PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Beginners Forum What is the least difficult way to learn to play an Instrument?

I assume some people start learning to sight read on day one, and others start learning by ear.
I am beginning to think that my inability to become skilled at sight-reading music has made things more difficult. Not that I can't read at all, but certainly not well enough to play something put in front of me.

Is it faster to learn music in a classical way?

Billy

What instruments are you interested in? For instance guitar,being so visual and pattern based can certainly be learned to a very high degree without reading standard notation.

I am interested in playing guitar, bass, piano, organ, drums, and various synthesizers.

The question came up when trying to learn to play Whiter Shade Of Pale on B3.

I was missing a couple of notes in my right hand, which became evident when I looked at the sheet music. After reading the sheet music, the bass pattern was also less of a problem to understand.

Billy

Define 'play an instrument'
My kids could 'play' drums at 3 .. no idea what they were doing, but they thought they were playing.

Nothing beats a good fundamental understanding of theory. Then you can 'transpose' it to any keyboard, fretboard or what have you.
The ability to read music kinda comes along with that, IMO.

If you could look at the sheet music and realize what you were missing when trying by ear, that's an example.of the above!

When auditioning some guitarists and bassists for my wedding band I found a number of them that fit into that "play" category, and they were a lot older than 3!


You are spot on about learning basic theory and reading.

Have a Merry Christmas.

Well, what I was getting at was being able to play a song the way it was initially recorded.

One can play Whiter Shade Of Pale on the guitar, and people would recognize the song, but it is a classic B3 song.

It can be played on B3 with a less complex bass line and sounds good, and one can interpret the original in many ways.

What became apparent to me was that although I could hear Procol Harum playing the song and duplicate most of the notes, I was missing things. Only when I looked at the sheet music, did I understand what I did not know.

The question then becomes, why start out trying to learn something by ear? Is it not less work to start out sight-reading something, commit it to memory, and then play it by ear? That would assume one knows how to sight-read.

So, is it faster to learn to sight-read and then use that skill as opposed to trying to learn a song accurately by ear? Obviously, both methods can produce the exact same results based on the sheet music being correct to begin with.

The answer would be different for different people I assume

Billy

+1
I would say the intended purpose is critical. Playing for one’s own enjoyment is one thing, playing at a top studio to secure a spot in the “inner circle” is quite something else.

Since I play my instruments basically for my own enjoyment, I’d rather play the piece with less accuracy than the original artist but with my own interpretation rather than playing it note-for-note spot-on with all the space for interpretation squeezed out. Of course, my approach will never land me a spot in the inner circle, and that’s ok.

But as I utilize tab more and more, I do find it rewarding to “steal” certain phrases or notes and incorporate them into my recorded interpretations. The important thing for me is to just be in the game and have fun.

If I were to advise a youngster, I’d say get formal training, learn to sight read and learn all the theory you can.

That assumes you can get a good transcription of what you're trying to duplicate.

These days, stem splitting software is much better than it was, so you can hear parts that were buried in the mix. So learning by ear still has an edge there.

Plus, the person who came up with the part in the first place wasn't reading a transcription of the part.

It also means you care about being able to duplicate something exactly. That's never been a goal of mine. If I can play the part so the arrangement works, I consider it a success. YMMV, which is one of the many, many reasons I'll never be in a cover band.

I agree with both Steve and David's statements. In the pop world, it is generally not necessary to play any piece of music note for note.

However many riffs and series of notes, both complex and simple, define a piece of music.

The more simplistic it is, the greater the need to play it note for note.

There is only one set of notes that defines Smoke On The Water. You don't need much ear training to duplicate that riff. Something like the opening riff to Riders On The Storm, on the other hand, is pretty complex to play if you are not a very skilled keyboard player. It does not lend itself to interpretation; otherwise, it just does not sound like Riders On The Storm.

The real reason for my question is that I am trying to make a decision if I should put in the work to learn to sight-read sheet music accurately and up to speed at this late date.

I can sit here for four or five days and learn Whiter Shade Of Pale note for note by ear. If that were the only song I ever wanted to learn, then by ear would be the fastest way. The issue is that I will want to learn other pieces of music note for note or at least the signature licks that define them in the future.

All of this is based on the even more basic question of whether I want to continue to be involved in music in the same way I have been in the past.

