Klarinet Archive - Posting 000466.txt from 1997/05

From: Karl Krelove <kkrelove@-----.com>
Subj: Re: Why learn scales?
Date: Fri, 16 May 1997 08:17:59 -0400

At 12:17 PM 5/12/97 -0500, you wrote:
>
>1. We practice scales and arpeggios (s&a) because they are common patterns
>in most music we play. We can't practice all possible sequences of notes
>with complete diligence, so we pick out some of the most common patterns.
>...
>4. We learn s&a to have some mindless patterns to use when we are focusing
>on something else in our practice (like tongue attack, long tones...)
>...That leaves 1, which is a very strong argument. Just how strong is clear
>when playing music where these patterns do not occur---for instance in
>a lot of atonal music, or other places where "wierd runs" occur (I'm
>playing Rachmaninoff's Symphonic dances now; the 2nd movement is a killer
>for this reason). It's the same thing in reading words. Reading letter
>by letter is too slow. But we can't just read word by word because
>we can't have all words in the forefront of our brains. So we often
>use syllables, and crash and burn when they look unfamiliar: ask an
>English speaker to pronounce Krzystov Zbiginiewski, and many will
>freak not because they don't know how to pronouce rz, but because it
>just looks "too wierd".
>
>For argument 1, I would think it's crucial to practice scales and
>arpeggios **while looking at them on the printed page**, to learn to
>recognise the patterns when they occur. Memorizing scales works for the
>weaker arguments 2 and 4, and may be necessary for the unfortunate
>argument 3. Writing out s&a is probably good for argument 2, but
>irrelevant for 1.

You might have a point in theory (not the music kind). In practice (these
words just have so many meanings) it seems to me that students who don't
memorize the scale and arpeggio patterns rarely really learn them. Because
they have the comfort of seeing them on the page, they end up re-inventing
them every time they see them, and the difficult ones that require specific
fingerings never become fluent. Maybe it's just my students, but this has
been very consistent in my teaching experience. The act of memorizing
simply makes the students practice them more.
Also, there is the small problem when using written scales of whether or
not to practice from Klose type scales, where the flats and sharps are
written in as accidentals, or other versions and layouts which show key
signatures. If key signatures are used, reading the scales becomes a really
pointless exercise, because the scales all appear as "white key" scales.
They still need to apply the key signature chromatics "from memory." The
approaches are more or less equalized and remembering key signatures in
real music is perhaps made less problematic if the scales are memorized.
Then, any diatonic pattern in a written piece gets recognized as a "scale"
and is played correctly (unless there's a trap in the middle) with the
right key signature. Whether it gets recognized as a Db major scale or just
a generic scale in a musical section that has a five-flat key signature
probably depends less on the "reading" skill you get from practicing from
written scales than on the basic dexterity and control that come from
thoroughly learning the scale patterns kinetically.
I hope this doesn't repeat points already made. I've been too pressed for
time to follow this thread up to now (it's school concert time), so this is
the first message I've read on this subject. I know the thread's been
going on for several days.

Karl