What's the Point of Reading Music

Musicman20

DLM said:

Musicman20 said:

I've never once been in a band situation where I have needed it.

With the greatest of respect, I'm afraid that is almost an impossibility, seeing as you are clearly literate.

As soon as you name a note A-G, that's theory.

Ha! Yes, that is true.

Phil_aka_Pip

harmonics, pinch harmonics, whammy bar techniques etc all have notation symbols, maybe not as standardised as ordinary classical notation (which themselves have only become standardised over time) - some publishers will differ, but Rockschool has a pretty comprehensive list.

Teetonetal

impmann said:

I've not found any communication issues with not learning to read manuscript. Then again, I've not wanted a job on a cruise ship or in an orchestra pit - so its probably not relevant to my musical journey.

I guess I'm lucky that I can pick stuff up really quickly and somehow remember how to play songs for years without playing them in between.

I'm not 'proud' of not reading music and being self taught in all this - but equally I don't find it a hinderance for what I do. I've played with a lot of guys who really know their theory etc and aside from a few ego-merchants who like to look down upon "lesser" players, I've not really had a problem.

I guess the argument is, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Absolutely.
notations biggest plus is that you can print scores in the same format for a range of musicians - it's great for anyone working with an orchestra or a pro band. 

But I wonder how many of the session pros out there now, or artists can read more than a few notes. Lots of great music created using nothing but the ear and a creative mind.

Danny1969

I would love to learn to read music, I can read the notes but not the timing information, it's something I keep going back to but have never got far with it. I play in a house band at a jam session twice a month with a very gifted keyboard player and there's times when we need to back someone and we have never heard the piece so all our jamming skills are useless. In this situation he will generally find the score with his iPad and play it ..... that's a wonderful thing to be able to do 

I would say for most guitarist in my experience it's not that important. In 5 years of working in a professional studio I never saw any guitarist reading music notation .... Horn players used it and keyboard players used it . Certainly I saw guitarist using the Nashville Number system and that's what I always use myself as it's key independent and you can see the numbers on a typical stage floor ...... you wouldn't have a hope in hell of reading traditional notation on a typical rock \ pop stage with twenty odd DMX moving head lights all doing their crazy thing and smoke machines bellowing out smoke for the lasers to cut through ...... just seeing the set list is a job sometimes 
A guitar playing friend of mine has just done a load of theatre work for a Disney production and the All Shook Up production. Although reading music was spec'ed in the job he blagged it and as all the pit performers were given the score and a CD of the songs he just worked out the songs from the CD like you normally would

DLM

Surely part of the answer to this thread is that @JohnGregson is part of this community, but doesn't post much because he's too busy working...

If you read well, you're basically a purple squirrel.

http://careertipster.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/purplesquirrel2.jpg

tampaxboo

i can appreciate it has its uses but i've never had a use for it. it hasn't slowed me down doing what i've wanted to do. i think i've managed to get away without it so far because i have always had a good natural ear (or musicality, whatever you want to call it). lucky.

i was able from earliest days to instinctively 'just know' the intervals and how they related to a guitar fingerboard. on imagining or hearing note x and note z my brain would instuitively think 'four spaces' and my hand would translate that, after doing that for a while i could do it with chords too.
so i could imagine or hear a song and be able to pretty much bash it out in my own fashion as good as instantaneously.

memory may be involved too. when your brain gets used to what an Em or Am sounds like (i learned 'the generic minor sound' as Em or Am open chords) and then you hear the same sound but 'a few spaces' up, you just know what shape yo uneed to make and where, and your hands find it insitnctively. well mine do.

i'm autistic and i think that may have helped a bit. seeing patterns and systemising, like the bit in beautful mind where he looks at the stars and they instantly join together. my brain works like that.
i'm (probably hehe) not a genius, i am probably mad, but that may be something too.

whether you need reading or not depends entirely on what you intend to do with your music. but you can live without it.

bloodandtears

surely these guys have something to contribute??

https://www.reading.ac.uk/internal/music/

EricTheWeary

Danny1969 said:

I would love to learn to read music, I can read the notes but not the timing information, it's something I keep going back to but have never got far with it. I play in a house band at a jam session twice a month with a very gifted keyboard player and there's times when we need to back someone and we have never heard the piece so all our jamming skills are useless. In this situation he will generally find the score with his iPad and play it ..... that's a wonderful thing to be able to do 

