A Review Of The Players School of Music, Part 2 (Jeff Berlin's School)

I originally attended the school back in October 2007 for 1 month, and posted a review on a separate thread - http://www.talkbass.com/forum/showthread.php?t=374716. I would suggest reading that post as a preamble to this one. This post has still turned out longer than intended, but such is life.

I returned for a 3-month stint from January - March 2009.

Many will recall my original review as positive. In retrospect, I can honestly say that my true musical life really started when I attended the school for the first time.

In the year and a bit since attending school for the first time, I covered several areas, based on the school's teachings:

Harmony: I used the harmony book they provided to teach myself about common chord progressions, voice leading, primary subordinate substitutes, secondary dominants, tritone substitutions, and harmonic analysis. Quite simply, if it was in the book I sat down and wrote it out in treble and/or bass clef and made sure that I played with it and understood it. When I was unable to physically practice my instrument, I also harmonically analysed something in the region of 200 real book songs, in the manner much as someone might do crosswords or sudoku.

Ear Training: I continued the Ear Training 1 book developed by the school, and obtained the follow-on Ear Training 2 and 3 books from sympathetic ex-students, continuing to use them as I had been taught at the school. I was also not infrequently transcribing some things for a band I was in.

Practicing:

• Chord tones of any jazz tune I was playing, in all inversions, up and down the neck.
  
• Sight reading - some Bach Cello etudes, Carol Kaye lines, many charts for the band I was in
  
• Common chord progressions in all 12 keys (after writing them out in all 12 keys)

In terms of how often I practiced over the last year, suffice it to say I have a fairly demanding day job and I consider myself lucky to get an hour a day in. At weekends I would have 2 hours on one of those days, if I was lucky. However I was rehearsing with and gigging with an amateur jazz band weekly as well over this time, so that helped. If I was unable to make time to practice, I nearly always did ear training.

My aim in returning was to see whether continuing the work I had done since attending the school had been beneficial, to improve my musical understanding further, and see if what I had worked on developing in the meantime was 'correct', and to fill any gaps that were apparent.

So, that is a reasonable summary of my background up to the point where I returned to the school in January.

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So - where did that put me on my return to the school?

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On the first day, I took the same harmony exam that I had done when I first attended the school. This time, however, I did very well; we found a large gap in my understanding of chord tensions, but my grip on inversions, voice leading, harmonic analysis, and so on was sound enough for me to be placed in Harmony 5 and 6 simultaneously. (There are 4 semesters in each year of the full 2 year course, so essentially I kicked myself along into the second year of the Harmony course).

In terms of Ear Training, it turned out I had done enough to get myself into Ear Training 5 (skipping the 4th semester). This semester moved into sight singing Jazz and Harmonic Minor, as well as transcribing melodies and rhythms by ear (without an instrument).

In terms of my playing and improvisational abilities, I ended up in the 'advanced' Ensemble, although given that attendance was lower this semester, the number of ensembles was less also.

I also ended up in two Chart Reading classes simultaneously - one equivalent to being in the second semester at the school, and another more advanced one, with trickier charts and 16th note rhythms to read.

I also decided to take private vocal lessons with a vocal teacher, Chip Marshall, at the school. It's a good instrument to have going for you, and I had no preconceptions about how to learn singing, especially as I have no formal singing experience.

In essence: with a year of hard work along my fairly demanding day job, I managed to get myself along into the second year of the program. Seems a reasonable result for the effort expended!

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How did the semester progress, and what was the outcome?

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My week took the following shape:

Ear Training 5 - 1 hour x 2/week
Voice Lesson with Chip Marshall - 30 min x 2/week
Ensemble - 1 hour x 4/week
Bass Lesson with Jeff Berlin - 1 hour x 2/week
Music Appreciation - 1 hour per week
Chart Reading 2 - 1 hour per week
Chart Reading 3 - 1 hour per week

Suffice it to say I was pretty busy.

Over the semester, we covered:

• Ear Training - Sight singing, in solfege, A harmonic minor, D jazz minor, G harmonic minor, and transcribing (sans instrument) eighth-note rhythms and major scale melodies in 4/4, 3/4, and 2/4. Taught by Matt Bokulic, who also wrote the whole ear training course there; a very funny guy.
  
  
• Ensemble - Walking and improvising over Stella By Starlight, Green Dolphin Street, Gone With The Wind, Cherokee, Have You Met Miss Jones, and I Love You. Plus doing all of the associated practicing privately over these tunes. Taught by various teachers over the week, each of whom would make suggestions about how to improve subsequently. For instance, Jeremy Powell, a sax player, would tell us to memorise the melody and changes of tunes we were playing and ask us to turn our charts around so we couldn't see them - forces you to go on ear a lot more! Not always successful, but helped my ear develop more this semester. Interesting to note that even though Jeff does not believe doing this sort of thing is necessary (he has stated that playing with the chart and good old fashioned raw repetition will cause you to memorise the song anyway), he does not interfere with what other teachers ask you to do. The other teachers in this class include Joe Porter, a good upright bassist, Matt Bokulic, and Jeff Berlin.
  
