"Other" Lessons

[TroyK]

I've heard before that it's good at some point to study with someone who doesn't play your instrument, but aside from a combo workshops and things I had never done it, until yesterday.

A pianist I play with asked me (with his teacher's permission) to come to his lesson with him. His teacher is a local notable and I was certainly up for it. I approached it from the standpoint that it wasn't my lesson and I didn't have an agenda going in except to do what I was told and be supportive.

It was really enlightening. She had us playing altered changes for a while, which wasn't particularly difficult, then we we played with contrasting harmonizations and then pretty soon, it became a workshop in sub-division and leaving space. For example, playing only on the & of 3. Then the & of 4 and 2 and so on until we had pretty much broken 4 beats up into as many little pieces as we could and practiced serious disipline to not go and fill that space and to keep time without acknowledging the 1.

It was really enlightening and we definitely help the two of us from a standpoint of playing together. Something about it not being my lesson and her not being a bassist, made me much more relaxed and not in my own head as I tend to be in my own lessons with bassist who I really respect. Made me wonder if I should study with her or a smattering of people who don't do what I do.

And I've also been meaning to take some bass lessons from a classical teacher.

Anyone else ventured off the path when it comes to taking lessons from someone other than a jazz bassist?

[Sam Sherry]

Where I started out at college there was one jazz bass professor, a true one-name bass star. I was a teenage shuthead and only spent one semester with him.

Instead I spent a year studying with pianist and musical force-of-nature Jaki Byard and then a semester with pianist and composer Tom McKinley. The basic lesson from Jaki was, "If you're not listening RIGHT NOW, you're going miss a lot AND I'm going to just keep going." Mr. McKinley was particularly helpful because at that time he was the only person at the school who would say, "Boway, you really have to work on playing time 'cause you're not playing much time now."

I also took a lesson with my childhood hero John Abercrombie one time in the early 80s. It was great, man. He was kinda bummin' that he couldn't pass out the guitar-oriented stuff that he usually gave his guitar students. I was just totally gassing that for pretty short money I got to play for a couple of hours with John ***ing Abercrombie! I picked up some cool thoughts but none more valuable than the idea that the telephone really works. The people you really want to connect with are within reach. They're pretty nice too.

[Eric Hochberg]

Originally Posted by Sam Sherry

Instead I spent a year studying with pianist and musical force-of-nature Jaki Byard

That would have to be the about best jazz education one could ask for, no matter what instrument you play. To hang and play regularly with JB or a musician of his caliber is the way to learn, master to student. And to play duo with him, must have been thrilling for a young guy! I met him once in his studio at NEC (my buddy was studying with him and wanted me to meet him) and I still picture his smiling face and great vibe.

[hdiddy]

Not from other teachers, but I've taken lessons for other instruments from my bass teacher. We've covered some basic piano comping and drumming. The guy is pretty brilliant with his teaching abilities. I'll probably pursue more piano from someone else later on too.

[wineaux]

I haven't done other instruments but I have studied outside my area/comfort level with my instructor. I wanted to play bluegrass, but in my first lesson I had a bow in my hand and was struggling to read. A few months later, I was working on jazz theory and starting/struggling to walk. After about six months, we played some bluegrass!

Now I can read, walk a little, don't scare the cats when I reach for the bow and have started to develop my ear. That cat knew what he was doing. I'm glad I listened!

[Treyzer]

Although I've had some great bass teachers, some of the most valuable lessons I've been fortunate enough to grasp have come from musicians who were not bassists.

In retrospect, I learned so much from some of the guys who hired me throughout my career. Although what we learn in lessons and college are very important, those lessons are nothing like OJT (if you're working with great people). I have also taken lessons from composers and arrangers. These lessons have been incredibly helpful to see past the bass and conceptualize music in a much braoder, big picture sort of way.

[Dave Speranza]

The two teachers I've had who have taught me the most about music are Barbara Conable (Alexander Technique & Bodymapping teacher, *not* a musician), and the great drummer Alan Jones.

I should add that they not only taught me conceptional stuff about music, but actual, real-life, nitty-gritty BASS **** that I have never gotten from other teachers.

[TroyK]

Yeah, Alan is great drummer.

i liked Alexander Technique too and I think it was good for me, but it's tough to say how it directly impacted my playing. It certainly didn't hurt.

As for lessons vs OJT, they are different things. I do believe that you can leap forward by years with a couple of months of heavy gigging with the right cats, but on a gig a lot of stuff happens and I usually end up doing what I do well or dealing. In a GOOD lesson, the teacher strips something that I don't get or is hard for me down to it's smallest denominator and leads me through overcoming it. That never happens on a gig.

They are both critical, no doubt.

[damonsmith]

I had kind of an apprenticeship with the alto player Marco Eneidi. He was the only student of Jimmy Lyons, and played a lot with Bill Dixon, Don Cherry, William Parker and Cecil Taylor.
I helped him organize his large group and other concerts and he taught me about music. We did tons of rehearsals and concerts and I learned so much from it.
Lessons from bassists were nearly all technique, whether they were coming from jazz, classical, new music or improvised music.

[Uncletoad]

Originally Posted by Dave Speranza

TBarbara Conable (Alexander Technique & Bodymapping teacher, *not* a musician),

I adore Barbara. I was privileged to study with her for most of a decade before she left Columbus for Portland. The impact she had on my movement, life and playing is without peer.

I miss her terribly.

[frichter]

My undergrad didn't have any bass teachers and I took four years of lessons with a tenor player. And now that I am at a school with bass teachers, I still use credits to study with different instrument instructors.

I can actually count on two hands the actual number of "bass lessons" I've had since I started playing the instrument 10 years ago (my current teacher and I do not play the bass . . . its more philosophical and discussion based).

Don't know if I would recommend my path, but I completely understand the validity and importance of studying with people outside of our wonderful instrument.

[ZonGuy]

I had several productive private lessons with jazz pianist Joe LoCascio about what makes the bass work in a jazz setting. Not chops, theories or licks, but concepts:

What is the role of the bass in the muisc?
What makes a functional bass part for a particular piece of music.

Very deep questions.

At one point, I also asked a noted drummer for a lesson not on drums but on working with the bass, but he freaked out. Shame.

[jgbass]

I just finished up two semesters of jazz piano. I learned the basic comping and had the opportunity to get back some of the piano chops I used to have. Very valuable. I hope to study some more piano, but, for now, I am going to use my new skills to help me work out new tunes. There's something about seeing and heaing the whole chord at once and how the changes work.

My teacher told me how one of his students used to study with a jazz pianist. This was not to learn piano comping, etc., but more to learn what pianists want from a bassist.