Do you ever get tunes confused

[Loren]

Loren, you're getting lessons from Shannon? You're a lucky man. She's a great flute player -- I'm inclined to agree with my friend Dale's assessment that she's the best American flute player of her generation -- plus a good teacher and a very nice person.

Let me try this. Do you (and/or Shannon) have any sort of standard test to see if one has properly "mastered" a tune? Because very few of us learned with exactly Shannon's method, and therefore what I think is perfectly normal behavior for good musicians can be considered "failures" of our methods for learning tunes if you insist on her way.

I don't "insist" on anything with regards to learning methods. I don't consider myself an expert on the learning of ITM tunes, or anything ITM related for that matter. I'm not suggesting there is a "Right" way and that all others are "wrong". What I am suggesting is that there are different methods for doing many things, and different approaches often lead to different results.

Take for example the skill of sightreading music: One practices in certain ways to become good at the skill of sightreading. Those who are very good at sightreading can have nearly any piece of music put before them, and then instantly read off the page and play up tempo pieces, without ever having seen the notation and never having played or even heard the music before. However, most musicians who spend much of their time doing this, cannot play the music note for note without the notation in front of them, even after having played through the same piece (by sightreading) numerous times.

By contrast, someone who is really skilled at learning by ear can hear a tune just a few times, and then play it back, note for note, with little difficulty, however even if they can read standard notation, they will not be able to sight read unknown, uptempo music on the spot, because it's a different skill set, borne of different needs, and therefore different training methodologies.

With regards to my comments previously, I don't think most people here have put much thought or effort into how to best develop certain musical skill sets, and for those who have put some thought into it, I suspect most don't have access to good resources - people who are highly experienced and skilled in those particular areas.

Many of us think we know something about music and learning, but then, it seems, many of us who post here think we know a lot, about a lot of things. (This comment is not directed towards anyone in particular)

For my part, I am finding that I must put aside whatever notions (and background) I have, so that I can be open to other approaches. This does not mean that I have blind faith in whatever is thrown my way - I tend to be swayed by results, not ideas, concepts and personalities.

I don't think there is a "test", as such, colomon, for tunes well learned, however I suspect there are signs, "symptoms" if you will, of tunes not so well learned. I also suspect since people tend to learn all their tunes more or less the same way, they most of a persons tune list will be equally well, or poorly learned. At any rate, if one frequently gets tunes, or parts of tunes confused, then that seems, to me, a symptom of not having fully internalized/connected with them. I don't mean in some esoteric, mumbo jumbo, new age, granola eating, Birkenstock and crystal wearing sense, but rather on a neuro/physiological sense, which I REALLY don't have time to get into at the moment, since I've already spent way more time on this message than I had intended.

Again, I'll try to get back to this, perhaps next week.

Cheers,

Loren
(apologies in advance for any spelling and/or typos, no time to proof read this one.)

[Loren]

Okay, after giving it a few moments of thought, I've realized that once again I've been far less eloquent and concise than I would have liked to be in that last post, and I've probably muddied the waters more than cleared them up. I suspect I better finish off here before things blow-up in face, as they so often do around here

First off, let me be clear: I am NOT speaking for Shannon, and I have likely made what should be a relatively simple process sound more complicated or mysterious than it should be, so I'll try to get back to the meat of it.

Shannon simply suggested to me that it is far better to learn a few tunes really well, to really "connect" with them, than it is to have learned a list of hundred tunes by rote, that you can perhaps run through at a session but that you can't play with any real depth and proper feel. Pretty much what any good ITM teacher would have to say, I'd suspect. She also suggested to me that people who learn by rote, mechanincally learning and practicing one tune after another, often have trouble recalling tunes or have problems getting tunes or sections mixed up, because they've never REALLy learned the tune in the first place.

With regards to the method of learning, I can only relate what Shannon has done with me, on a general sort of level. I believe I've essentially covered this already but perhaps I needed to clarify:

Shannon plays an entire tune for me, first at a nice moderate tempo, then slowly. I record this on my minidisc player. During the lesson Shannon will play a phrase, and then ask me to sing the phrase back, or, if I'm having trouble, we'll sing it together, then immediately go to the flute and play the phrase.

