Better understanding of perfect pitch and chords

[tapper mike]

What if all the music theory talk doesn't work for your brain? I have dyscalculia. It keeps me a million miles from music theory. Extremely frustrating. Yet I do "feel" music. Otherwise I'd not be on this site. So, if perfect pitch isn't helpful, and theory is, how do you train theory when you have a neurological deficit?

if you can understand the context of the written word then you can understand theory. Theory is best practices for intended result. Practice being the operative word.

Do you understand the concept of Rhythmic modes? There is a video in this thread that explains the concept/theory behind rhythmic modes. Can you play the note divisions. If you can't play 1&2&3&4 You need to practice till you can. Only when you can see, recognize by hearing and perform can you say you fully understand the concept of "the eight beat" Same thing with triplet figures and 16ths. When you can hear it, play it, identify it. Then you understand it. Either you understand through recognition and performance or you don't. If you don't then it's something you need to study through practice.

If you do then you can move onto Trying out the rhythmic ideas represented in the example. Again, read, see, hear, imitate, identify. If you can carry the ideas around in your head. Hear them when you listen to them in other peoples music and be able to recreate the concept on your own. Then you have it.

While some people can play music well or write with little to no formal education ask yourself if you are one of them? Some people get a few ideas in their head by listening to others and combining them with experimentation like... James Taylor. Who has had a very long and successful career as a singer songwriter without having studied formal theory or being able to read notation. He's the exception, not the rule.

When you work with other musicians as musicians do you need a means to communicate thru a common language it doesn't matter if you are providing the material or the material is provided to you. If you only have one good idea and it's not applicable how do you move through the moment to arrive at something worthwhile on the other end? How do you resolve something where your talent is not enough to cover for your lack of knowledge?

[Jace-BeOS]

Guess I should have known better than to ask that question.

The rhythmic modes video was nice (for a video on you tube, the guy was excellent & the sound/camera work was great). I comprehended what he was showing but it didn't leave me with anything other than a desire to jam on my fully weighted keys. I don't have his experience nor his dexterity (no one has ever offered me teaching I could practice, so I've only developed a naive grasp of keys; as comfy as I feel I've gotten, with what must be my own type of awareness of relative pitch, I'm extremely aware of how limited that comfort is). Teachers always gave me notation. Notation means nothing to me. I can't see music. I understand the concepts but I don't see the music. I don't integrate all the various bits of data into anything that's music. I can't isolate individual note positions on the staff. I appreciate the concepts of tempo & that notes are fractions (an extremely difficult topic for dyscalculics, fractions), but, again, seeing them does nothing.

I watched the second video a bit but the sound and picture quality sucks and he immediately was using terminology I don't know. I don't know what level that's supposed to be at, but it's not beginner.

As a beginner, with piano and then guitar, no teacher did anything other than throw paperwork at me. I don't (& my parents didn't) have infinite resources to seek ideal teachers & no one but me knew there was a learning disability involved. Only in the last 6 years was it officially acknowledged but there's nothing for me. Kids today have all these opportunities. I'm 36. I'm not unintelligent. I'm not lazy. I'm not looking for a magical free ride. Perfect pitch only gets my attention because it sounds like it might assist in having the same control over an instrument that I have over my voice. Again, not lazy or stupid; I'm just not able to process certain types of data the way most people do. Most people have no idea what this is like and therefore cannot imagine there's anything to accommodate.

I'll wander off now. I didn't intend to thread hijack.

[skipscada]

Guess I should have known better than to ask that question. :(

The OP seems to have lost interest, so don't worry about thread hi-jack. It's a shame you feel unwelcome when all you want is ideas to take your music forward. Some hardened forum-dwellers tend to use a tone that may seem unfriendly. It's probably a reflection that they feel strongly about their ideas, not that they are against you as a person. It's a shame if you take it that way.

Training your ear can surely be useful. Here's a site that can help

http://www.good-ear.com/servlet/EarTrainer?chap=7

... there are many similar things out there. Doing similar kind of work with your instrument is probably more fun and rewarding.

I can't see why your trouble with numbers should be a major problem when working on your music. We all have strengths and weaknesses,and the way we work around them is how we give our music personality. Music theory is a useful tool and source of inspiration, but the only essential part is your mind and your connection with whatever you use to make sounds.

[Jace-BeOS]

Sorry, I didn't mean to give the impression that I was offended by Tapper Mike. I just feel defeated in terms of seeking info that I can use (because it's really outside most people's comprehension, since they operate just fine).