  
• Chart Reading 2 - a range of written eighth and sixteenth note lines in a variety of styles (latin, hip-hop, jazz, etc) and improvising over the form of each of the associated charts. Done with Matt Bokulic.
  
  
• Chart Reading 3 - Reading and improvising over a variety of tougher charts with harder syncopated 16th note rhythms and compositional forms - mainly written out funk and jazz charts. Done with Matt Bokulic, who writes a lot of the charts - funky stuff!
  
  
• Harmony 5 - Writing and practicing exercises from the course's Chord Tone Studies book, which includes a variety of exercises in major and minor keys. Taught by Matt Bokulic.
  
  
• Harmony 6 - Exclusively harmonically analysing Real Book tunes. All the work I had done privately needed some fine tuning, but this class was illuminating. Figured out some of the keys to minor scale harmony here, and really improved in this area once I figured out that harmonising the minor scales (jazz minor, harmonic minor, etc) really opens the doors further in understanding advanced jazz harmony. Taught by, you guessed it, Matt Bokulic.
  
  
• Music Appreciation - A surprise class to me, and hugely enjoyable. 1 hour a week to listen to a short history, along with a major work, of a selection of major classical composers - Brahms, Schubert, Korsakov, Beethoven, etc. taught by Matt Bokulic. Found out I like Debussy more than I thought here!
  
  
• Vocal Lessons - breathing exercises and improvements to vocal technique, ended up learning and singing several Broadway tunes. Taught by an experienced singer and singing teacher, Chip Marshall. Turns out I'm a tenor, and have a decent voice. Who knew?
  
  
• Bass Lessons - with Jeff. initially some written walking lines over the tunes being covered in ensemble, subsequently focusing on approach-note chordal exercises in all 12 keys for major, minor, dominant 7th, minor 7, minor 7b5 qualities; and exercises from various chord tone study books. Also, towards the end, Jeff recorded several solos for me to listen to, one of which I transcribed and derived many ideas from.
  
  
• Recording Session - I was fortunate enough to be able to take part in a recording session at a nearby recording arts school, which was organised by the school but not a part of the everyday program. This turned out to be a great studio to record in and was valuable experience about working in the recording environment. I've yet to get a copy of that recording, but they'll post it to me when it arrives.

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General reflections

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• The school had substantially fewer students this semester compared to the last time I came. This resulted in two huge benefits - everyone who was there was absolutely serious about music, and gave a very intimate feel to the school, contributing to a great camaraderie between students and teachers. All of us ended up hanging out together quite a bit, and I have seen quite a few of my teachers' gigs, so I can report they practice what they preach. And sound great.
  
  
• Studying two instruments (bass and vocals) was nearly more than I could handle, and was very challenging time-wise. Especially as I ended up in two Chart Reading classes (which is not typical at the school). I had rather a lot of extra work, which I just managed to stay on top of. If you decide to study two instruments here, be ready for a real deluge of work.
  
  
• In terms of how I structured the day, I generally woke up early, practiced vocal breathing exercises before school, then arrived at school 08.30 or so to do ear training exercises with a piano. I would then practice about 40-60 mins on whatever I had to cover that day, have a break, and repeat until the day finished at 17.00. Generally I would practice 2-3 hours a day on the instrument on top of ensembles/etc. Sometimes less, rarely, more. And when I say practice, I do not mean 'jamming' - I mean focused and attentive practice on musical information that was new to me and required total concentration. Anytime I found myself starting to noodle, I took a break.
  
  
• Keeping up with the ear training is extremely important. Falling behind in that class is hard to catch up on. Although I had no problems keeping up, I did have a few 'bumps' I had to iron out - for instance, I spent a while writing out 8th note rhythms landing mainly on upbeats, as this turned out to be a problem area for me when I was sight-singing or transcribing. It is easy to underestimate the importance of regular daily practice of ear training, but it is utterly essential.
  
  
• You will be seeing a lot of Matt Bokulic! He really puts a heart and soul into into the school, as you can see from the list of classes, and enjoys teaching. He's a lot of fun.
  
  
• Both Matt and Jeff are Berklee graduates. After questioning both of them, it is clear that they have structured things at the school to be similar to their teaching experiences at Berklee. Of late, I have come to think of the school as 'mini Berklee'.
  
  
• In my previous review, I stated that I thought a full two years worth of study at the school would get you fairly well along the road of being a great player, and be well rounded in music generally. I stand by that!

All told, this has been a defining musical experience for me. I am definitely a hugely improved musician, and feel more confident in my reading, improvisational, and aural abilities. I am now competent enough to cover a variety of gigs, including jazz, although artistically I have a very long way to go.