Most likely, I will acquire some new skills and continue with many of the old ones.

Then there is the possibility I will just go fishing...lol

Billy

If you've realized the benefit of being able to read music I'd strongly encourage continuing.
It helps you develop in so many ways.

It doesn't prevent you from putting your own spin on things, in fact it'll probably make you better at it.
If you can already play by ear, before you know it you'll make the relationship and reading will come quicker as you can hear the notes you read.
Like you said, there are times when it will save you time (a precious resource) so investing a little, like most things, will pay off in the long run.
It doesn't mean you have to stop playing by ear/feel, you just have another tool to pull off the bench when needed.

/5 stars: would recommend!

Well. I have been considering taking some formal or perhaps informal piano/keyboard lessions.

I would even like to have a student ID as that would save me money on several things, and perhaps put me in cantact with people I would otherwise never meet.

Been doin a lot of thinking in my advancing age...lol

Billy

I see I need to make a correction.

If I were to advise a youngster anyone, I’d say get formal training, learn to sight read and learn all the theory you can.

Billy, from your post I assume you can read some music. If so I would like to make a suggestion.
Buy fake book and an accompanying fake book disk from Notes' Norton Music. Pick a song from the disk, turn to the proper page in the fake book, and play along with the disk. Do this a few times via a different song each time and your reading will improve. In fact I have to get back to doing this myself.

When I was teaching guitar and bass I would young people had no choice buy to read music and eventually learn some theory. The "bucket list" people, virtually all retired people, had a choice to go that route or just learn a few chords and songs. Teenagers whom wanted to shred or thinking they could take 3 lessons and be on tour I said I'm not the teacher you want or need.

Good luck

Hey Mario

Learning to sight read involves many parts. Playing with a metronome can help you visualize what a quarter note duration should sound like at 120 BPM, for example.

However, the physical coordination between the right and left hand and issues with the way a human hand is designed make playing what you may be able to read difficult for everyone.

Single-note sight reading in the treble cleft is not super difficult for me, except when notes are placed more than one octave above or below the staff. Recognizing chords in all the roots and two other inversions is not so easy for me. Truthfully, there is a hell of a lot to learn.

I have never had piano instruction, so I need to improve my basic piano skills and sight-reading.

Some of the learning happens almost automatically. You hear a piece of music that contains a quarter note rest for example, and you see the rest on the sheet music and relate the symbol to what you hear.

I am glad I have pretty good hearing recognition of musical notes. It will certainly make learning to sight-read better a lot easier.

For me, there are not so many "mountains" to get over in music. There are just a million hills that stretch beyond the visible horizon.

Billy

Sounds like your point of view is that of a guitar player.
Plenty of great guitar players never learn to read. (Wes Montgomery)
Some great ones learn later in their careers (Chet Atkins).

Most other instruments start with sight reading. Piano, Clarinet, Bassoon, Violin, etc.

An understanding of harmony may be more important that sight reading if playing non-classical music on guitar .
A well written bar by bar chord chart arrangements may be all you need.
I couldn't imagine reading a guitar chart where all the chords were spelled out note for note. Sounds like torture.
For me comping chords to a guitar chart is mostly figuring out what notes you can leave out or need to avoid for what the chart calls for.
The first few times through a chart can be a bit of re-writing the parts.
That job is about simplifying.
Personally I don't really think about notes on a staff. I think numerically, major, minor, dominat for the chord quality mostly. Nashville Numbers for the changes.

As a bass player I've read a lot of bass charts that were flat out terrible.
If you played them note for note you'd never get asked back. All roots ,all quarter notes.
A bar by bar chord chart (like a guitar chart) is much more helpful imo.

For my instruments (bass & guitar) reading may be less important than understanding harmony.

Nevertheless, when I'm learning the head of a new tune on guitar I do wish I was a better sight reader.

That probably didn't help at all.

Happy Holidays.

As a child, I started with piano. A classical teacher who taught her students to sight read, discouraged to a lesser degree, the use of playing by ear but didn't get very upset over the ones who did play some things by ear. She also was big on music theory and wanted her students to have a solid grasp of the theory behind the music.

I really didn't have a desire to learn to sight read the music. I could use the sheet music to figure out the melody and chords but when it came down to it, I preferred to play by ear.

