 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-06 13:48
As a challenge during this sad, scary, boring confinement period, I have been trying to memorize pieces: mostly the Bach Cello Suites in the Voxmann version for clarinet. The benefits of learning by heart:
: it's good for the memory and for the neurons (I have a few left, though I haven't counted them)
: I find I play more expressively when I'm playing by heart.
: it makes you think more about how the piece is constructed, because this helps you in the memorization process.
Do you memorize pieces?
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Author: kilo
Date: 2020-05-06 16:51
Oh gosh...someone was mentioning this on a sax forum. "Take this time to start memorizing the heads to all the tunes in your book" — for all the reasons you mention. It's a wonderful idea...memorizing 32 bar tunes is challenging enough; memorizing the cello suites would be a prodigious accomplishment! I've noticed, however, that Bach's lines are logical enough that I can often play them while looking ahead a few measures so I guess it's not totally out of my realm. Good suggestion.
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Author: Bob Bernardo
Date: 2020-05-06 16:51
Hey Ruban, good topic! I surely agree that a person can play more expressively and by or from the heart when the music is memorized. For some reason I can't memorize music! But I've played some pieces so many times I think music can still be played very musically. I've had a deep fondness for conductors who could memorize music. These concerts always sound better.
This topic reminded me of the old school style of teaching which is often referred to of course as Solfeggio. Some of the old time teachers would make their students sing the parts before playing them on the horn. Surely this made the clarinet sound a bit different as well. Well anyway, I surely see where you are coming from, in reference to memorizing. Music can sound better. A lot better.
Is Solfeggio still being taught in colleges, music schools? Maybe also known as Sight Singing and Ear Training? Don't know, but I hope so.
A friend and I were just talking about this yesterday! The voicing style as we once sang the parts. This surely effects the clarinet sound.
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Post Edited (2020-05-06 16:53)
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Author: Ken Lagace
Date: 2020-05-06 17:26
One trick I invented years ago is to work from the end. Memorize the last eight bars, then the last 16, then the last 24 etc. That way as you play, you are getting mentally tired, but getting to music you have played more.
It will cost you $15 to use it though. It is a reduced rate this week only! :=)
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-06 18:01
Ken: Great idea! I'll give it a try. Well worth 15 bucks. Do you know this technique that's somewhat similar? Read the last chapter of a novel. Then try to imagine what came before; what led up to it. Wonderful exercise for one's imagination.
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-06 18:05
Dear Bob, I think you've probably heard of the late Thea King, who played with the English Chamber Orchestra. She played the piano and the clarinet about equally well. Well anyway, she told a friend of mine that she found it more difficult to learn a clarinet part by heart than a piano part! -and this in spite of the fact that the piano has four times as many notes. My explanation: on the piano you have the complete score in your head, not just part of if. Reason number two: there is something more logical and geometrical about a keyboard than the keys of a clarinet.
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2020-05-06 19:08
Like other pursuits, you get better at memorizing with practice. Your brain gets comfortable doing it, and you start to absorb larger chunks, like patterns, figurations, phrases, or repeated sections. You may also get better at "playing by ear," so similar figures in different keys memorize easily. After a while memorizing starts to become automatic, so any piece you play much tends to "stick" pretty easily.
You have to keep going over pieces you've "memorized". Little changes will creep in without your noticing, and you tend to forget parts of things you haven't played in a while.
Concert pianists and other solo musicians memorize tons of music. For example, today it's not terribly unusual to find young pianists having memorized all 32 Beethoven piano sonatas, along with other stuff. Sviatoslav Richter reportedly had over 800 pieces, many of them long and complex, in his fingers. There's some debate about whether memorizing is a waste of time and energy.
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Author: Johan H Nilsson
Date: 2020-05-06 19:41
For anyone to master a piece it has to be memorized to a large extent. Otherwise the musician cannot have an idea about its interpretation and is a paper score sequencing machine.
Technical difficult passages must be memorized by the brain for the fingers to play them.
For melodic music, I have memorized every piece I have played and trained enough. It is inevitable.
I haven't played very much "contemporary" music, but I find it way harder to remember and am amazed by the soloist who can play the material without a score. I assume they have trained so much they have learnt the sequence of tone... sounds.
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Author: Tony F
Date: 2020-05-06 20:18
In a previous life I serviced radar and computer systems in the military. We learned to memorize huge logic and electronic system schematics because we might not have access to them in the field. This skill has carried over into my musical adventures and I find I can read through a part a couple of times and it's in my head forever. I just visualize the page.
