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Best method for teaching myself to sight read music?

#21
As usual, I will bring up a technical but obvious point for advanced players..

Pay attention to spacing on the stave.

For example,. If two notes are located on adjacent lines, they are a third apart, two lines apart they are a 5th apart. I didnt say major or minor third, but you can dive into the details. Learn to look at the spacing and connect that to a distance on the neck in terms of frets and strings.

With this approach, you can master not only bass clef, but treble clef, alto clef and any moveable clef quickly. It also allows you to sight transpose up or down.

Also, you will be able to hear the music just by looking at it. It takes some practice, but its not a genius thingy.
 
#22
Yep. Repetition is the key. I used to find any sheet music I could for big bands and match the arranger up on YouTube and just play along as a sight reading, then Add it to my daily rotation afterward. I got my YouTube playlist up to about 75 or 80 charts and I’d just start and the beginning and go til I always done for the day then pick up where I left off the next session.

In my world all gigs are reading gigs and being a strong sight reader puts you high up on most sub lists.
YMMV
 
#23
it's a hard thing to practice ... i was very good at it in high school - piano ... then , it was something i practiced ,... mostly , just by borrowing a hymnal from my Mom ,... open it where ever = play .! Repeat ... getting boarded , then ad ' sight transposing to it ' ..!! now , ... ha ,... a thousand years later = not
 
#24
Do it a lot!

Also fun are the Melodious Etudes for Trombone by Joannes Rochut, which are transcriptions of vocalises by Marco Bordogni. Basically vocal exercises, so they're not super technical, and are available in progressively more challenging volumes. There's a ton of them in each book, LOTS of great stuff with which to practice both sightreading and a massive variety of intervals and rhythms and keys.
 
#29
RemoteOutpost said:
My wife bought me the Hal Leonard Complete edition, books 1,2,3 but before I get too far into it I just wanted to ask if there were any more entertaining or more effective methods out there that might make the process more efficient or just overall better.
Click to expand...

probably the best beginner set out there. Certainly I’ve never seen better.

if it’s moving too fast for you when playing the CD’s try to get ahold of a Tascam Bass Tutor (CD version is cheaper used, or if you want to rip the CD’s the newer version).

old:
Portable CD Bass Trainer Tascam CD-BT1 MKII Excellent | eBay

Newer:
Tascam GB-10 Guitar/Bass Trainer/Recorder | eBay
 
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#30
I'm tempted to get those same Hal Leonard books to start learning bass notation, myself.

Funny thing is I could sight read treble notation to this day with a fair amount of ease. I played trumpet through school and some of college, and as some have already said, sight reading in that arena was a fairly regular practice.

But when I started on bass, I just jumped in and started learning by ear. Until pretty recently, I hadn't taken the time to learn bass clef notation (or even note location on the fret board), so now I struggle with it.

I will say that most of the answers already provided here are great. "Nothin to it but to do it", as they say. It's rocky in the beginning, but with time you start to pick up on where notes are located on the instrument, and it requires less thought/concentration. I'm sure one-on-one lessons would be a huge help, too.
Best of luck :thumbsup:
 
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#31
RemoteOutpost said:
...more effective methods out there that might make the process more efficient or just overall better.
Click to expand...

I'm going to mildly disagree with those folks who said it's 'all repetition, there's no trick, just do it'.

It is those things (and there is no 'trick') but you did ask for ways to make the process more efficient. And the way to do that is to put your time and effort into practicing within your ability while pushing the threshold. Whatever the limitations are at that threshold - whether it's note recognition, rhythm interpretation, playing technique, etc. At times it will one or all of those things, and others. That is what should be the focus most of the time.

That is pretty vague but the reality is that process is very individual. The recommendation others have made about getting a good teacher to guide you is spot on. A qualified instructor will be able to identify your abilities and limitations and customize your practice routine. A teacher with an academic approach will be more a valuable then someone who takes a "song of the week" approach to teaching.

What is your end goal in learning to read? What kind of gigs do you play? How do you want to apply sight-reading skills?

Edit: I lied, here's one trick:

Accuracy > Speed. ​

That can be read 'as accuracy is greater than (or more important than) speed'. Also can be read as 'accuracy leads to speed'.