I recall one particular day when the teacher would, at the end of the lesson, give me the new song to work on for the following week. She would play it so I knew what it was supposed to sound like. I went home and because I really liked the song, I sat down and started to work on learning it. I worked hard on it using the sheet music and by the end of the week and the next lesson, I had that song nailed down. I walked in to the lesson and couldn't wait for Mrs Leigh to as me to play that song. And when she did, I played it without a single flubbed note. I was proud. When I finished, she sat there for several seconds and didn't say a word. Then she said... That was really good. You must have worked hard on it. Then she said I want you to play it again for me but this time, I want you to play what's on the sheet music. Oooops..... Yeah, I had it close but it wasn't what was on the sheet music. So much for not reading it.

I have played the piano and learned to play the guitar and mostly by ear, especially the guitar. I played drums in the school band and orchestra..... playing drums by the sheet music was boring. I've always been an ear player and prefer it. I can read the notes, but I can not and have no desire to play by sight.

Another quick story..... At a church I attended and played guitar in the music program, there were 3 folks involved in the program who were piano players. Two of them were masterclass musicians and could read anything in any key and play sight unseen for the first time like they had been playing it forever. They would look at it for a couple of seconds and then play it without any mistakes. The other lady was good but not at that level. After rehearsal we'd often just mess around ... the drummer, bass player and myself, jamming but the ladies never joined in. We'd be like, lets jam a 1,4,5 in A major. When I questioned them, they had no real clue what I was talking about. If they didn't have sheet music they were lost.

But when it comes to learning..... just do what you think is best. I never say don't learn to read. You should at least have a basic knowledge of the musical staff and the notes and their values and theory. Theory is best learned with a piano. It's really easier to understand on the piano ....at least for me. it was. No matter which way you choose or combination thereof, the only thing that will work is to spend lots of time doing it. Have fun or it's not going to happen.

If it wasn't fun, I don't think any of us would have done this beyond grade school.
Well, except maybe for the chicks, but other than that ..
/kidding, I never seem to get 'chicks' .. but I sure have fun

Do you think the intro to this song could be learned by ear? I assume a very skilled B3 player could.
I also think having the sheet music would be a distinct advantage, as it would significantly reduce the time needed to learn it.
It's from a Tab Benoit song called "Nice And Warm." Paul English plays the intro on B3.


Perhaps I should have posed the question in the thread differently.

"What is the least time-consuming and least difficult way to learn to duplicate a piece of music note for note and play that piece of music on a software emulation program of a B3 organ with a MIDI keyboard controller? "

Other issues.
I sometimes look at the sheet music for some guitar parts both in standard notation and TAB. I am not skilled enough to play that part live and up to speed without studying it, nor would I typically want to. Sight reading for guitar or other string instruments is not a simple skill to learn but people do it every day.

I do not think gaining more musical education and skill sets will make one less creative or that there is any real downside. There is some truth to the fact that certain music universities leave an identifiable "stamp" on their students.

Billy

I concur with both statements. I’m still learning every day. I can also identify weaknesses in big band musicians I encounter who graduated from the famous music schools in the northeast.

OK, that is different...

... and you've moved the goalpost again.

Some instruments lend themselves to written notation. The piano and organ are excellent examples of this, because there aren't those many "moving parts" to work with. Notation that captures the notes, pedaling and dynamics does a good job capturing all the elements of the performance. For keyboard instruments, it's helpful to have accurate fingering (i.e., which finger to use on the keys, but this may need to be modified depending on the player's reach.

On the other hand, for a lead guitar there can be a lot on musical information that's not captured by traditional notation, and is difficult to capture in even in tablature. Some things aren't captured in notation, like amp settings. The best way to learn is to treat the tablature as a general roadmap, in combination with a recording of the performance.

The best notation is the one that allows you to accurately recreate the original performance. Since you're talking about being able to play live, you're not going to use that notation while performing the music. Notation is only a temporary tool.

Sight reading is hugely useful. But you don't need to be able to sight read in real time in order to use written notation. You do need to know the basics. For example, an F# in a key signature means all Fs in the music are played as F#s, and an accidental stays in effect for the duration of the bar. Beginning players often add in accidentals to all notes to remind themselves.

Obviously, learning to sight read will allow you to perform lots of new material faster. But if you take your time, you can memorize music that's notationally difficult to read without being able to sight read it in real time.