Tony F.
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-06 21:14
Tony: we have different types of memorization. Visually, I'm no good at all, but I'm pretty good at aural memorization. AS I also play jazz-by ear of course-the music dictates to my fingers pretty well.
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-06 21:30
Johan: there's a certain biological logic in tonality that you don't get in atonality. You don't FEEL where you're going in the latter and contrary to what some people would have us believe, it's not just a question of getting used to something unfamiliar.
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2020-05-06 21:35
Hi ruben. There are indeed different types of memorization. Some musicians rely predominantly on visual memory; Artur Rubinstein said that he saw the score in his mind's eye when he performed from memory. For others it's more about muscle memory, aural memory, etc.
When I was going to grade school in the 1950-60's, memorization of facts was required. Later trends in education moved away from rote memorization. Now I don't know what is taught. However, memorizing is both a natural and a learned skill. There are excellent, simple mnemonic techniques that I've read about but I've never seen taught. Most people are readily capable of far more memorization then they do; the most basic, productive technique is just to try! However, I think the effort may be accurately categorized as "work".
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-06 22:45
Dear Philip, I agree with everything you've said. I would just like to add that there exists a physicality in music (does this word exist?!): you feel physically carried from one note or chord or rhythm to the other as though buoyed by water. Words or numbers don't do this in the same way. They're more reflections than reflexes.
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Author: Tom H
Date: 2020-05-07 05:32
I've played Weber's 2nd Concerto by memory. Maybe because that's the first solo I performed in 1971 as a 16 year old. I recently did it with our professional band in 2018-- basically to show off. I may have done another piece or two by memory, can't recall.
There is no reason to play by memory. Just another thing to worry about? Some instruments seem to gravitate toward it. I can understand it with a piano concerto--man it's gotta be memorized with all those fingers. Vocalists, I guess. Jazz, rock, well that's a different story.
Last summer we had a flute soloist who did a concerto by memory. I was surprised to see that.
The Most Advanced Clarinet Book--
tomheimer.ampbk.com/ Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001315, Musicnotes product no. MB0000649.
Boreal Ballad for unaccompanied clarinet-Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001314.
Musicnotes product no. MNO287475
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2020-05-07 07:45
Hi Tom H. "I may have done another piece or two by memory, can't recall." That made me smile.
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-07 12:40
Tom H: "Just another thing to worry about? I agree! I only memorize as an exercise and wouldn't perform something by heart in public. Anyway, I mostly play chamber music and chamber music isn't played by memory. If you have a memory lapse, you will derail your partners. I memorize: 1. To maintain or even improve my memory 2. To get to know the piece better 3. to play the piece more expressively.
I would also like to add that it's important to periodically go back to the score when you have memorized something, for there is a definite danger of drifting away from the original, especially as far as nuances and articulation go.
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-07 12:43
Philip; That reminds me of the golfer, Lee Trevino, saying: "There are three things you lose when you play golf and get older: You lose your physical strength, so you don't hit the ball as far. You lose your nerve, so you don't putt as well. And the third thing you lose...the third thing, I can't remember."
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2020-05-07 16:46
In recent summer seasons with my local community band I've been asked to play a couple solo pieces, and I memorized them for performance. One was an arrangement of Flight of the Bumblebee. I had two weeks to prepare, and then a single rehearsal immediately before the concert. Note, I'm very much an amateur.
During rehearsal it was going ok, when I suddenly realized that I'd mistakenly segued a running passage in the first A section into the similar passage from the final A' section, which was intended to proceed in a very different direction. Mid passage, blindly, panicking, I made up about 4 bars of chromatic, vaguely bee-sounding stuff, and, miraculously it ended on the right note at the right time. Having never practiced improvising that way the result surprised me as much as anyone. In fact, more than anyone: the conductor stopped the band to go over something else, and apparently neither he nor anyone but I noticed the drastic departure from the score. I had to stifle a laugh.
That was such bogus luck that I'll probably undergo years of misfortune to balance it out.
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Author: Tony F
Date: 2020-05-07 17:19
Muscle memory plays an important part in the process of memorizing a piece. I once commented to a pianist friend concerning the rather physically histrionic playing of a well known concert artist. She pointed out that he was playing a complex piece from memory and the physical actions were a part of the process of memorization. The movements become almost a dance to accompany the piece.