[Jace-BeOS]

If curious as to "why", there are tons of similar complaints about dyscalculia & music theory out there i just started finding. Example: http://www.dyscalculiaforum.com/forum/v ... 4&pid=2201

The thread starter sounds like me. Including his recognition of people who don't know how he can play by ear (while they can't & require notation). If you google "music theory dyscalculia" (without quotes), you'll find a lot more. So far I'm not finding anyone who identified solutions, other than giving up & just playing.

The problem I have with that is I'd like to understand the construction of music *somewhat* academically so as to aid in composition. Otherwise I'm just listening to other people and trying to work out how things I like to hear are done structurally. Someone says point & counterpoint and all I can think of is call & response. If someone starts talking about scales & chord progressions, I'm utterly confounded. I can recognize major & minor, but I can't just list chords. Even Computer Music magazine's basics articles on music theory confound me. So I can't "talk" the music. Stuff like this, as Tapper Mike said, is how musicians communicate when they work together.

Sure, lots of clueless musicians don't do it (garage/punk bands), but they can usually play well enough by ear to interact with each other. I haven't developed any instrument other than my voice because it always felt so distant from what's in my head. Hearing that note in your head and playing it on any instrument is kind of a process of discovery (& hearing that process blocks hearing what's in my head, so, again, perfect pitch sounds like a cool ability).

As far as untrained musicians, I actuall tried to work with two guys, separately, once. My timing was so much better than theirs (I guess from being so in tune to electronic music tools), that I couldn't really work with them (no common musical interests either). I don't ever encounter musicians in the real world, so it's, again, important to me to get myself to grips with the theory so I can continue to feel I'm growing as an independent musician. (yeah, listening to music is a huge part of that, I just feel pretty inferior to these pros that can put music together like speaking a language fluently, where I'm doing it all by ear, sequencing, some bits of live playing, and very rarely feeling in control of the process).

If you check my soundcloud page, I'm not just out to "make beats" (that mentality bugs me because I grew up on music with form & structure & have no interest in pumping out club tracks), but you can probably tell I learned through the rigid structure of Amiga sound tracker-like software (except for where I improvise, which just wanders around without much structure at all). Meh.

Thanks for the feedback. I don't feel unwelcome, just unable to participate. Life long issue there

[tapper mike]

In retrospect I can see how I was an ass. Sorry.

I started by being self taught. I'd look at friends play, then when they were done I'd ask them questions and go home to my guitar and practice. Bought a book of chords for guitar and a beatles book. It was standard practice for those of us who couldn't afford lessons. There was a lot missing from my early education as well.


Sometimes you need to develop the skill at playing before you can move on to the larger theory picture. Every month I'd get guitar player magazine and try to make sense out of the theory columns offered. GP was the only guitar mag on the shelf back then. I knew that there was stuff I didn't know and couldn't learn on my own.

I went through teachers like water. And like I said earlier taught myself to sight read because no one would do it for me. I'm still slower at sight reading then I want to be but I can analyze material. I'd wished I'd learn to sight read from the beginning, But not knowing then didn't stop me from learning later.

Getting back to teachers. Some are there only to appease the parent. Parents don't care about theory, They care that there child can perform music. You don't need much theory to perform and you don't need advanced technique. Some students don't care about theory either. Teaching theory can be your first ticket to losing a student who isn't interested and you can't make them interested.

I did hit upon a great teacher who knew what I wanted and knew how to teach me. My personality is such I don't want to be handed anything I want to work for it. A classic example. I wanted to learn jazz chord melody. (block chords) He says to me. This is what I want you to do. Start on the 5th fret low string and form every chord you can possibly concieve (because I already had a good grasp of chords) then move to the next string and form every chord you can, then the next and the next. Next week I'll show you what you missed and we can work from there. I was pissed at the statement because he knew that I was a solid rhythm player and he knew that I already knew every guitar chord in every book ever written (or so I thought) I went home and I worked out the fretboard. Came back next week. Started with the low E string on A. began forming and playing more chords then even the average jazz player would know. I even thought about and came up with chord shapes that were'nt documented.

His response "You missed a few" let's go over them. He shows me the shapes makes me play them and then he scores out a progression and makes me perform it using the new shapes. He repeats the process with all the chords formed on the next string and next one. Nearing the end of the lesson he pulls out Ted Greene's Chord chemistry" and says to me "See you don't know every chord in the book.

Now I was doubly actually triply pissed. I was pissed at myself for not knowing every chord in the universe of which I had previously prided myself on. I was pissed when he rubbed it in my face and I was pissed that I was not any closer to understanding block chords. But he exposed flaws in my perception he added skills to my repitoire and did so in a way that stuck. If any other teacher would have shown me a book of chords and made me play through the examples. I'd have quit him in a minute and I wouldn't have the mindset to apply them. So Eric scored points made me think and apply changes and forced me to use them in context of my own playing rather then the same old thing. At the end of the lesson we'd have a jam trading licks he'd play the chords to back me and I was encouraged to play the new chords to back him.