I would say for most guitarist in my experience it's not that important. In 5 years of working in a professional studio I never saw any guitarist reading music notation .... Horn players used it and keyboard players used it . Certainly I saw guitarist using the Nashville Number system and that's what I always use myself as it's key independent and you can see the numbers on a typical stage floor ...... you wouldn't have a hope in hell of reading traditional notation on a typical rock \ pop stage with twenty odd DMX moving head lights all doing their crazy thing and smoke machines bellowing out smoke for the lasers to cut through ...... just seeing the set list is a job sometimes 
A guitar playing friend of mine has just done a load of theatre work for a Disney production and the All Shook Up production. Although reading music was spec'ed in the job he blagged it and as all the pit performers were given the score and a CD of the songs he just worked out the songs from the CD like you normally would

Years ago I used to know Robert Robertson ( younger brother of B.A.) a bit and he was a theatre bassist. His practice regime was sight reading scores from West End musicals. Just a crazy level of skill really. 

I think there's an argument to say if/ when you are playing someone else's music and you want to play it accurately ( or just do a meaningful reinterpretation) then you should be going back to the source. The source for Cats is in the sheet music, the source for Muddy Waters or Oasis is the recorded version - even if you can find sheet music then that's someone else's interpretation. Equally Tab or a YouTube lesson is also someone else's interpretation.

The keyboardist in my band is ,well, hardly stretched by what we do but she's played in a lot of bands ( does deps) and is a classically trained pianist. For the ska, reggae, soul, pop, rock stuff she doesn't ever look at standard notation as she can learn it quicker without and feels that a lot of it is simply incorrect anyway. 

So, is there a point in reading music? Depends on what you want to do. 
Would I tell my younger self to learn to do so knowing what I know now? No, I'd say work a lot harder at developing your ear/ transcribing from recorded sources because that's what could unlock the whole back catalogue of modern popular music to you. 

robinbowes

I've found knowing theory helps me immensely, and reading music sort of goes with theory. When we're working on songs, being able to talk about chord I, V, VI minor, etc., discussing harmonies "you sing the 5th, I'll do the 3rd". All good stuff.

R.

Danny1969

robinbowes said:

I've found knowing theory helps me immensely, and reading music sort of goes with theory. When we're working on songs, being able to talk about chord I, V, VI minor, etc., discussing harmonies "you sing the 5th, I'll do the 3rd". All good stuff.

R.

Yes I would agree a good grasp of theory is essential when working with others .... to the point I'm kinda leaning towards see'ing not knowing any theory as kind of rude almost ...... like not bothering to learn the language when you move abroad.

I get the fact that playing original music with your mates doesn't require any theory and in that situation it's certainly not rude or expected ...... but when i work with a dep player who can't instantly transpose a piece or follow me in thirds ` fifths etc it's a bit irritating because if your gonna put yourself forward as someone who can step in then you should be able  to speak the language

I haven't always thought like this ... I used to think everyone can get by on ear alone but I've changed my mind after working with people who are more theory trained 

siraxeman

Yeah but what I want to know is there's 2 guitarists right, one can read really well and the other can't....who's the best?

thegummy

I'm going to read through all the replies more thoroughly when I have time off.

Would say though that theory is immensely useful and isn't even up for debate. Purely talking about reading sheet music which is separate.

Impression I get is that it's useful if you're working in a role where someone pays you to play from their written sheet music.

Will need to read all the opinions to see how useful it is outside that environment.

Erskine

thegummy said:

Incidentally, does anyone know a good resource for guitar sheet music? Or rock music in general?

I've never been able to use tabs properly, I was searching for bass tabs the other day but couldn't tell which notes were in which bars.

I'd probably say midi files were the better alternative, though not so easily available.

Not sure if you mean a software resource? If you do, you could try GuitarPro. The cost has crept up on this since its early days, but it may still suit you. There was also a free application called TuxGuitar. There may be more for phones or tablets, but I dont use those.

There are also some online sites that provide TABS to download - for GP or text format. Not sure if you are allowed to post links to other sites on here, though.

Sporky

If you ever want any orchestral accompaniment then you'll need to write it in score notation or pay someone else to.

It's also very good for giving parts to others - much quicker than trying to demonstrate it out do the "nah, play an A, then a B quickly, then..."

It's not even hard to learn.

