, I've been trying to somehow expand solfege to chords, but it's a struggle.
- open positions and empty strings. because you are in movable do, they change all the time, which is a strugle
- you don't memorise fretboard note names, which again is bad for chords
I feel like I'm at the crossroads here and I don't really know what to do next. Learning all scales and internalise the relations between tones seems like sooo much work. On the other hand, I'm really limited by the drawbacks stated above.
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I worked with Solfege for years and it is a good way to learn singing and recognizing intervals, esp. away from your instrument. It starts getting complicated when Do is not the root of the chord, so I switched to singing the actual note names but I´m still thinking intervals. (It´s more like using the fixed Do system. In german all note names are one syllable, ex.: A flat is spelled As).
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Exactly! If our brain had a bit more flexibility, solfege should be easy to apply to chords. Eg, below is the chord progression for A-major scale for strings 1-3, so Do=A.
Originally Posted by generalduke
It's easy to see how chords are built on top of the scale and why we use major, minor and dim chords. But when we play, we tend to memorise chords by their absolute names, while this method would require shaping chords in real time. It should be possible though. Maybe by memorising the structures (Do-Mi-So, Re-Fa-La) and of course the structures for 7th chords. I kinda feel it has potential, but I haven't unlocked the concept completely yet.
And then there's harmonic analysis (beyond my comprehension), where apparently scales change quite a lot, so your movable Do even moves mid-song, which adds to the complexity.
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"Necessary"? No. Not much is I guess. Maybe that's the wrong question. Originally Posted by Nova_Comedy
Is it worth the time you could otherwise spend doing something else? Is it beneficial? Sure. It can be. I'd put it in a category with things like learning to play hands drums or reading up on theory/harmony or artist bios. It's a very solid away-from-the-instrument enrichment activity and well worth the time for anyone legitimately interested.
I think most people approach the wrong way honestly. It's really verbal/symbolic language stuff. So learn it the way you learned to read text as a kid. You don't learn to read technical material which is nearly beyond you're comprehension when learning to read text. You learn simple and familiar, and then gradually progress.
End game thinking is ok, but forget issues you might have EVENTUALLY with modulation etc until you're pretty competent with basic melody on simpler tunes, or even basic harmony. Can you sing the MELODY to a tune on which you're working arps? Work through a progressive instrumental method book if you like. You'll get the arps etc when appropriate. Don't get the cart before the horse. The main benefit to solfeggio is learning to hear "place". You'll know if it's worth it pretty quickly if you do some basic work on simple melodies you already know. Codify what you know before approaching the unfamiliar.
You can't play guitar 24/7. So it's a cool thing to look at, but don't REPLACE guitar time if your goal is learning to PLAY.
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I've found it useful (when I've deemed it helpful or necessary, that is) to think/sing chromatic solfège syllables relative to the main key of the piece, i.e. constant tonic Do throughout.
I wasn't convinced by the idea - suggested a while back by a forum member who used Bruce Arnold's material - until I tried it.
I don't need to use it much these days - but when I do, I go with numbers for chord tones. That way I can reference the main key and the 'chord of the moment'.
I feel that makes for 'better' (more nuanced) note choices and eliminates guitaristic half-guessing.
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Originally Posted by matt.guitarteacher
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I swap between numbers and solfege... I would recommend functional ear training whatever system you use.
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Yeah, I’m always ear-training. I just learn it by interval name.
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Not sure if you mean it, but I don't mean interval - I mean hear scale degree. That seems like a subtle difference, but this is what I mean: Originally Posted by Nova_Comedy
E.g. - somone plays a V-I cadence in C, you then hear G and E.
Interval - major 6th
Scale degree - 5 followed by 3, or sol followed by mi
The latter is more useful for dictating melodies etc in a tonal climate. I find it really useful for standards, bebop that kind of thing.
The interval stuff can help with harmonic listening and very chromatic music.
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I do solfege and numbers both. I learned numbers first in school, but then as you get into chromatic notes numbers are a pain to me. So then I started getting into solfege since it has syllables for chromatic notes. So now that I'm used to both I end up mixing them not alway intentional. But some scale degree I can sing/sound out more accurately with a number versys a solfege syllable.
Bottom line its all about learning sounds/pitches and their feeling, then having a standard set of labels for those sounds so you can communicate and notate them.
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Sight singing is one of the most valuable tools any musician can possess.
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To answer your question... yes. That's the short answer. Originally Posted by Nova_Comedy
The longer more in-depth answer is probably that yes and also some more yeses and then another yes and yeah, for sure... definitely. Yes.
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Solfege is fantastic. Highly recommended. I've spent a fair amount of time with it and encourage my students - those who are serious - to become at least mildly fluent in it.
Here's a nice chart I made for their reference:
I know there are variations - I found this to work very well.
I love the concept of having one syllable to assign to each of 12 possible chromatic relationships, and additional distinction for things like #2 vs b3.
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I think after thoroughly internalizing the relationship between each notes function within the key center it doesn't matter if you use solfege, degrees or even just la, la, la, la, la, la. But in the beginning of understanding this, it is extremely helpful to practice solfege. Makes the task way more easier. This all applies to tonal music of course. As for atonal music I just listen to intervals without any regard for tonal center (since there is non).
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I’ve since started ear training with solfege degrees. Nifty.
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If you come to France - no way around it!
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A lot of the way people learn to play is either in the fingers, or largely by ear. Solfege or numerical singing sharpens an awareness of each note and its function; that's an extremely powerful ability as an instrumental player. I learned with numbers but when I got to music school it wasn't the norm there and I had to do a crash course on solfege. I'm so glad I did. Singing lines in real time (solfege uses one syllable notes so that "flat seven" note can be sung simply as "te").
Fostering an awareness of every single note you play and what its relationship to the tonic is what it's all about. Solfege is the one tool that will let you do that easily and simply. Highly recommended.
David
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Originally Posted by TruthHertz
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Yes, That
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I tried "fleven" for that and "flen" couldn't mean anything else. For flat 3 was "flee". I didn't keep it up though and sing "flat seven" or "flat 3" now. Originally Posted by TruthHertz
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