Originally Posted By: JoanneCooper
Originally Posted By: Janice & Bud
Improvising solos was mentioned. I can hear chord changes readily and can play decent acoustic bass and acoustic rhythm guitar for a couple of genres. I cannot solo nor do I sing. And I don’t think I could’ve ever learned to solo or sing other than in a very rote manner, i.e., note for note. I sincerely believe that we are “hard wired” for this...or not. I can put together chord a progression give it to Janice and she can very quickly come up with multiple melodies for it. She’s a good rhythm guitar player and had she devoted time to learning to learning technique and practiced I’m convinced she could play the melodies she makes up to sing on an instrument. And since she can “scat sing” sing I’m sure she could play improvisational solos on whatever instrument she spent sufficient time with. She hears melodies everywhere, in nature, even machinery smile

FWIW, I base this not just on her but from having had the privilege over the last 45 years to play with immensely talented musicians. I guess it’s a pessimistic view but I think that there is an interplay of nature and nature necessary to improvise and w/o the nature element all the nature in the world will not create it.

Interestingly Bela Fleck, who does not read music, creates layered compositions by singing the part he wants different musicians to play.

Bud

PS I realize I may be completely full of it and overly influenced by my psychology background. smile


Hi Bud. Thanks for chipping in. At musical u they believe that everybody can learn to sing and play by ear and that it is not something you are born with (or not). Some may take longer and have to put in more effort than others but it is possible. The tools and techniques they introduce (step by step) help you do that. As I say it is very early in my journey with them but I have changed my attitude. After only a month I am doing things I never thought I would be able to do. I am actually playing melodies and chords by ear and on the way to recognizing the key by ear. Before, if I struggled I would always resort to looking up chords or asking the other musicians what key is this in and try and improvise by memorizing patterns on the fretboard. I must say though, is a lot of work learning to recognize all those intervals and chord types by ear.


Hi Joanne,

Thanks for your original post and for your very informative responses. As I am prone to do I likely over generalized what I was trying to say. I don't mean that musical ability, or mathematical ability, or painting, etc., is either there or not (I don't think it is binary). From my perspective there are heritable degrees of it that can indeed be shaped by our environment. Not everybody can learn to be Einstein, or Rembrandt or Beethoven. But we can use learning to shape what we have. However I do believe we must have something to start with and some have much more than others. It's an argument that has been going on for many years in the behavioral sciences (nature v nurture). Pardon my ole man rambling. I'll definitely check out your reference. If it can help me it could teach a stone to sing!


Cheers,
Bud