Neill

EricTheWeary said:

Danny1969 said:

I would love to learn to read music, I can read the notes but not the timing information, it's something I keep going back to but have never got far with it. I play in a house band at a jam session twice a month with a very gifted keyboard player and there's times when we need to back someone and we have never heard the piece so all our jamming skills are useless. In this situation he will generally find the score with his iPad and play it ..... that's a wonderful thing to be able to do 

I would say for most guitarist in my experience it's not that important. In 5 years of working in a professional studio I never saw any guitarist reading music notation .... Horn players used it and keyboard players used it . Certainly I saw guitarist using the Nashville Number system and that's what I always use myself as it's key independent and you can see the numbers on a typical stage floor ...... you wouldn't have a hope in hell of reading traditional notation on a typical rock \ pop stage with twenty odd DMX moving head lights all doing their crazy thing and smoke machines bellowing out smoke for the lasers to cut through ...... just seeing the set list is a job sometimes 
A guitar playing friend of mine has just done a load of theatre work for a Disney production and the All Shook Up production. Although reading music was spec'ed in the job he blagged it and as all the pit performers were given the score and a CD of the songs he just worked out the songs from the CD like you normally would

Years ago I used to know Robert Robertson ( younger brother of B.A.) a bit and he was a theatre bassist. His practice regime was sight reading scores from West End musicals. Just a crazy level of skill really. 

I think there's an argument to say if/ when you are playing someone else's music and you want to play it accurately ( or just do a meaningful reinterpretation) then you should be going back to the source. The source for Cats is in the sheet music, the source for Muddy Waters or Oasis is the recorded version - even if you can find sheet music then that's someone else's interpretation. Equally Tab or a YouTube lesson is also someone else's interpretation.

The keyboardist in my band is ,well, hardly stretched by what we do but she's played in a lot of bands ( does deps) and is a classically trained pianist. For the ska, reggae, soul, pop, rock stuff she doesn't ever look at standard notation as she can learn it quicker without and feels that a lot of it is simply incorrect anyway. 

So, is there a point in reading music? Depends on what you want to do. 
Would I tell my younger self to learn to do so knowing what I know now? No, I'd say work a lot harder at developing your ear/ transcribing from recorded sources because that's what could unlock the whole back catalogue of modern popular music to you. 

I think that's an excellent point.  

I remember some years ago we tried out a guy who was a classical guitarist - he had reached the stage where he really wanted to be in a band. He was fine with chords but when I asked him to learn the famous solo in "Don't Speak" of course he asked me for the music.  I explained to him that even if the notation existed, it wouldn't help him, he had to listen to the recording and learn it from that.  He simply couldn't do it, in fact he couldn't even get close.  I found this quite shocking especially as it's not a particularly complicated piece. 

Ideally it would be nice to have both abilities and I keep see-sawing on the sight reading issue, but unless you are determined to make playing the guitar your career it's difficult for most of us to make the time to develop the skill.      

VimFuego

I know plenty of people who can read notation and learn tunes by ear. Contrary to popular myth the two are not mutually exclusive. 

Sporky

Neill said:

I remember some years ago we tried out a guy who was a classical guitarist - he had reached the stage where he really wanted to be in a band. He was fine with chords but when I asked him to learn the famous solo in "Don't Speak" of course he asked me for the music.  I explained to him that even if the notation existed, it wouldn't help him, he had to listen to the recording and learn it from that.      

If the notation was correct he'd be able to play it from that.

And I'd bet he could play a metric shitload of stuff that most rock guitarists couldn't even read.

All this belittling of people who just have different skills seems a bit contrived and defensive to me.

robinbowes

The point here is that playing by ear and reading music are different skills and are not mutually exclusive. Neither is inherently better or worse than the other, but either may be more relevant depending on context. 

Teetonetal

siraxeman said:

Yeah but what I want to know is there's 2 guitarists right, one can read really well and the other can't....who's the best?

That's easy. The one who gets paid to be heard.

aord43

Neill said:

I think that's an excellent point.  

I remember some years ago we tried out a guy who was a classical guitarist - he had reached the stage where he really wanted to be in a band. He was fine with chords but when I asked him to learn the famous solo in "Don't Speak" of course he asked me for the music.  I explained to him that even if the notation existed, it wouldn't help him, he had to listen to the recording and learn it from that.  He simply couldn't do it, in fact he couldn't even get close.  I found this quite shocking especially as it's not a particularly complicated piece. 

Ideally it would be nice to have both abilities and I keep see-sawing on the sight reading issue, but unless you are determined to make playing the guitar your career it's difficult for most of us to make the time to develop the skill.      

Why on earth we would the notation not help him? Confession 1: I have no idea why the solo you mention is "famous" and I shall have to go and look it up now. Confession 2: I also find it very difficult to figure something out by listening. Don't judge everyone by your own standards.