Being able to sight read means that you can spend more time learning the music instead of deciphering the notation.

Music theory can be extremely helpful for memorizing a piece. For example, if you see chordal arpeggios, harmonic progressions, pentatonic scales and so on, the piece of music becomes something more than hundreds of random notes to learn, but instead a realization of musical ideas within a context. The larger the chunk, the less information has to be memorized.

Once you've memorized chord shapes on an instrument, it's easy to see them in notation and tie them to the muscle memory of where they are on your instrument.

As far as learning parts quickly and accurately, it boils down to the same thing for every instrument:

1. Have an accurate representation of the performance (standard notation, tab, etc.).
2. Be competent in the techniques required to perform the piece (fingering, bends, etc.).
3. Slow and accurate performance of the music, broken into small, learnable parts.
4. Playing the parts so they connect smoothly.
5. Once a slow, accurate performance is obtained, progressively adding speed until it's up to tempo.

Thanks, David

I think what you said is pretty accurate. Well, there are plenty of people who can sight-read note for note at speed.

In years past, I found understanding music theory from a guitar perspective difficult. I got a piano with the idea that it would help. It certainly was valuable because it is so visual. Drop the third by a half step, and you form the minor, for example. Where is the third on the guitar?

The more theory one knows the less trouble it is to guess what the next chord may be, especially if it stays in key. Melodies are discreet and pretty much unique, which is why we can copyright them. Learning a melody does not lend itself to interpretation. Change the melody line, and it is not the same song. Songs frequently have highly recognizable features other than melody. What I call "signature licks". In years past, we never played a lot of cover songs, but when we did, they were pretty close to the original. The lead guitar player and the keyboard would play their own solos but then come back to the original idea. We were lucky; both Lewis and Morrow could hear something one time and play it back note for note.

Perhaps one does not want to play "the same song," and on rare occasions, the new version is better than the original.

I am trying to discover what I actually know. For example, I played every chord in every inversion on the piano in the key of C just to see what I could remember. Then, I played the same in other keys. Some keys were easy, and some were not. To figure out a path forward, one needs to know where one is at.

It would be wonderful to hear something and play it back, note for note. Unfortunately, I can not do that, so I have to use some other method.

So far, sight reading is the only thing that has been very useful in filling in the notes I can't seem to hear and remember.

I know the answer, it has always been contained in the work I was unwilling to do...lol

Billy

This. I chose Deep Purple originals and then covers of songs that are shall we say, a bit more than the average level of difficulty.

In a forum for Cakewalk back in the old days, a couple of the folks there decided to do a cover of Lazy. They nailed it note for note. If you were in the cake forums over a decade ago you might remember that being posted.


HIGHWAY STAR




OR

BURN


<<<<< This one is especially interesting in that the drummer is a 12 year old girl who nails it. Ian Pace reaction:

I don't think this was sight read..... but I might be wrong. If you know how to listen and are at a high level of proficiency on your instrument, you can nail these songs.

Deep Purple has always been one of my favorite bands. Yes, I remember the Cakewalk forum and miss it. A number of very competent musicians came there.

This was likely my first encounter with Deep Purple Live.



Perhaps because I met Steve Morse in the airplane world and became friends before I knew he played guitar, he has always been one of my favorite Deep Purple guitar players.

Many musicians can hear and play back what they hear more or less note for note, but most of us can not.

I have discovered how to use something called Synthesia. While it has serious limitations, it has enabled me to learn to play a couple of descending piano/organ lines that I have struggled with for years.

I am mostly interested in the results. I am not overly emotionally connected to the method.

Billy

There is a gold mine of info in this thread, some real valuable stuff.

One perspective that hasn't been dwelt on is the role that repetition, practice and sleep play in the process of learning.

It's all about establishing and strengthening neural pathways.

Two quick war stories. While playing songs on my bass that I want to learn, sometimes my mind would wander off on some non-music topic. This is nothing new and if I didn't catch myself my playing would just collapse and I'd have to stop and start over. But recently for the first time, my mind wandered while I was playing and I chose not to "come back". To my surprise my fingers kept on playing and I didn't skip a beat. This may not be news to established musicians but for me it was astounding. Of course, I had been practicing the song for weeks, so the pathways were established and strong. I think folks refer to this as muscle memory. I know fingers don't have memory, but it sure did feel as if they did.

