Chiff and Fipple Forums

But nothing beats face to face or personal online interaction

Call me old fashioned, I have never had personal online interaction to learn music, but surely just being in the company of good players beats all that by a country mile?

Call me old fashioned

Ok, you're old fashioned

but surely just being in the company of good players beats all that by a country mile?

I can't agree more. The problem as I see it, is they're always in too short supply

Bob

awildman wrote:Pacing is always an issue with canned lessons, and OAIM is no different. You either go too slow and bore the more advanced players or too fast and alienate the beginners.
....

Have you tried contacting OAIM admin and asking them to add support for your tablet? ....

I don't think there's much point in asking OAIM to add support for my tablet, because it's entirely my fault that I set Chrome back to factory settings of 2013 - the newer version I had didn't work with YouTube any more (and updating to the most recent version didn't work either - neither does the new YouTube App... I suppose they want me to buy a new tablet to keep the economy turning. But I'd rather spend the money on whistle lessons...). As for the speed - the Whistle Basics course is expressly for beginners, it starts with how to hold the flute, so there should be no way to bore anybody by going too slow. The problem might rather be that Kirsten Allstaff is so good that she can't quite put herself into the position of a beginner with no experience of learning by ear. Or that she thinks it's easy enough to back up (the 10 s button is really handy - if it works...) Or of course it could be all my fault for being too slow on the uptake.

Busterbill, where is there a possibility to download the lessons? As far as I can see it's streaming only?

AaronFW, good to hear that the speed increase is not just in my imagination.

Maybe I should take a closer look at Blayne Chastain's lessons...

If it's just Youtube, you can slow it down by using the little 'gear wheel' symbol.

fatmac wrote:If it's just Youtube, you can slow it down by using the little 'gear wheel' symbol.

It isn’t a YouTube, I talked with some of their staff and they have their own type of video player. I don’t know much about it.

The problem as I see it, is they're always in too short supply

Mileages may vary there.

At this stage there's such an overwhelming amount of easily accessible information and music I wonder sometimes why the dependency on teachers seems to be on the increase.

The company of good players, the interaction, listening, listening and more listening, to immerse yourself and have a hunger to learn should go a long way. It's important to get some pointers every now and again, to keep the right track, and have people to bounce ideas off.

I am not sure the hand-holding pupil-teacher approach is the best way to go at this. I have had pupils who had the consumer approach: I come to you, you teach me how to play well. That's not really the way it works, you have to be hungry for it, do the work, form your own ideas. But you said it: old-fashioned.

Getting lost in the complexities of 'Shoe the donkey', that's probably a whole different issue. My son, ten at the time, used to call it 'Shoot the Donkey'. We'll leave it at that.

I've used OAIM as a record of tunes played simply, and as lessons that are of varying effectiveness. They break the tunes down, which is not although it's just much easier live with a person. I appreciate what the site does--you get a chance to hear the tunes in a session setting, which is nice, and then there are tracks you can slow down, which is useful. It'snot as good as a live teacher.


In my experience, which involves competence in other forms of music but not ITM, half an hour of playing live with people is worth weeks of solo practice. At home alone I tend to keep practicing the same mistakes, over and over, but when you are carried along by the necessity of a gig, or even just of keeping up with, you have to muddle through, and the muddling though is what gets you past your stalls and hesitancies. i would guess that the best practice by far would be playing in a dance band: having to get it done, not just for fellow musicians but for dancers. My experience playing in lots of swing bands was exactly that--committing to the tune live. That's the only thing that gets you over the hump.


It's not like it's easy to find people to play with, at least not around here. There are some sessions, but they are less than welcoming to beginners, and there are teachers but they involve substantial traffic expense and time away from family responsibilities for this father of a 13 year old. It's doable, but not easy.

The company of good players, the interaction, listening, listening and more listening, to immerse yourself and have a hunger to learn should go a long way. It's important to get some pointers every now and again, to keep the right track, and have people to bounce ideas off.

YES

i would guess that the best practice by far would be playing in a dance band: having to get it done, not just for fellow musicians but for dancers.

Certainly a positive for 'grinding in' a tune, and giving you an opportunity to explore small variations while strictly observing time as you pass through the nth iteration of a tune. . .

I have had pupils who had the consumer approach: I come to you, you teach me to play well. That's not really the way it works, you have to be hungry for it

. I've observed a strong 'consumer' bias in the 'States' The hunger is a more important element. . .

Bob