That goes for playing technique and for sight-reading. It's not always enjoyable to practice something beyond your ability: Ex. reading a bassline while playing out of time and less than 50bpm, when it should be played at 120bpm. But pitch, rhythm and technique accuracy at those slow speeds is what builds the foundation for the line to be played at 'gig speed'.
 
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#32
Read with metronome on. Slowly enough. If you can't read a note in time, skip it and read another. Reading in a gig situation, it's more important not to lose yourself in the sheet, rather than read all the notes. If you can't read too many notes, try at slower tempo, but always with metronome. Your final aim is to read about one bar ahead of your playing, so you can understand the rhythm and prepare your fingering.

Another issue would be the motivation. I learned to read when I started to play in a big band where reading is neccessity. I learned fast because I had to.

Sometimes I still can't read the sheet at tempo. What helps me is to read the sheet before I play it, looking for clues. Some knowledge of theory is vital. For example, if you can recognise 'this is Db arpeggio up, then F arpeggio down', you will remember it and you don't need to decipher 'Db F Ab Db C A F C'. This way of thinking also hepls to play the read sheet more lively.
 
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#33
superheavyfunk said:
Whatever method you use, just remember that you are learning to read a new language. It will take you about the same amount of effort to read music fluently as it would to read Japanese fluently (assuming English is your first language, and you have no prior experience with music notation). Ear training is important too, so that you can recognize the sound of each note while you're reading it, even without an instrument in your hand.

Dedicate some time each day to the task, and give yourself a little test every couple of weeks. If you do this for a year, you'll have the basics. If you do this for two years, you'll be pretty darn good! In three years, you'll be pretty darn fluent and should be able to sight read/play all but the most difficult pieces on the spot. Good luck!
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Daily practice was the key for me. Get a lot of music that you don't know (in binders or some of the music reader apps) and try to get through it. One or two songs a day is the doctors ordination.
And while I still don't consider me a great sight reader, I can now get through most gigs without embarrassment.
 
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#34
And I said:
you just put music that you don't know in front of yourself and play it.
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This really is the crux of it. Now to elaborate a bit:
  • Whatever books you choose make sure it starts simply, and works up to novice, intermediate, and advanced. (My favorite sightreading materials were always graded trombone method books)
  • Don’t slow down at difficult passages. Pretend you’re playing with a band and have to keep up. If you make a mistake, keep going.
  • Don’t stop and start over. That’s practice—not sightreading. Pretend you’re playing with a band, and must do it in one take. If you make a mistake, keep going.
  • Read ahead. At least 2-4 beats ahead. If you don’t know the next note until its beat, then you’re already too late.
 
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#35
I always broke down a task into bite size pieces. For sight reading I would practice scales and always speak out each note when playing it. For rhythm there is one great exercise: write down a rhythm for one bar and rest one bar. Now take the first bar and move it up 1/16 (or whatever length you choose). The 2nd bar will only have one 1/16 note. Repeat. I'm 100% self taught and back in the day I was decent at sight reading.
 
#36
I signed up with the Sight Reading Factory site.

You can choose difficulty level,length of exercise and tempo.

It supplies an element of randomness/ surprise that books may not give you.

The first thing I improved on was recognising key signatures and being able to play the pieces in the different keys.
 
#37
Lots of good advice here, just read a lot and make sure its different stuff all the time. When you find a weak spot in the process isolate it, like rhythm for instance. If you can play the rhythm instantly, hammer it. rinse and repeat.
 
#38
This is a 10k hour problem - not that it'll take you 10k hours, but just that the only solution is to spend time doing it. There's no way to "hack" sight reading because it's not exactly like learning a new language. That implies that you can learn enough to fake your way through it. It's like learning how to fluently speak a new language. And the only way that's going to happen is to learn all the vocabulary and practice a ton to internalize it. You are essentially letting the information go straight from your eyeballs to your fingers, with your brain as a conduit.

Of course, there are many degrees of difficulty to the music you will be attempting to sight read, so you can level-up so to speak. There's no saying you have to be a master before you can do any of it. But sight reading is hard.

And it's absolutely a worthwhile skill to acquire.
 
#40
RemoteOutpost said:
My wife bought me the Hal Leonard Complete edition, books 1,2,3 but before I get too far into it I just wanted to ask if there were any more entertaining or more effective methods out there that might make the process more efficient or just overall better.
Click to expand...

Thank you for asking the question. I’ve largely abandoned the practice of New Year resolutions, but sight reading is a 2020 commitment.
 
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