The 2nd story involves what your brain does during sleep; it clears-out toxins, plaque and metabolic waste and also organizes/compartmentalizes info learned during the day. Just before dozing off, thinking about what you're trying to learn can help your brain learn the material faster; a pre-sleep review can speed this up. Some people have pushed this to an art-form. I haven't, but I have partially solved some tough engineering problems in my sleep by doing a pre-sleep review of the material. Just another tool in the toolbox.

I wonder to what extent the musical giants have exploited this kind of stuff.

LOL...Steve...This reminded me of a bass player I used to play with. He would sometimes stick his flip phone under the edge of his hat and talk to his girlfriend while he was playing on stage.

My guess is that the "musical giants" have explored anything that they thought would be of value.

One of the differences between most of us and super-good players is the amount of time we spend with our instruments in our hands. Most "musical giants " have never been more than thirty feet from their instruments for 95% of their time.

It is my impression that mastering a particular skill takes around 7000 hours of diligent study for most things, such as becoming a pilot, a woodworker, or a bass player.

Billy

[quote=Planobilly.......................................
One of the differences between most of us and super-good players is the amount of time we spend with our instruments in our hands. Most "musical giants " have never been more than thirty feet from their instruments for 95% of their time.

It is my impression that mastering a particular skill takes around 7000 hours of diligent study for most things, such as becoming a pilot, a woodworker, or a bass player.

Billy [/quote]

Exactly! There are no short cuts. Yes there are programs that can help but in reality you must put the work in to become an accomplished guitarist, bassist, pilot, or actually any profession or hobby.

On the lower end of the equation, you can spend 20 minutes a day on a particular skill and in one years time be better than 95% of the people at that particular skill. That is about 120 hrs of time. (the 100 hr rule)
I'd heard that 10,000 hrs or the equivalent of approximately 5 years of full time work was the milestone to be a master of the skill. But of course.... practice alone doesn't make perfect as the saying goes. Only practicing perfectly makes for perfection in time and mastery of the skill.

I too have heard this "10,000 hour rule". Not sure if it's universal. Some may achieve mastery in less time and certain high-intensity professions like medicine may take considerably more time; 5 years won't even get you out of college and then there's the work of keeping up with the new developments.

In any case, having crisp goals that you hold yourself accountable for is valuable. Personally, I have a goal of learning and recording on my bass, 100 classic rock songs and 100 smooth jazz/ambient favorites. I'm only at song #7 on the rock songs but hey, the journey is as important as the destination

But it takes far less than that to learn a very limited set of skills that will lead to a well-defined output.

Let's say you want to be able to play a particular song on the piano. Not how to play every song on the piano, but a single song. Let's also say that you get a teacher to make sure you're no building in any bad habits as you progress through the process. That way, you can increase in speed as you memorize it, instead of getting locked up because your hand position is terrible, or the fingering is nonsensical.

There's a whole lot you don't need to learn. For example, you don't need to know the right fingering for all keys, or even the key the song is in - just the passages of that song. And so on.

I've met plenty of musicians who are mediocre at an instrument, but can play one song really well. It's little more than a party trick, and goodness knows how they learned that one song - probably because thought the song was really cool. But they learned it, and it's etched into their muscle memory.

And once you've got one song, you can move to the next. Certainly, you'll need time, but not 10,000 hours.

There's another element here that hasn't been mentioned: musicality. Because that transfers, and it's already part of your thinking.

When someone is first learning an instrument, they're focused on the mechanics of the music. That's why teachers tell students to focus on the music first and foremost, making everything you play feel musical, focusing on the timing, phrasing and dynamics.

If you play another instrument, hopefully that's already part of your thinking process. You already know how to feel the beat, find the groove, and use appropriate dynamics. You're not just playing notes and hoping you're hitting them at the right time - you're interpreting the notation into music.

The well-defined output to a very limited set of skills is the sudden stop that will kill you when you crash the airplane...lol

It is not funny, as it happens about once a week. After the NTSB investigates the "accident," the cause is generally always the same: "pilot error."

If "well-defined output" means one song someone learned by some method, that person would be highly unlikely to be able to articulate that song twice the same if there was any level of complexety.

What you get with that one song that you learned by whatever method is plausible music at best. Even untrained ears can hear the lack of proficiency.