The first time I ever played a solo part (The "Air" from Rinaldo, on Eb clarinet) I had a complete mental blank as the band played the opening bars. When it came to my entry I still had no idea what came next so I just "let my fingers do the talking". I blanked my mind and let the fingers play, and the right noises came out. After a couple of notes my brain caught up and it was all OK after that.
Tony F.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2020-05-07 17:40
As I read this thread, I sense that mostly "memorized" means being able to play a piece from memory without reference to printed music. I've always had trouble memorizing much of anything, music or anything else. I'm constantly in awe of actors who memorize entire plays and can even understudy multiple parts beside their own.
As a clarinetist, I've only once performed from memory, the Weber Concertino when I was 18, because I was playing it as a scholarship winner at my music school and the conductor insisted that I play from memory. I was nervous enough to begin with and having to play without the music in front of me simply added to the trauma.
I have never been in that position since then. On the rare occasions I've played as soloist I've always had music on a music stand. And, of course, playing orchestral or chamber music, there never is an issue of having to perform from memory.
There is a different degree of memorization - not necessarily being able to play a piece from beginning to end without having the music in front of you, but simply knowing the music so well that you could, in fact, play individual passages from memory with just a glance to get started. I would still to this day be completely unnerved if for some reason I had to play, for example, one of the Brahms Sonatas without music, but in fact, passage by passage I can play them without really referencing the pages much. The printed part is (1) a source of security and (2) a memory jogger to make sure I don't go off on a wrong tack. I don't think I play the Sonatas any less expressively or feel any less personal commitment to them because I couldn't/wouldn't attempt performing them "from memory" in the usual sense. Any less than I think I play the solos in the slow movements of the Rachmaninoff 2nd or Shostakovitch 5th (for instance) with any less commitment because I have music there. I know those passages and even practice them from memory.
I don't think classic beginning-to-end memorization is necessary to play well, although you need to know the music you play quite thoroughly. Having music in front of you when you perform can be a source of increased security. Which for some of us is vital.
Karl
Post Edited (2020-05-07 17:45)
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-07 18:53
Karl: I agree 100 per cent with everything you have said, but still think it's a good exercise and opens up one's lyricism and imagination. I hasten to add that I don't and wouldn't do it in public.
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Author: Tom H
Date: 2020-05-07 22:19
Yes, actors with all those lines (well they probably shoot scenes separately, but still). Concert pianists with 10 fingers playing all those notes (and how DO these people sight read so well?).
Agree also that when you play a solo you really have memorized it, but are just used to looking at the music, and it is your safety valve so you don't get lost and start playing a section that is similar to the correct one (if that makes sense).
"I may have played a couple of others by memory but don't recall"--That IS (unitentionally) funny.
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tomheimer.ampbk.com/ Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001315, Musicnotes product no. MB0000649.
Boreal Ballad for unaccompanied clarinet-Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001314.
Musicnotes product no. MNO287475
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Author: Slowoldman
Date: 2020-05-07 22:39
I suspect that there are different types of memory for music, for "book knowledge", color memory, etc. I certainly memorized a lot of facts, figures and concepts during my years of medical training, but a piece of music or even an excerpt? Can't do it! (Nor could I do it when I was younger.)
Playing something many times over gives me a certain degree of muscle memory, which is essential to master a piece (or as close as I'm going to come to that), but playing it all from memory? Nope.
But that's me.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2020-05-08 06:29
Slowoldman wrote:
> I suspect that there are different types of memory for music,
> for "book knowledge", color memory, etc.
>
> Playing something many times over gives me a certain degree of
> muscle memory, which is essential to master a piece (or as
> close as I'm going to come to that)
Yes - there are different kinds of memory. Funny thing is, I don't feel as if it's entirely "muscle memory" when I do practice music from memory - there's a lot of aural memory guiding my fingers and rhythm and sometimes visual memory also contributes. Phrases join to form periods, which combine to form further structures that have logic that pulls me along through a piece (until it doesn't, hence my need for the security of the printed part on my stand). Muscle memory, to me, is more operative in learning basic patterns - scales, arpeggios, chromatic fingerings, etc. that are constantly needed to execute anything, at least in traditional genres, and for learning the occasional short series of notes that aren't standard patterns, like a foreign word in a piece of writing or narration that you don't recognize from previous experience.
