Why are Irish sessions so fraught?

[Mr.Gumby]

Well, since I haven't said that once, I'm not sure where you got it from. What I said, from the start, is that, if one tries to play that tune in with others before you've also given it a bit of a listen, it won't work. In addition, I happen to think that getting a regular, live tune, initially, from the dots, will slow down the process of actually knowing the tune. Where I totally agree (could hardly emphasise more) is that it's just as bad when you get someone wedded to a particular version to the exclusion of even being able to hear differences from place to place and even from night to night in the same place.

You said this:

when someone has learnt a tune from the dots, and before they've played it with people, keeping an open ear and mind and adjusting as they do so, they can't play it with other people. Full stop. Don't care who they are. Don't care how good they think they are. You know the tune when you know it. And, for session purposes, that means having played it in sessions.

Which is essentially total nonsense.

A few weeks ago I was leafing through the Seámus Ennis book and was drawn into 'The Woods of Kilkenny', a tune I didn't know and can't to this moment not recall having heard at all, ever. I played it twice through and had it (it is admittedly not a very difficult tune).

Want me to record it so you can check whether or not I 'have it' . I have no doubt in my mind whatsoever I can sit down with anyone 'in session' and play it without a problem (I haven't played out since I learned the tune).

[benhall.1]

Either you're not reading what I'm writing or I'm totally crap at language. So, that would be a tune that you're not going to play (at this time) with other people, that you haven't heard before? Hmmm ... I bet you can play it in the house, by yourself. I bet it sounds fine. In and of itself. How you play it after a year or so of hearing other people who already know the tune play it will, I suggest be a different matter. Tell me which is likely to be better. My little addition (in almost every psot) is that I think that (hopefully you agree) better stage will come sooner if you know the tune by hearing it first, rather than by getting it out of a book. This is the case for me, and it is clearly the case for a lot of people of my experience who, sadly, get too many tunes from the dots.

[Mr.Gumby]

Ben, I assume I summarise the correctly:

I have a tune here that I have learned from a book a few weeks ago without ever hearing it played by anyone. I haven't played it with anyone. Yet I have no doubt in my mind at all I will have no problem whatsoever playing it with anybody (and I mean anybody) no matter how long they have played the tune.

You say this is impossible. I say you are absolutely wrong.

This is not going to move an inch either way.

Best of Luck.

[benhall.1]

OK. Frustrating this, though, since there's so much - even in this thread - that we seemed to agree on. Leaves me puzzled ...

Now you've summarised, I agree that we seem to disagree on that one point, in the very clear way that you have just expressed it.

[AlBrown]

At first glance, one of the most misleading places there is to learn about sessions can be thesession.org. Some people go there to pour out their fears about sessions, others complain about things that irritated them at sessions, some hide behind anonymous user names and huff and puff and argue about things that don't matter half as much as they think they do. You can easily get the impression that sessions are like snake pits, just waiting for their next victim to fall in.
But once you realize that people on the internet are more apt to go on about negative things than positive things, and that folks tend to be more grouchy and grumpy on the internet than they are in real life, you start to look beyond many of the negative things you see on the website, and find the positive things, the good advice, the humor.
Every session is different, but I have been to more than a few in more than a few cities around the USA, and most are filled with pretty nice people who are pretty accomodating, and willing to work with someone who is just getting started. The only thing they consistently ask for is that, as you come back week after week, that they see signs that you are working to improve your playing. And they generally expect that what you can't play, you listen to. That doesn't mean that you won't run into the odd grouch or opinionated blowhard, but in general, sessions are pretty friendly gatherings.

[sbfluter]

You need to hear it to grasp the idiom and you need to be around musicians to retain it.

This is kind of what I'm trying to say. Only I think seeing it played in person adds even more to the ability to grasp the music.

It helps to watch even if they play instruments I don't know how to play. Something about their expressions and movements as well as watching people move their fingers and bows brings it to life. Somehow it comes even more to life when I am allowed to mimic others as they are doing it. Sitting passively and listening is nice, but there's something about feeling my fiddle resonate in my hand with the massive sound of the group as I first get the outline of the tune, then fill in some of the trickier bits, then fill in a few more notes and eventually just get it. Hard to explain. And it's not just learners doing this it is everyone. I've talked to the best fiddler in our group and he's admitted to just playing the bare outline when he doesn't really know the tune that well.

"How you learn" and "why are sessions so exclusive" are sort of separate topics but sort of the same. How does this music get passed on and how close is it to the way classical music is passed on? Irish seems closer to me to classical music than old-time in the way the music is passed on.

[NicoMoreno]

That's only because you've done the very thing you call "sad". Learned that idea from a machine.