There is no exact definition of correct finger position on a piano. There are excepted "norms" that apply to people whose hands are big enough to produce that fingering. Different fingerings, correct or incorrect, produce different sounds on the piano.

It would be doubtful that anyone who only spent the time needed to learn one song of any complexity could play it like the original.

Obviously, one does not need to study and practice for hundreds of hours to learn to play the three chord 1, 4, and 5 in the C key at 60 BPM.

Professional musicians get better year after year on their way to becoming great musicians.

You can not even hear the mistakes you are making when you start out.

Most of us play music because it is something we like to do, and we have no intention of becoming highly proficient musicians. We mostly only get good enough to get by if we are lucky. A huge number of guitars and pianos" get shoved in the corner, never to be used again." Next time you go to someone's house and you see a piano sitting there, ask them to play it.

I know many musicians who "think" they can play a lot of songs, but they can not play a single one correctly. They have limited hearing, no reading skills, and no writing skills and, therefore, are seriously unable to communicate or be communicated to by other musicians.

Welcome to the typical bar band, let's get drunk, have some fun, and play Mustang Sally.

There are other musicians who have worked diligently and gone to school to get an education. They have worked thousands of hours to try to perfect their craft. Many of those people are icons we look up to, and some are virtually unknown.

Billy

I once wrote an essay in college about all the benefits/disciplines involved in the task of learning music.
It was well received and the thing I remember most was someone stating they had never thought about it and give musicians a lot more credit than they did prior to reading it.

That statement made my day and the hours spent writing it worth it.
I told myself it may have been one of my best works and to never lose it, but I did. At least the electronic copy.
Hmm, wonder if I still have a printed copy somewhere.

Basically the executive summary was that musicians are reading a second language, expressed using various parts of their whole body with their instrument while not just articulating in the moment but thinking ahead so the next note(s) are properly placed in a group conversation that a larger group wants to hear.
It's never the exact same conversation and it is obvious when the topic becomes tiresome to any one involved because they are listening to each other and adapting the conversation at the same time, all in real time .. and for an experienced musician the biggest factor is the discipline of listening to each other while participating.
Only the paper took three pages to get to that <grin>

Nicely spoken.
If ever you find your paper, I'd like a copy if you would be so kind.

Not building bad habits. That is so true.

Not only in music but in everything. As many here know, I train my dogs to find human remains. I caution people who approach me asking me how I do it to not attempt it on their own but to find a mentor, someone with experience to help them avoid the rabbit hole and bad habits that they will develop on their own if they don't have that expert guidance.

It's a ZEN thing. A state of being that when you are in it, it's amazing. Almost magical. You can actually step back and watch yourself do this thing while you are doing it almost like an autopilot mode.

This can be achieved in performing and it's really amazing when you get in this mode while you are writing a song.

Well, I found it BT .. so here in all it's promoted glory is that letdown .. <grin>

Asking a teenager to define music will result in an answer much different than asking a senior citizen. However, both will stand firm in their feelings about music. It is such a deep felt relationship that most people have a very defined opinion of what music is and what it is not. An explanation of “good music” has caused heated debates among friends and generations, yet it is one of the most refined, studied and precise arts; this has led researchers to conclude that the art and study of music increases one's intellect and intelligence. It is such a personal, emotional and creative form of expression.

There have been many attempts made at describing just what music is. It's been said that music is simply sound with a rhythm. Webster's Dictionary gets a little more abstract in their definition, saying it is “the combining of sound and tones as a form of artistic expression.” That definition, by their own extension would include “any combination of sounds that is pleasing to the ear.” What is pleasing to one person may not be so pleasing to another, but everyone holds music dear. Whether it is a particular love song or a reverent hymn, music and song is understood by all. The theory and components that make up music are often not understood by the listener. There are many performers of music who do not consciously understand it either, but there are many tasks, languages and math computations taking place in even the simplest of songs.