I think of muscle memory mostly as an analog to phonics and word recognition in spoken and written language. You can't do anything with any kind of meaningful structure if you can't recognize and produce (orally or sub-vocally) those basics. To me, memorizing more complex written or spoken thoughts, scientific concepts or musical structures involves much more that the muscle memory that gets us through the basics.
Karl
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Author: kdk
Date: 2020-05-08 06:36
Tom H wrote:
> Yes, actors with all those lines (well they probably shoot
> scenes separately, but still).
I had live plays in mind more than movies. Stage actors' stock in trade is the ability to memorize sometimes very long scripts.
> Concert pianists with 10 fingers
> playing all those notes (and how DO these people sight read so
> well?).
I don't know how pianists play all those notes, either. But some concert performers that I've known have been really awful sight-readers. The pianists who make their living as accompanists are more consistently the real sight-readers.
Karl
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Author: Fuzzy
Date: 2020-05-08 07:41
Coming from the "early jazz" side of things (where tunes are much shorter and less complex, and highly melodic), I've come to realize that as long as I "know" the tune well enough to sing it through in my head (including the bridge/and variations), then it is really easy to play in any key without any printed aid.
However, in high school, pep tunes, marching tunes, and the occasional concerto - I'd try to memorize using all the normal tools used by classical musicians. I found it to be very difficult for me. Plus, the songs I "memorized" were lost from my memory within a few weeks/months at most. I was convinced that I'd never be able to play without music.
On the other hand, I took about eight piano lessons - never tried to memorize anything, and I still know the first two-hand-independent exercises I played, and can play them (still) decades later. I'll never understand why piano was almost automatic where clarinet was so difficult.
At any rate, in recent years I've tried to take my concept of "knowing" a song back to the classical side of things, and it does work to some degree...but I doubt it would work at a high level. I simply don't have the technical abilities required.
Come to think of it - I'm not sure how much of memorization has to do with actual memorization vs knowing your way around the instrument. (i.e. knowing how to jump to the interval you hear in your head from the note you're currently on). Perhaps it is as much aural familiarity/sense as it is memory - or some combination of the two, instead of strict memorization?
Fuzzy
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-08 12:46
I would just like to point out that probably more than 95 per cent of the world's music is improvised or played by heart. This even applies to Western Classical music, as a lot of members of amateur and church choirs don't know how to read music and learn their parts by rote.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2020-05-08 16:53
ruben wrote:
> I would just like to point out that probably more than 95 per
> cent of the world's music is improvised or played by heart.
> This even applies to Western Classical music, as a lot of
> members of amateur and church choirs don't know how to read
> music and learn their parts by rote.
>
Our first daughter began to take Suzuki violin lessons at 4 years old. In the Suzuki approach the students learn by rote from recordings (at the time, tape cassettes) for a long while before music notation is introduced to them. The pieces, even in the first book of his curriculum, are a page long and in some ways fairly challenging technically. The teacher models the music (and preliminary exercises to build muscle memory for specific techniques and motives) during both the group lessons and the individual ones. Whole groups of children play these pieces in performances without a shred of printed music in front of any of them.
The point is that the human memory is capable of a great deal, especially at a very young age and that musical performance is an aural, not a visual, art. The kids in our daughter's group didn't know how to read music or even realize they could learn. Indeed, some, like our daughter, resist learning to read music later because the music they have to start with is far beneath their technical ability. Learning to read Mary Had a Little Lamb is a little insulting at 6 or 7 when you can play Vivaldi and Gossec.
It may be that we who rely on written music so much were cursed at a young age by the way we were taught. We'll never know - there aren't any do-overs.
Karl
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-08 18:46
Why has the Suzuki method never been used with wind players-as far as I know?
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Author: brycon
Date: 2020-05-08 18:48
Quote:
I would just like to point out that probably more than 95 per cent of the world's music is improvised or played by heart. This even applies to Western Classical music, as a lot of members of amateur and church choirs don't know how to read music and learn their parts by rote.
A friend of mine, who's a very fine pianist, wrote her dissertation on the history of performing piano music from memory. Interestingly, what she found was that the practice of memorization coincided with the rise of specialized concert pianists (that is, not composer-performers) and also with the fall of improvisation in performance. I'm sure there's something to do with changing attitudes toward the score/text and the composer/author in there as well.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2020-05-08 21:41
ruben wrote:
> Why has the Suzuki method never been used with wind players-as
> far as I know?
>
I think for a couple of reasons.