This still didn't get me closer to understanding how to harmonize a melody (or so I thought)

So the next exercise was to harmonize four notes. He gives me the key and the four notes and that's all. He tells me he wants me to harmonize using these new chords. Next week I come back chip on my shoulder but wiser and go thru them. Then it's his turn. I notice he's playing an extended chord that doesn't belong in the key. The only thing it shares is that it has one of the notes. "Hey that doesn't belong" He replies, Yes, yes it does. It's called harmonic justification. The beatles used it (but prolly didn't know it as that) Stevie Wonder uses it And it's used in endless examples of jazz. Harmonic justification means you fit the chord to the note not the key.
Tada, A new theory revealed to me that would have ever remained a mystery.

So I'm learning things but the picture is still incomplete but better then if someone had just presented a sheet and say "play this" He hands me a piece of sheet music and says I want you to harmonize this. All it is is melody and key signature. Record the melody to a cassette, play it back and then harmonize with one note a thrid, an octave or a seventh all the way thru. then go back and write a progression that fits the original harmony. Don't forget all the stuff you've already learned like new chords and harmonic justification.

Next week we talk about "style" some artists favor certain approaches over others. By that time I'd had the general concept drilled into me. Could perform and could write and rewrite. Then we covered individual styles and characteristics there of. Joe Pass, George Benson, Jerry Reed, Chet Atkins. We'd listen to a piece, Analyze what made it sound like the artist. He'd hand me a sheet and say Interpert it as if the artist were playing it. Rather then just handing me a song of thiers to learn.

It was a long process. Didn't happen in a day or a week or a month. But each step of the process gave me more then a rough idea because I had to work it out. Pen to paper, Pick to strings, Cassette to record, and most importantly brain.

No teacher knows everything.

Teachers teach from what they know and expectations. If my goal was to be a heavy metal guitarist the first thing is to remove all the blockage which keeps me from being a heavy metal guitarist. The Theory I'd previously learned that doesn't apply would have to go, techniques that have no relavance to Heavy Metal would also have to go. And I need a teacher that is a heavy metal guitarist. Now, my teacher Eric is great, He's an awesome guitarist to see him perform with his band you'd prolly never know the skills he has in jazz or country because he makes his money playing the blues, rock and occasional fusion. If I really really really wanted to learn heavy metal. Eric would hand me a card for someone who specializes in HM

So my advice to any one looking for a teacher is be dilligent and put expectations on them. Don't expect them to magicly understand what you want out of the lesson plan. I want to learn X style. I want to learn theory. I want to learn notation. I want to be able to play songs, I want to learn how to interpert songs, I want to learn how to improvise. I want to learn how to write music (prolly the hardest thing for a teacher to teach) If you make your expectations clear from the start and stick to your goals. You'll be able to weed out the teachers that are holding you back and find the ones that move you foreward.

[Jace-BeOS]

In retrospect I can see how I was an ass. Sorry.

i have no problem with you at all, but thank you

Thanks also for the details about your teacher's methods and your way of looking at it. i can see how you've applied something to music teaching that i have had to learn to apply to doctors: find the one that works best with you, instead of just being manipulated and pushed around. Funny thing is, i'd learned this lesson about teachers, too, but never could do anything about it in school or even college (you get who you get, pretty much). But music teachers... well, if i have the cash to try them out, sure, i could say "thanks for the lessons, but i think i need a different approach, bye."

Good lesson to have in mind for many things.

Your description of seeing friends play and then talking to them... that's an element i've never had access to and i'm growing bitter about it. i don't have musical friends and back when i had musical acquaintances, they weren't close enough to do this with (or they were asses). i also don't tend to have success with male friends (the competitiveness for starters), since the few musicians i've bumped into over my lifetime have all been male.

Regardless, i'm finding that one of my key issues in life is lack of connection with people of similar interests. Forums only do so much. i live in a culture black hole. The culture here is BS & conservativeness. Not arts.

i appreciate your preference to want to work for something rather than be handed it. In a way, i have to admit, embarrassingly, that i've had to work at the things that "normal" people do habitually/automatically, so i'm kind of wishing there were some areas i could get around the work, especially with what amounts to "fun & hobbies." But, no, it's all up to me. That's why i've gotten out my neglected guitar and started watching the GarageBand tutorials, of all things. Keys i feel at least some comfort on. Guitar, i feel like a clumsy oaf. So i decided to put time into that specifically. i want to improve myself. That's why i'm here asking questions. i have the time. i do not have the best idea of where to go or what to do. Structured learning is something i've always hated, with school, for the very reason of my learning disabilities. But i respect the intent of the structure. And, just having access to a human being where i can say "hey, how come...?" is something i'd really like.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts

[tapper mike]

There are two schools of thought When it comes to performance.
Play it like it is, and Improvise.

