Teacher....

[Xlrar]

I have read in a view forums is real nice if you had a teacher... But in my town i don't have any teacher to helping me! You think that cd's and books like "How to play in 80 days" things like that real help people learn playing bass? If you have any suggestion to help me i will appreciate!

[cowsgomoo]

yes, I think books & cd's can give you a lot of useful information

I'll go against the 'popular wisdom' of Talkbass and say that you can learn a lot without a teacher...

for example, I do NOT see any point in paying your hard earned money to a bass guitar teacher in order to learn fundamental music theory concepts...

bear in mind that good bass teachers are very rare... one thing most won't do is be honest and tell you when your money's being wasted...

primarily your teacher should be used for assessing areas you need to work on, and giving you advice on how best to learn those things... the real progress comes when YOU sit at home in the woodshed and spend the hours working on those things... in order words, the teacher points you in the right direction and then YOU do the driving

at the end of the day, learning involves:

1. having an idea what you want to achieve
2. finding out how to achieve it
3. learning what you need to know
4. putting it into practice...

a teacher can help in stage 2, but the work in 1,3 & 4 is nearly all yours... and people in Talkbass can help a lot in stage 2 if you can't get a teacher... and you don't have to pay for it

'self-taught' doesn't mean 'made it up as I went along with no clue'... it usually means you immersed yourself in books, records and hours of playing

[mutedeity]

I half agree with you there, cows. Frank Zappa was self taught and so was Adrian Belew. On the other hand not everyone has the capability to be autodidactic.

As for seeing no point in paying a bass teacher to teach you fundamental music theory, who should they pay? What are you to teach a student that knows nothing about theory when you are showing them improvisational applications or getting them to practice arpeggios or scales to put a technique in perspective? Should they be sent off to someone else?

In fact the teachers that waste people's money are the ones that don't or can't teach applicable theory and try to get away with showing their students a bunch of licks that have no context while the poor student goes away and wonders why they can't seem to put it into practice.

I do agree that you can learn a lot without a teacher. Usually though a good teacher will be able to make sense of things that aren't immediately obvious, help guide you with good technichal development, help advise and mentor your conceptual development and in general save you a lot of time. As I said in the other thread about teaching, I believe, from experience, that people that don't teach and ground their students in theory and theoretical application are wasting their student's time and money.

[soong]

I think the internet is a FANTASTIC and virtually endless source of intformation for lessons and teaching.
although, having an actual teacher means that you personalise your lessons and move at YOUR own pace, working on YOUR weaknesses as a musician.

In that sense, a teacher is invaluable.

Also, the internet cannot provide you with information only aquired through life experience.

[cowsgomoo]

Originally Posted by mutedeity

I half agree with you there, cows. Frank Zappa was self taught and so was Adrian Belew. On the other hand not everyone has the capability to be autodidactic.

As for seeing no point in paying a bass teacher to teach you fundamental music theory, who should they pay? What are you to teach a student that knows nothing about theory when you are showing them improvisational applications or getting them to practice arpeggios or scales to put a technique in perspective? Should they be sent off to someone else?

In fact the teachers that waste people's money are the ones that don't or can't teach applicable theory and try to get away with showing their students a bunch of licks that have no context while the poor student goes away and wonders why they can't seem to put it into practice.

I do agree that you can learn a lot without a teacher. Usually though a good teacher will be able to make sense of things that aren't immediately obvious, help guide you with good technichal development, help advise and mentor your conceptual development and in general save you a lot of time. As I said in the other thread about teaching, I believe, from experience, that people that don't teach and ground their students in theory and theoretical application are wasting their student's time and money.

I don't disagree with what you say at all, and respect you & your view totally

I suppose, like most of us, i'm guilty of seeing the world through my own eyes & sometimes thinking what's right for me should be right for everyone else... (should have listened to the Diff'rent Strokes theme song).. and my musical heroes tend to be those auto-didact types you mentioned

I personally think the majority of bass players would benefit more from general music lessons than specific 'bass guitar' lessons... a good ear and a broad understanding of music will give you the resources to learn any 'idiomatic bass stylings' you'll ever need... (your 'bunch of licks' paragraph is spot on)

and when I say 'general', I mean really broad... lessons that cover music history and all instruments and eras, in addition to music theory...

our problem as bass players is that we're almost as ghettoised as guitarists... we sometimes seem to see playing the bass as an end in itself, rather than seeing how it fits into the bigger picture of music, art and creativity...

maybe when I said you shouldnt go to bass teachers to learn music theory, I should have said you shouldnt go to bass teachers to learn anything at all except technique

i'm digging a real hole here

[mutedeity]

I kind of see where you are comming from. I would have to say though that bass is as valid as any instrument to use as a means of teaching theory. If anything it is a more universal instrument than piano and guitar for this purpose since bass tends to have a universal gemoetric system in standard tuning which means that you can show the intervalic functions in a standardised way. In more simple terms you aren't confusing the student with different shapes and the geometry of any scale, arpeggio or interval is transposable for all 12 "keys".

As for music history and so on, I think that can be said of any given instrumentalist to be honest. I have taught quite a few students who had passed standarised grading levels in piano or violin up to a fairly high level who didn't have the first idea about how the major scale was relative to the minor scale or how any diatonic theory worked beyond recognising a major triad from a minor triad and how to recognise a keysignature.

As I have been trying to point out, the main thing that a lot of people don't seem to understand is that good technical development and good theoretical development are interdependent. The more you know about theory the more ways you can apply and develop technique and technical applications in a practical sense.

It is really impossible for someone like me to teach technique without teaching theory. Sure if a student were to come to me with the same theoretical knowledge as me but wanted me to show them certain technical approaches, for example, I could accomodate them. I have to say though, I have never come across someone like that yet. Most people that are at that level are able to undertake technical development on their own through etudes and other theory based exercises. On the other hand, I have had quite a few students who were quite advanced technically but felt limited by the fact that they had no idea how to apply what they were doing to the music they were trying to play.

One other thing to keep in mind. There are as many theoretical paradigms as there are ways to play. Even if I was to send a student on for lessons in theory elsewhere I would then have to deal with the fact that the student was being taught one thing when I am trying to get them to incorporate a technique that contradicts that paradigm.

So back to the problem; How would I teach technique to someone that doesn't understand theory and why would I send them on to lessons elsewhere when I am able to teach them myself?

[FuturePrimitive]

Originally Posted by mutedeity

In fact the teachers that waste people's money are the ones that don't or can't teach applicable theory and try to get away with showing their students a bunch of licks that have no context while the poor student goes away and wonders why they can't seem to put it into practice.

That describes every "teacher" I've had on bass. And guitar for that matter. Can't seem to find a decent one. Admittedly I probably haven't looked hard enough, the Eastman School of Music (Ron Carter's alma mater) is right here.

[mutedeity]

Originally Posted by Daveg27

That describes every "teacher" I've had on bass. And guitar for that matter. Can't seem to find a decent one. Admittedly I probably haven't looked hard enough, the Eastman School of Music (Ron Carter's alma mater) is right here.

I am supprised to see that being in New York. I hope you find someone. If you want to fly out anytime I'll see if I can help...