(1) Suzuki developed the curriculum around the violin using his own experiences and music he was familiar with. You'd probably, to be effective, need a largely different set of pieces to develop each wind instrument idiomatically. Even the cello Suzuki books include different music from the original violin series. Someone would have to compile curricula for each instrument.
(2) But, probably more to the point, woodwind and brass players rarely start at the young age Suzuki's approach is meant for. Suzuki's pre-literate basis probably works much better with kids who in their language skills are pre-literate or who still read at a fairly low level and don't depend on it as an information source. And Suzuki instruction assumes a partnering between child and parent (they are supposed to learn the music together), which becomes more difficult as kids approach pre-teen years. Brass and woodwind players more often start at age 8-10 (or later) and, at least in the U.S., more often than not are motivated by the availability of a school band program. They already read (English). To play in a band or orchestra, reading music notation is realistically a requirement pretty much from the beginning. So, I suspect, there wouldn't be enough of a demand for Suzuki-style materials or for teachers who would organize their instruction around Suzuki's principles.
None of that is to say that there are no teachers of non-string instruments who teach younger students with a Suzuki approach, but not enough for the publishing world to make an investment in a whole program. Nor is it to say that those beginners whose instruction includes music reading don't fall back on memorization as they rehearse and hear their music repeatedly. But that's much more haphazard than true Suzuki teaching would be.
Karl
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Author: Tom H
Date: 2020-05-08 22:11
When I was teaching beginner band once in a while a student would kind of slip through the cracks. Really not reading the music, but figuring out the melodies and playing by memory. I tried to identify any who were doing this and stress the importance of reading-- ie. "learning this new language". Some responded well, some wound up quitting when the music became too hard to do that.
Perhaps these students would have excelled starting with Suzuki at like age 5? But they probably would never play in a group where you had to read.
The Most Advanced Clarinet Book--
tomheimer.ampbk.com/ Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001315, Musicnotes product no. MB0000649.
Boreal Ballad for unaccompanied clarinet-Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001314.
Musicnotes product no. MNO287475
Post Edited (2020-05-08 22:12)
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Author: ruben
Date: 2020-05-10 18:36
As a challenge, I suggest memorizing pieces for solo clarinet: studies, pieces for clarinet alone, the Bach cello and violin pieces, Teleman Fantasies? These works are self-contained and you are not interacting with another or other musicians. It's funny what playing by heart does to your sense of time going by: it warps it. Time seems to go by faster. When we play with the score, we are aware of something spatial: the number of pages, bars, etc.
rubengreenbergparisfrance@gmail.com
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-05-11 01:00
Hi Karl,
I find your comments on the Suzuki playing very interesting. I learned to play the violin and piano mostly by ear, self-taught, as a teenager because I never could get anywhere with music lessons. I only realised at age 28 that the problem was that my eyes had not developed properly. They could not focus back and forward from fingers to music fast enough to read and play at the same time.
My eyes were fixed with exercises, and I'm now starting my music learning again from scratch on the clarinet. I'm learning with a proper teacher, and following the ABRSM curriculum, playing from sheet music. So in a sense I am starting over, and finding it very interesting indeed to experience the difference.
My teacher has a lot of laughs watching me learn because he has a PhD in the psychology of music and so I'm kind of a curiosity to him I think. I sight-read timing poorly and so he has to coax me though the difficult timings as if he was an air traffic controller helping to land a plane.
I would very much like to learn to play my pieces from memory, because I think I would sound more relaxed if I was playing for my neighbours, off the cuff like that. Sometimes I can do it, but I think the pieces tend to come out as a sort of good-enough paraphrase of the tune but perhaps not quite in the right order. Maybe at a street party that is good enough?
I would love to know some tips on how to analyse the structure of a piece in order to memorise it properly. I like Ken's idea of starting with the end part first.
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Author: Jarmo Hyvakko
Date: 2020-05-15 02:44
I played the Debussy' s Rhapsody as soloist in our orchestra some decades ago. In those days, when i practised that piece i hadn't used the paper for years, i always practised it by heart. The only thing i remember from that concert are my thoughts during playing: "what comes next, what comes next, what comes...".
One rock musician said once: "the classical musicians can't even go to toilet without paper"
Jarmo Hyvakko, Principal Clarinet, Tampere Philharmonic, Finland
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Author: Tom H
Date: 2020-05-15 04:49
I THINK I may have done the DeBussy by memory at age 17....LONG time ago. But yeah, you have to be sure what "similar" section comes next.