Sometimes she'll also ask me to use my hand in the air (while we're singing the phrase) to do a visual representation of the how the notes are progressing "stepwise" (vertically), in terms of intervals: so ABdB AFFF would be 1st note then, up, up, down, down, down, same, same, same - in this case all the upward and downward movement would be evenly spaced, which would change if the intervals between notes was different. The idea being that both the singing, and the visualization help you connect with the progression and intervals on a deeper, more pemanent level.

So, basically, it's: 1)Listen to the phrase, 2)sing the phrase one or more times, and perhaps visualize the intervals and their direction of travel, and then 3) play the phrase. Ornamentation, where apropriate, is articulated during singing with a the usual "de -dum- diddly-dum" or whatever you like, and the hand during visualisation does not travel vertically.

Does this all make sense? It's nothing complicated, no "secret stuff", no voodoo or smoke and mirrors.

That's basically the method. I'm not suggesting it's something new, or "Special", however I do believe the singing and visualization (which could be done in various different ways) are crucial parts that make a difference in terms of how the info is routed and processed by the brain etc. And as such the process IS significantly different from simply visually learning and practicing notes off the page, or even, imo, learning by ear without fully paying attention to what's going on with the intervals and vertical motion of the notes. I also believe having to "physically" visualize it yourself, and internalize it by singing, is very different (in terms of how the information is processed by the brain, and therefore the results one gets) from simply either looking at a page of written notation, or even visualizing the notation.

Okay, I think that's about enough out of me. Once again, I feel I'd have been better off just to keep my mouth shut.....

Loren

[missy]

Loren - I "think" the way we teach is similar to what you are saying......

(we teach mountain dulcimer)

First off, we teach technique, NOT repetoire. We will use a tune or two, of course, but only when they utilize the particular thing we are trying to teach.
We also like to teach "listening", so we give students a recording of a song done by several different people, with several different approaches. We tell the student to not try to PLAY the song until they've listened to it over and over. Then at first, to just concentrate on whether the song is going up or down in pitch. Find the bare bones basic of the song, first - then begin to fill in ornamentation, chords, etc.

When I stated earlier that I mix up some songs, I do - but especially in old time and bluegrass - many songs just aren't that "different". And it's not like session songs where there's a "right" way to play the tune, they can vary area by area.

I also do a lot of improvisation (I really would be a horrible session player!), so honestly I sometimes don't know where I "get" a version from or if I'm just combining 2 different tunes.

But I agree that the style of learning you are detailing can be very good. We always tell students that getting a song through their ears - to their brain - routing it through the heart - THEN out the fingers is a great way to learn music.

[pop]

" "Okay, I think that's about enough out of me. Once again, I feel I'd have been better off just to keep my mouth shut.....

Loren " "

Your posts on this subject have opened my eyes to learning tunes,i had never give it that much thought.I can get trad tunes ive listened to all my life and know well, but learning tunes i dont know has been a struggle,i now think "hopefully" i know where ive been going wrong cheers.

[colomon]

Shannon simply suggested to me that it is far better to learn a few tunes really well, to really "connect" with them, than it is to have learned a list of hundred tunes by rote, that you can perhaps run through at a session but that you can't play with any real depth and proper feel. Pretty much what any good ITM teacher would have to say, I'd suspect. She also suggested to me that people who learn by rote, mechanincally learning and practicing one tune after another, often have trouble recalling tunes or have problems getting tunes or sections mixed up, because they've never REALLy learned the tune in the first place.

See, there's the thing. I think you're looking at the above statement, which strikes me as entirely correct, and thinking therefore the contrapositive is true -- if you screw up, it must be because you don't know the tune well enough. And I think that's simply not true.

Going back to the "Kiss the Bride" example -- I chose that because it's the closest thing I have to a party piece. It's not some flash-in-the-pan tune for me, it's right at the core of my repertoire, and has been for years. Stick a whistle in my hands and ask me to play, and it's about even odds I will start that tune.

Yet after a couple of days of working on "Trim the Velvet", I suddenly couldn't play "KtBBtB" any more. The tunes are close siblings, and the second parts of each start the exact same way. "Trim the Velvet" was on my mind, because I was working hard to learn it. So unless I was concentrating very hard on it, "KtBBtB", which normally falls off of my fingers effortlessly, would instantly wander off into the tune I was just learning.