No good irish musician is advocating that. No good musician did that.

[Mr.Gumby]

"How you learn" and "why are sessions so exclusive" are sort of separate topics but sort of the same. How does this music get passed on and how close is it to the way classical music is passed on? Irish seems closer to me to classical music than old-time in the way the music is passed on

I think both your questions have been touched upon extensively during the course of this thread, the fact you're still asking the same question makes me wonder if you really want an answer.

I also get the impression you have a sense of entitlement that may well be the cause of your woes. I said above, in my experience musicians are generally very accommodating and my own experience is that the finest musicians have always been kind and helpful to me. But I also know that I never demanded the right to sit in and noodle about when I found them socialising and playing music with their friends.

I said earlier on: a bit of sensitivity towards the social situation you put yourself in goes a long way.

I also explained 'immersion' learning. And yet you fall back to your original position about classical music (which is miles off the mark).

Anyhow, another part of the discussion that refuses to shift even an inch. Any of us could have learned a few tunes, making better use of the time wasted here.

Best of Luck to you as well.

[benhall.1]

An idea just occurs to me: do you think in all this that we've managed to illustrate rather nicely the point made in the OP?

[talasiga]

better dawn late than never .....

[Denny]

[highland-piper]

It's interesting to compare threads like this with threads on Highland Piping forums.

In Highland piping people wonder if it's possible to be any good at the style if you *can't* get tunes off a page, while in ITM people wonder if it's possible to be any good if you can. I've seen ITM people say that if you learn to read music it will ruin your musicianship (yes, the very fact that one has learned to read they feel is detrimental). You can find some Highland pipers who feel it's *wrong* to learn a tune by ear -- that the only real way to learn a tune is from the page. I think the only logical conclusion is that it's possible to learn well by ear or by eye or by some combination, so do what's easiest for yourself and don't worry about it.

About 10 years ago I heard Kevin Burke make references to getting tunes out of books. My impression of it was that it's something he does (or did at the time) -- go through books looking for new tunes to play.

It's interesting that Ben thinks it's so difficult for people to learn tunes off the page and then get together and play them. That's exactly what we do in a pipe band. The pipe major hands out sheet music (frequently a march, but we play reels and jigs, too) and we learn the tunes. At some point we play them together, for the first time. It's just something we do. Now obviously it doesn't sound as good the first time as it does after a bit of practice, but that would be the case no matter how we initially learned the tunes.

It's fun to read about tune transmission in earlier times. It's pretty obvious that 100 years ago people valued sheet music. O'Neill talks about examining his teacher's manuscript tune collection after the teacher's passing.

I find that I can learn tunes by ear just fine, but for me the tunes don't fully make sense until I see them (even if I have to write them out by hand). I'm a very visual person. There could be some other person who was exactly the opposite.

[Mr.Gumby]

It's interesting that Ben thinks it's so difficult for people to learn tunes off the page and then get together and play them. That's exactly what we do in a pipe band. The pipe major hands out sheet music (frequently a march, but we play reels and jigs, too) and we learn the tunes.

I think where that differs from Irish music is the fact that as a pipe band you are all looking at playing the same setting, the one that's on paper. I think Ben is put on the wrong foot when he assumes a tune learned from the page in an Irish context, as in the example I gave, is learned in that way i.e. exactly as it sits on the page. And when played will encounter a myriad of different settings. And thus requiring a calibration against a played version.

My position is that once you play and play well, it doesn't matter whether you learn by ear or from the page because you will approach the tune in the same manner in both instances. And are equally able to be flexible about the tune. I think that why Ben and myself differed in our opinions. That's what I believe happened anyway.

[Redwolf]

My position is that once you play and play well, it doesn't matter whether you learn by ear or from the page because you will approach the tune in the same manner in both instances. And are equally able to be flexible about the tune. I think that why Ben and myself differed in our opinions. That's what I believe happened anyway.

You and I are on the same page here.

Redwolf

[AlBrown]

Written notation only provides the bones of a tune. When someone with classical training puts their classical style on top of those bones, it sounds like classical music. When someone with Irish musical background puts their Irish style on top of those bones, it sounds Irish. The problem is not that notated music cannot be useful to someone playing Irish music, it is the fact that many of the people using notated music are coming to Irish music for the first time, and are putting the wrong inflections, articulations and ornaments on top of that tunes, and those subtle micropulses that give the different notes slightly different durations are off. The result can often be something that sets your teeth on edge, especially when that music reader proves less than capable of hearing the difference between their playing and others around them, and adapting accordingly.
Written music provides a valuable starting point for many people. The problem is, it is only a starting point...