The Most Advanced Clarinet Book--
tomheimer.ampbk.com/ Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001315, Musicnotes product no. MB0000649.
Boreal Ballad for unaccompanied clarinet-Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001314.
Musicnotes product no. MNO287475
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-05-15 16:36
That's the thing that really confuses me when I try to play from memory. I can get the music to sound sort of right just by playing right-sounding-ish bits in the right-sounding-ish order, but getting it exactly right is a whole other problem.
I think that for my street party audience it may not matter though. I think it may be a nicer effect to pay relaxing music more-or-less right from memory, than to do an exact performance from music, especially as the music does tend to blow away. :-)
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Author: Tom H
Date: 2020-05-15 21:47
When I played the Weber form memory those times I don't recall doing a lot of thinking or worrying about starting to play the wrong section in the right place. During the ochestra interludes (band, piano in these cases) I didn't even think of what part of the solo came up next. When it was over I thought "wow, how did I remember all that"? In fact when I did it with the band 2 years ago one player asked how I could memorize it all. I said that pianists and vocalists do that all the time.
But, this was the first piece I ever performed (in H.S.) so I REALLY knew it in & out. I realized later there is no point in memorizing all that other than to show off.
In college there was a competition. I actually played the Nielsen with piano acc. from memory. I didn't win -- not because of getting lost, but because I made a few technical mistakes. 15 years later I performed it again-- with the music.
The Most Advanced Clarinet Book--
tomheimer.ampbk.com/ Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001315, Musicnotes product no. MB0000649.
Boreal Ballad for unaccompanied clarinet-Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001314.
Musicnotes product no. MNO287475
Post Edited (2020-05-15 21:50)
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Author: ned
Date: 2020-05-20 07:29
Tony F made couple of pertinent points, from my perspective, at least.
''...This skill has carried over into my musical adventures and I find I can read through a part a couple of times and it's in my head forever. I just visualize the page...''
and...
''...Muscle memory plays an important part in the process of memorizing a piece...'''
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As I am a non-reader who plays jazz regularly (once a week plus odd jobs) I have to be able to come up with the goods all the time.
I would agree that muscle memory has quite a deal to do with my being able to remember parts and head arrangements to all of our repertoire.
As for ''visualisation of the page'', that is not a skill I possess, principally because I don't read dots. The closest I would come to that would be to use a lead sheet as reference, and even then, it's not the dots I use, but rather the chord sequences.
Over this period of pandemic I find that I am putting in much more practice together with the help of Band-In-A-Box. I type in the chords and set the key and tempo and my pre-set trio of guitar, bass and drums accompanies me endlessly.
Prior to this though, I will have memorised the melody line from a recording in my collection or YouTube. BIAB is helping me to memorise chord changes, but it's quite a task for me, in addition to melody memorisation.
It seems to be working for me though.
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Author: Tom H
Date: 2020-05-20 07:39
ned, I hear what you're saying, as I have dabbled in jazz over the years, can do certain things with a melody (and more if I know the tune well), and am half decent improvising on a blues scale or dixieland.
But it's different when playing a classical concerto. Apples to oranges. The notes are exact and can't be replaced or improved upon (well, once in a while I do this, being a bit of a maverick...). That's where the possibility of "getting lost" while memorizing comes into play.
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Post Edited (2020-05-20 07:42)
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Author: ned
Date: 2020-05-20 08:43
Yes Tom, I understand what you are saying too. Classical is way out of my league because I don't read.
Which makes me ponder...what do classical players do when the score indicates ''improvisation''?
Is this common? Do you get shot at playing your own stuff?
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Author: Late_returner
Date: 2020-05-20 12:42
A related topic may be what is meant by " reading music", where i think we do not often put much emphasis on the word read.
I can do the simple stuff of playing from a treble score, looking ahead for fingering, etc. Is that all that is meant ? Or would this more correctly be called "playing a score"? Only in a few cases can i "read" the score to hear the music in my head before I play it.
Is it similar to " can you read Einstein " where my eyes pass over the words and equations without too much enlightenment. But my PhD physicist son can read and understand the texts and can consider the value of the proofs offered. He is "reading", I am surely not.
I wonder if the ability read and hear the score in ones head is part of the same process that facilitates memorisation ?
Apologies for drifting, but wer'e in lockdown anyway.
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The Clarinet Pages
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