Dissertation Help

Jason Gale · #1 05-23-2008, 06:49 PM

Hey guys,

I'm sure none of you know me here, haven't posted for ages anyway. But I'm posting in the hope of getting ideas and opinions off any of you willing.

Basically I'm starting my dissertation for bass degree now and I'm going to be producing (for the physical project) an instructial book for helping with creativity on the fretboard. i.e. expanding the thought process of an individual bassist when writing/composing a bassline for music.

I'm aware there are some other books already available in this vein but I believe that I have a slightly different approach to it. I'm going to be coming up with another form, other than tab and transcriptions, to show the ideas to the reader. Which I'm hoping will get the brain and fingers thinking differently over the fretboard.

Anyway i just wanted to put this in discussion and get any ideas and questions hit at me. It would be much appreciated!

Also could you please fill out this survey for me!

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?s...AV80Htqw_3d_3d

Cheers guys,
Jase

the_fonz · #2 05-23-2008, 08:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jason Gale

I'm aware there are some other books already available in this vein but I believe that I have a slightly different approach to it. I'm going to be coming up with another form, other than tab and transcriptions, to show the ideas to the reader. Which I'm hoping will get the brain and fingers thinking differently over the fretboard.

you mean like graphic notation?
i love that crap
sounds like a great idea

Jason Gale · #3 05-23-2008, 08:31 PM

Yeah i was thinking of having a grid like a fretboard with lines which show the patterns with arrows pointing the direction and stating which finger to use on each note. But using different colours on each line for the different ideas you could use based around your first idea etc. Its very much an idea in my head at the moment that i cant really explain, but im getting there haha.

Cheers!

Jim Carr · #4 05-23-2008, 08:52 PM

OK, here is the dissident dissonance.

Sound and images, please! Reinventing TAB/notation with another graphical system is wasteful, unimaginative, historically unfathomably redundant, and especially useless to bassists, IMHO.

There have been zillions of these "aids" for various instruments in the last century alone, not to mention back to 1500. Do some actual research, please! These alternative notation systems/tabs, etc. mostly all died and went to a library shelf.

Actual articulation of musical ideas is the root of expression, IMHO. I say this having been totally on the "other side."

Go get the Jazz Icon DVD of the 60's Charles Mingus concerts in Europe and watch 5 minutes of it, then report back. BTW, I have used/taught tab, notation, theory, bass, music history, composition, ear training, orchestration, arranging, etc. for (way) too long, but DO STILL believe that new approaches are possible and a good thing. I am not just saying "Don't."

But please, just spare the world yet another graphical representation of a musical, physical, and cognitive activity that is not really graphic. Your channel is way too narrow and too shallow. Get youtube-able!
All IMHO.

Jason Gale · #5 05-23-2008, 08:58 PM

I don't appreciate being told to research, which is what i have done and am doing and am actually doing now right?! The idea of the book isn't about the new concept of tab or transcriptions its purely a method that i put into place when writing bass parts for artists or bands that i am going to explain in the book and hopefully put into some format where you can see it.

I appreciate your thoughts and opinions but i really don't care what you have been doing for so long as its irrelevant to me and the target audience of this book.

Thanks anyway.
Jase

MarkTAW · #6 05-23-2008, 09:14 PM

The notational systems I'm aware of are:

Neums, which were sort of like accent marks that just served as reminders to singers as they were reading the words

The staff, which is what we're familiar with, invented by some Italian at the behest of the church (which is why church music is the only music a millennium old that we have documented). He also invented solfege & a "do a deer" type song to help you memorize the notes.

A tab-like system invented in Asia around the same time as the staff.

Back to Jason - your system sounds like you're trying to shove 2 dimensional information onto a 1 dimensional chart. Tab has the benefit of being 2 dimensional and being, in some form, able to show time. Your system sounds like it might be great to show off nuances in playing, but not for transcribing whole songs. But I could be reading you wrong...

Jason Gale · #7 05-23-2008, 09:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MarkTAW

Back to Jason - your system sounds like you're trying to shove 2 dimensional information onto a 1 dimensional chart. Tab has the benefit of being 2 dimensional and being, in some form, able to show time. Your system sounds like it might be great to show off nuances in playing, but not for transcribing whole songs. But I could be reading you wrong...

Yeah you are right mate, in the book there will be transcriptions and tabs of everything anyway, but i also wanted something to try and show the thought process of varying your ideas... if that makes sense? As the whole idea of the book is about creativity i suppose and showing methods of thinking of things differently. The book will be mainly text with the odd tab/transcription/grid-type-thingy now and then.

onlyclave · #8 05-24-2008, 01:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jason Gale

I don't appreciate being told to research, which is what i have done and am doing and am actually doing now right?! The idea of the book isn't about the new concept of tab or transcriptions its purely a method that i put into place when writing bass parts for artists or bands that i am going to explain in the book and hopefully put into some format where you can see it.

I appreciate your thoughts and opinions but i really don't care what you have been doing for so long as its irrelevant to me and the target audience of this book.

Thanks anyway.
Jase

Hey mate, if you check his CV I think you will see that he's written a few more dissertations than you. He's probably offering good advice but at least he's letting know it's his own humble opinion. I think he was trying to do you a favor and keep you from wasting your energies on trying to reinvent the wheel again.

Stumbo · #9 05-24-2008, 01:05 AM

I'm not sure what you're asking.

Since it's your dissertation and you can't really show us what you're up to, just kinda describe it with words, it seems you should just do it and then let the world see it when it's done.

A dissertation is a learning exercise and whether or not a real product comes out of it is secondary. There are many theoretical dissertations written as mental exercises and that's as far as they go. The learning process is the key.

Good luck.

E2daGGurl · #10 05-28-2008, 01:01 PM

Hey, Jason - don't worry, there are always new bass players who want new ways of doing things. I use my own system of notation, and I admit it isn't perfect. I'm just getting to the color issues. Here's what I try to include (some of it is obvious):

Standard musical notation, fretting, finger placement, chord. I use the standard music notational for techniques like bending, etc. I started using color to handle transposing. There are few songs we play in different keys, but of course I'[m not going to redo the standard musical notation just for that, so I add a second color on the tab section, if that makes sense. Meh. Hard to explain.

I agree that we don't any new complete systems (like a whole new way of doing tab) but some way of reminding ourselves which fingers to use would be cool (without adding more numbers, which some people find confusing - when someone else tries to read what I've written down, they get the finger/fret thing mixed up).

Using color for standard variations is something composers and some players would really like.

Don't forget that we live in a digital age, and that while you seem to be writing a paper-based book, even dissertations are getting some help from web-based appendices. In the long run, thinking of having an html-based "book" to go along with your RW book would be a great idea.

mambo4 · #11 05-28-2008, 02:26 PM

I guess I feel that standard musical notation is so universal and ubiquitous in music that any other representation system is crutch that ought to be abandoned as early as possible by students.

However, if you are trying to expand students' thinking about the fingerboard without resorting to notation or tab; I don't see any need beyond the common photo/ diagram of the finger board with dots ala Bass Grimiore or those pocket picture chord books. No translation or explanation needed.