Functionally, after one month of study at PSOM a year and bit ago, I entered the second year of the school after a year of private study. This clearly demonstrates to me that a commitment to studying musical facts, and incorporating a structured program of ear training and practicing chord tones, is effective.

I have a good idea of what I need to be practicing and doing for at least a year or two, and I will be doing a lot more transcribing. I will seek to get a teacher on my return to the UK to help monitor my progress. Frankly, though, I've been spoiled by my lessons with Jeff and the ability to pick Matt's brains regarding harmony. I'll miss the school, and all the friends I made there.

Pete

As many people asked me this question privately after my previous review, I thought I would make a separate post on what it was like to study with Jeff, and elaborate on some of what he says.

One-on-one, he is kind and honest, and is not slow to tell you when you're doing something that needs fixing. His ears are fantastic, so he doesn't miss anything in your playing! It only takes him a bit of listening to you to 'make the diagnosis' and prescribe the remedy, as it were.

I have found many of his concepts to be useful:

• I practice new musical information slowly and attentively, and take frequent breaks to ensure that whatever I am doing has my full attention.
  
  
• I never practiced with a metronome. Nonetheless, my time has improved the last few months. I think this mainly comes from playing with other musicians on a daily basis and from the rhythm studies and transcription done in ear training.
  
  
• Playing in an ensemble or gig situation is a different situation to practicing. What you sound like when soloing/playing may not necessarily precisely sound like what you practice, but the 'flavour' comes through.
  
  
• Improvement occurs in baby steps. If you're happy taking baby steps daily as opposed to expecting big jumps suddenly and periodicially, half the battle has been won. This is helpful in remaining patient!
  
  
• 'Groove' and 'feel' are acquired with musical experience and understanding. As everyone plays with feeling, no matter what situation they are in, experience and acquisition of musical information will help you to improve in these areas. On a personal note, I have found transcription to be a big way forward in this area...
  
  
• Jeff would give me some exercises to simply 'regard' - i.e. practice the heck out of, but not to worry about memorising. Then, the week subsequently, when it was clear that I had come to understand it more musically, we might move to putting it in to all 12 keys. But the emphasis was really on going at the speed appropriate to you, and not moving on until he felt that you were understanding the material being presented. If that speed happened to be fast, fine. If it was slow, also fine. People go at the speed they can.

Overall, I have found Jeff to be a great teacher; supportive and friendly, but always pushing you into new musical territory. It's hard to imagine being able to study with someone of Jeff's caliber anywhere else. A totally singular experience.

Pete

Thanks. Anyone else have any comments?

Pete

If you check the 3rd or 4th post in the first thread I reviewed the PSOM in, I describe chord arpeggios in all inversions. Click the link at the very top of my 1st post in this thread for the link. Enjoy!

Pete

Kurisu said:

Peter -- Thanks for the wonderful insight into the school!

Could you give a bit of information about how you practice the chord tone exercises? I'm working on that right now and I feel like I'm just going up and down chords in the positions up and down the neck... I'm not sure if this is all I should be doing, or if there's something else that I'm missing.

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Hi Ian,

Nice to see you pop by. Don't worry, we'll find the opportunity to jam again sometime!

Looking forward to Jeff's next thread.

Pete

Hard to say.

The guys I know who did the 40 or 80 week program got a lot out of it, mainly by working their socks off the whole time they were there. It's hard work. They also read a lot of music, transcribed a lot in their own time, were always checking out videos, etc.

I went separately a whole bunch of times because it's the only way I could manage to do it with working. Whether that was better or worse than going solidly for 40 - 80 weeks - well, I would have prefered a solid 40 - 80 weeks if I had the time. The school pushes you but private lessons move at your pace, really. It all depends on how hard you want to work.

On the whole I would probably say if you have the time to spend to attend for 40 - 80 weeks solidly (and the money) then I would go for it. I think doing it all the time and working at it solidly for 1 - 2 years pays greater dividends more quickly than spreading it out. You have to get your 10,000 hours in somehow.

Ukiah Bass said:

On the other hand, you've got to practice what you learn to burn it in. Slamming through non-stop might provide the same benefits as cramming for a test. Puts you over the edge, briefly, and then 'poof' - all gone. I find my truly deepest insights come after applying what I've learned over and over again in gigs. Go back, learn some more, apply it and absorb, repeat over a lifetime. Might depend on individual circumstances, but this works well for me.

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I think a year (or two) of solid steady work is probably not like cramming for a test. I worked pretty solidly for two years on harmony, ear training, practicing, and playing. I would love to have the time to do the same amount of work as I was doing then, but I don't. However, I still have the benefits of the time spent over those years and more importantly the discipline which keep me practicing, doing ear training, and playing today.