And now that I've actually learned "Trim the Velvet", and I'm not practicing it all day long, the two tunes stay safely separate. Unless I do something foolish like try to play them back-to-back....

[Loren]

Well, I think it boils down to paying attention to what you're playing, rather than just going through the motions, but whatever.

Loren

[colomon]

Well, I think it boils down to paying attention to what you're playing, rather than just going through the motions, but whatever.

Tell you what. You come back in say, four years time -- of regular session playing -- and tell me you've never ever screwed up a tune you know well, and I'll be happy to admit that I and every Irish musician I regularly play with are screw-ups.

[Loren]

Tell you what, you go back in time and grow up in a household where Curtis Institue Students come to your house for private piano lessons every weekend, and then we'll talk about what "excellence" in music means.

Seriously, I'm not saying that there is a path to not making any mistakes ever, what I am suggesting is that if one loses his place or confuses tunes on more than a very occasional basis, then something is wrong - professional musicians RARELY have this problem, so what do YOU think they are doing differently?

Loren

[lesl]

Thanks Loren for clarifying about the hand motions. That answered my question exactly. I've never used it and it seems to me a good technique to add to breaking down a tune - there's a similarity there of watching your teacher's fingers go up and down the instrument and copying the motion as you slowly go through the melody.

what I am suggesting is that if one loses his place or confuses tunes on more than a very occasional basis, then something is wrong - professional musicians RARELY have this problem, so what do YOU think they are doing differently?

Yeh that's what I'd say too. I do wish there was a secret..

At times I've found some small fingering or bit which separates similar ones. Get that spot right and the rest of the tune is right too. Miss it and you end up in something else. But even this involves matching that small bit to the tune you want, even though the notes leading up to it are exactly the same as a different tune..

Probably its only number of times over those tunes. After all, there are certain tunes we all play that we'd NEVER confuse with anything else. At first it's likely because you only have one tune that sounds like that, so that tune feels unique. But as repertoire increases the similar tunes start popping up. Still, in spite of that there are certain tunes we never confuse with others. We know those tunes totally. No reliance on tricks or paying attention to something carefully. I doubt anyone would confuse Happy Birthday with another melody. How come? What are we doing right?

[oleorezinator]

i puzzled. how could one be confused? didn't anyone tell you that the only difference between the tunes are the names? i'm joking of course! i'm as confused today as when i first started in the ancient mists of time.

[Leel]

When I play the Welsh tune Suo Gan, I keep getting it confused with the 'concerning hobbits' theme from LOTR..

They both start very similarly and i end up playing a kind of hybrid hobbit tune..

Nah. It's not like any two Irish tunes sound anything alike.

There's more than one!!??

[johnkerr]

Seriously, I'm not saying that there is a path to not making any mistakes ever, what I am suggesting is that if one loses his place or confuses tunes on more than a very occasional basis, then something is wrong - professional musicians RARELY have this problem, so what do YOU think they are doing differently?

Professional musicians are doing things to limit their possibility of making a mistake. (Which is not in any way to say that they are not excellent musicians.) Here's what they do:

If they are professional classical musicians, they are either reading from a score (in the case of orchestral musicians) or performing a limited repertoire in public performance (in the case of soloists). You think a professional orchestral musician can play the whole symphony they played yesterday with a score in front of them without a mistake if you yanked their sheet music from them right before the concert starts? Or do you think a violin soloist would play flawlessly if the conductor told him right before going on "Oh, sorry. There was a misprint in your contract. We're doing Beethoven's Concerto No. 2 today, not No. 1.", and although he used to perform No. 2 years ago, he hadn't been through it for a long while?

If they are professionals in a music that allows variation or improvisation (rock, folk, jazz, etc), they limit their performing repertoire as above, and if they step outside this limited repertoire any mistakes they make become "variations" or "improvisations", and they have the musical chops to pull that off without it seeming like they've screwed up. Professional traditional musicians would fall into this category. No matter how many tunes you know perfectly, your repertoire is still not without bounds, and eventually tunes will come up that you haven't played or heard before. Good trad musicians can often fake their way through these tunes and sound quite good at it - perhaps even better than the likes of you or me would sound even if we'd been playing the tune for years and thought we had it perfectly. But no professional trad musician would set him/herself up for this in a performance situation.