Music is a language. It is written in a structure that only those who know the language can decode. Reading music is very much like reading a foreign language that must be studied, practiced and then put into use in order to become fluent. There is a unique complexity to this language because while learning it, the only way to comprehend it is to put it into action. It is unique in that it requires physical action on the part of the reader. To learn to read the notes, or musical alphabet, the reader must be able to hear what each note is saying. This is always done with some kind of musical instrument in hand. As the notes are read, and then played, a relationship develops between the eyes, the ears, and the hands. This learning process is very reinforcing; if done incorrectly the result offends the readers ears. The mistake is evident and compels the reader to do it over again to get it right. It is also a language that can be learned by people of all countries and native tongues, then applied to allow a heartfelt communication and expression. An even more astounding aspect of this language is that it is not one that is meant to be expressed singly and in turn. People conversing in the language of music all express themselves at the same time to create a harmonic blend of sound and rhythm that moves not only the artists but also all those within hearing distance. These audience members often have little understanding of all the expression and simultaneous listening going on by the performers. It is a very complex language, spanning many styles, genres, and cultures, yet it is absolute and strict, requiring an outcome as precise as a math equation.

Maybe that's because music also incorporates math. The rhythm of music is based on a count and a flowing subdivision of that count happening in time. The waltz is based on a count of three. A march is often in a count of two. The overwhelming majority of music is based on a count of four. These basic counts, or beats, are then subdivided in smaller elements in groups of three or four. When the subdivision happens in three it is most likely a swing or shuffle style of song. The division of four is more common and strict, being used for most modern music in this country for the last fifty years or more. A musician, one who can read and express this language, is doing these math calculations instinctively while reading the music and performing on their particular instrument. There are many artistic music pieces that are written in what is called odd-time signatures. These pieces can have a basic beat count of five, seven, eleven or even nineteen beats that need to be subdivided over time.
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That can add up to some pretty complex math. No wonder the human brain excels when this art is studied over time. So far music involves reading a written foreign language while doing continuous math calculations and taking an action that results in a pleasing sound. Like they say in the infomercials- “but wait, there's more!”

As the study of music develops it becomes necessary for an artist to not only rigidly read what is written, but may also be required to improvise. This act requires a knowledge of the theory behind music. Note relationships, chord structures, and scale patterns are all necessary to become proficient at being a musician. The most amazing thing about the ability to improvise is that it requires this knowledge to be put to use in anticipation of the next note. Every true musician knows that when the time comes to play a note is not the time to figure out what note needs to be played. The note will inevitably be either a wrong note or played late. Since music requires these subdivisions over time it is very evident when a note is not played at the right time. It's now understood that musicians are reading another language, doing math at the same time, and actually thinking ahead to the next note while performing on their instrument. Some types of performances compound this by adding choreography into the mix.Most concerts contain some type of choreography. There will often be separate dancing, but when the musicians have to also physically perform timed actions it really complicates things. One example of this is the marching band. These musicians, often student age, are performing timed physical actions on top of everything else discussed above.

No wonder so many researchers have reached the conclusion that learning music can expand ones ability to learn other things. It also teaches a discipline of structure and practice that leads one to be diligent in getting the desired results through constant effort. The reward is that one precious possession everyone has: a favorite song.

Yes, nicely expressed.

One of the things I find interesting to me personally, is that whether I like a particuar piece of music can depend a great deal on my state of mind at the time. Some days I can listen to and love a particularl piece, another time I have to stop ... it's too challenging. Some days a simple piece will be fine, another day it'll be terminally boring.

rharv, I copied this to a Word doc so as not to have it lost a 2nd time

You hit the major points; it's a complex international language, it has rules, it's unique, it's mathematical, it's emotional, it has psychological, intellectual and learning benefits, and it's conversational via improvisation.

What you've written could be the preface to a college text book on music appreciation or theory.

Well done and thanks for sharing.

From now on should we start calling you Professor RH?

Just don't call me late for dinner

I find that a lot of the music that I didn't like when it came out, I have come to appreciate a bit more, now. Not saying I like it or that I would make it a regular listen..... But I appreciate the effort that went into it. And this is especially true if I have a chance to see a live performance of the music by musicians on stage.

Nothing like seeing the musicians perform it live

I started learning when I was 10. I can play most instruments, I have always, always found that practice makes perfect. I most of all can play the guitar, piano, and drums. I learned to read music at 11, but I can also play by ear. I'm now 58, so I've been playing a long time. The easiest way is just do it regardless of weather or not you can read music or not. Memorize every note and chord, it will come to you, that is how I learned to play motzart and all the classical giants, I can listen and identify most every chord because I have ever chord and note memorized that I have been able to learn in all my years of playing. Memorization is the absolute key.