If you are from the "play it like it is school" Pick up Guitar Pro 6
There are hundreds of thousands of songs for GP. You can listen, read the notation or a little of both and you'll have a backing band.

If you are of the improvise school pick up Band in a box. There are thousands of biab songs in the greater biab community. With biab you look at the chord name and listen to the music. You can play your own choice of chord without diagram or notation or tablature so long as it fits and not be bothered by having to play note for note. Or you can play the melody or your melody against the changes.

BIAB is fun for me, guitar pro is work. I can make biab work for me if I by studying the notation of which I actually have had fun with. It's look and listen stuff. keyboard display, fretboard display, notation and tablature. Which ever way makes it easier for you to learn.

[jancivil]

implicit in the conversation was the notion that reading/information would mean knowledge, per se.

seemed to beat typing, 'reply w quote'. it isn't directed at any person.

Ok. I suggest you don't to include a person's name if your comment isn't directed at that person. You made it look like I was saying something that I wasn't saying. Not that it matters much.

Well, you did chime in with the word 'knowledge' following someone that had only spoke of looking at information. It's a thread, you know.

[jancivil]

dyscalculia & music theory:

The thread starter sounds like me. Including his recognition of people who don't know how he can play by ear (while they can't & require notation).

The problem I have with that is I'd like to understand the construction of music *somewhat* academically so as to aid in composition. Otherwise I'm just listening to other people and trying to work out how things I like to hear are done structurally. If someone starts talking about scales & chord progressions, I'm utterly confounded. I can recognize major & minor, but I can't just list chords.

It sounds like a cognitive impairment, by which I mean is not going to change over your life.

You're going to have to make sense of it on another level I reckon. I personally don't think I can imagine not being able to make sense of numbers in music.

that said, I don't put them first in my own creative endeavors. I do everything from the standpoint of hearing intervals in context of other sounds. I do have to determine a lot of things about the time after the first impulses in order to make things coincide, but on a basic level I go by ear. It's how I got melody, certainly. But I don't know, how much of my understanding of 'modes' owes to getting numbers.

I started on drums. I never heard of eg., 'rhythmic modes' (except for relatively recently: from medieval times, the metrics of long/short), but I learned everything from emulating a record and applying the analysis - in drum lessons for a brief time - physically. Most of what I came across as a kid was 4/4; in the first band I tried to have I had to sort out how 3/4 worked from some sheet music; I'd only played 4/4 beats up to that moment. I didn't have any information, the internet or any of this, and it doesn't seem like woulda been a very intellectual process, just a matter of getting something together 'every three' that I could feel. Maybe my father pointed me to 'waltz time'...

First time I played with professionals they cut me with a slow ballad in 5/4. There was no information on how to do this, I had to fake it til I made it. I can't imagine my drum teacher having said anything other than well, 'what do you think happened' with some suggestions and a model for it. It's a matter of 2+3 vs. 3+2 but one can feel the difference as if it weighs more on one end or the other I suppose.

I don't think I encountered 'music theory' other then real basic stuff until I chose to take a community college course at 18. I was a lead guitarist with some style by then and I couldn't talk so much about what I did. I did come up in a naborhood where a number of people were a lot better than me and I interacted with them on purpose as much as possible. I have no idea what to say to you about that.

I don't think 'by ear' should be too readily dismissed, is the upshot of these anecdotes. If someone fails to grok the how of that, it's their problem. It isn't so freakish I don't think. There are people that don't play by ear to begin with and I don't understand how that works any better than you get numbers probably.

Someone says point & counterpoint and all I can think of is call & response.

Well counterpoint is some lines interacting with other lines in a way that is a happy situation for all the lines... "Point and..." is another phrase that doesn't have the same meaning. Counterpoint in music isn't necessarily 'answer to statement', it can be but...

[jancivil]

People that have 'perfect pitch' can avoid to develop relative pitch and get away with it, seems to me.

The exercise of developing relative pitch is of supreme importance if one wants to come up with their own music by ear, as music is not separate atoms, it works like a field. You can develop knowledge of intervals in a suble way by emulating what you hear in songs. I don't know to what degree a term 'major sixth' for instance is mystifying you but... I was taught to remember the name of the interval from a moment in a song.

Ma RIIII-A! West Side Story, Ma to Ri is an aug fourth, proceeds to the P5.