Colomon's example of the two similar tunes is spot on. There are a lot of Irish tunes that bear resemblance to other tunes in some portion, enough so that if you're playing one of them and not concentrating fully your muscle memory will lead you right into another tune - maybe even a new one that you're just learning but had played a lot the day before. A friend of mine calls this kind of tune one that has a "trap door" into another tune.

Loren, professional musicians do screw up, all the time. (But usually they make even their mistakes sound good.) Only geniuses never screw up. But of course there are a few professional musicians who are indeed geniuses.

[Loren]

John,

I don't have the time to spend rebutting your points with regards to classical and rock, jazz etc.

"Colomon's example of the two similar tunes is spot on. There are a lot of Irish tunes that bear resemblance to other tunes in some portion, enough so that if you're playing one of them and not concentrating fully your muscle memory will lead you right into another tune"

Thank you very much for repeating what I said in an earlier post: If you lose your place or get tunes confused, it's either because you don't know them well enough in the first place, or you weren't fully paying attention (concentrating), while playing.

"Loren, professional musicians do screw up, all the time."

Define "all the time". I don't know of any profession where "Screwing up, all the time" is acceptable.

"Only geniuses never screw up. But of course there are a few professional musicians who are indeed geniuses"

I never, for a moment, suggested that most professional musicians "NEVER" make mistakes. My point is that they make them far less often than those who often get tunes confused or lose their place. I was also suggesting, then, that perhaps, if one were open minded, one could learn a thing or two from those who get tunes confused significantly less often.

I find it interesting that rather than actually trying a different method, in an effort to determine it's effectiveness, some here would rather spend the same amount of time, or more, defending their current way of doing things, or avoiding the subject by taking a different tack, and then arguing more.

For those of you who would like to develop the ability to get tunes confused less often, and improve you ability to learn by ear as well as be able to retain tunes better, and be more "connected to the tunes, consider this: If you are ACCURATELY hearing a tune in your head, while you are playing it (this means being able to "accurately hear a the notes, and even the upcoming phrases before you play them), then how can you get lost or confused while you're playing a tune? It's like having a "teleprompter" in your head - you're hearing in advance, ACCURATELY, what you are going to play in a few seconds from now. Does this makes sense? If so, I ask again, how can you get lost or confused if you are doing this?

This is the point, essentially, of learning to accurately sing, and then play a tune, phrase by phrase, by ear, slowly. I imagine, that if one has a singing background, or just a really well trained ear, one can hear the notes accurately enough not to have to sing, just going straight to the instrument. For those of us who aren't singers, we perhaps hear the general upward and downward (stepwise) motion of the tune, but not the EXACT interval changes and notes, and these are major things that can cause difficulty in learning by ear, and confusion, or getting lost, where two or more tunes are very "similar".

So, by breaking a tune down, phrase by phrase, and learning to identify each note, sing it (in tune) play it on your instrument, it then gets "burned" into your head very accurately. And, once you can hear it accurately, you can play it accurately. (I'm rapidly filling a piggy bank with nickels for every time I've been told this recently)

Please keep in mind, this is not some "theory" or "concept" I've dreamed up (it has nothing to do with me), I'm simply trying to share something that I've learned from a far better player, that I've found hugely beneficial to my own playing and learning. I've taken the time to do this, not because I like debating this crap, but because many folks are not as fortunate as I currently am, to have access to really good instruction - and this is something I can related to, having struggled along myself for so many years with little access to good info.

I'm not expecting, or suggesting that anyone should take my word for any of this, simply learn just one tune this way, and judge for yourself based on your results. (You must have a slow recording of the tune to learn from, or a way to slow down an uptempo recording, while keeping it in tune.)


Okay, I REALLY have other things I must attend to. I'm off.

Loren

[Key_of_D]

Man, there's lots of john kerr's in this world eh? I know of 3 in my family alone!

[johnkerr]

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