Jeff Berlin asks - Why Do Some Object to My Educational Views

[Ant Illington]

I think unskillful delivery clouds your fundamental point.

i agree in part. I believe it is "unskillful" delivery in Jeff's replies to ignorant arguments that gets in the way of his fundamental points. He should simply ignore them and let his beliefs stand on their initial merits.

 

[Whousedtoplay]

A number of people are just unwilling to admit that music is a discipline - no different than medicine, history, or anything else. They think it is something you can just "feel". These are often the same people who say that knowing music theory is an impediment be being a good musician, or that smoking marijuana or taking other drugs improves their performance.

I would like to see an outstanding musician who has achieved it without hard work, but
I know a lot of musicians who wasted their talent by avoiding hard learning work.

 

[DirtDog]

This subject seems important to chat about. I have views about learning that are standard fare in the teaching of other instruments. But electric bass education deviated away from teaching in the only validated way that provided everyone the skill to play their instrument for the reason that it was built. Even being self taught, the only other manner to learn by, doesn't guarantee you the musical improvement or acquiring the skills that practicing written music gives you.

People that don't pay to learn how to play are except from any comment about learning that I make because they aren't seeking musical improvement to where what I say has to be embraced. EVERYONE is taught by other people. We are shown music, lines and all kinds of things related to playing. But we aren't beholden to embrace anything we are taught if we don't wish to because neither the teacher nor you have that special agreement that their knowledge must be adhered to, not like there is in a classroom situation.

I'm not sure I understand the premise here.

Is it that you believe that paying to learn is only "validated" method for everyone to learn to play electric bass while those that choose to teach themselves to play are not seeking to improve musically?

Or is that that you are incredulous that not everyone shares these beliefs?

 

[JeffBerlin]

I'm not familiar with the old drama and I'm not familiar with his work. I've seen a handful of videos on youtube and I've seen his recent threads here. So as an outside observer looking at his style, I see someone with a lot of insight and very little couth. Titling each thread as a sentence that speaks about yourself in the third person doesn't help. So I have no problem with the man or his character. Just the way he communicates.

I thought to comment on your post first. I don't believe that I ever commented about myself in the 3rd person. Jeff Berlin never does this.

 

[JeffBerlin]

I appreciate comments from everyone. I suggest that you review my thoughts and see that I include statements such as "in my opinion" "for the most part" or "exceptions aside." I do this knowing that my views don't gel well with people that feel uncomfortable with near absolutes. Fair enough!

My comments are based on how everyone was taught since written music became organized. Everything that I share about learning is based on music history and how everyone learned how to play for centuries. There are only two ways to learn: 1. Being self taught (or entirely having the last word about what you wish to practice and learn from) and 2. Being taught musical content to practice. I don't believe that people will find a third option.

If people feel that this statement might appear too preachy or too absolute, to those people and to you, in a couple of previous posts, I've invited people to pick ten musicians from any period in music history playing any instrument that one could think of, beginning around the time of Bach up to today. I invited them to research the background of these ten musicians and see if they could find some that weren't taught by practicing musical content or who wasn't self taught. People finding examples where people were taught other than being taught musical content or being in charge of their own musical development would put a great dent in my "absolute" or "100%" statements. True? Do the research over the next few days and see what you discover for yourselves about how people were taught how to play. Then post them in this thread so that we can have something to chat about.

I have noticed that for some people, the perception of preaching is more important than the content of the message being shared. This is a shame as people tend to read into things. Christopher Hitchens got the same kind of response from a lot of people which got him to offer this rejoinder:

"If someone tells me that I've hurt their feelings (or, in the case of TB, too preachy), I'm still waiting to hear what their point is. In this country, I've been told, "That's offensive" as if those two words constituted an argument or a comment. Not to me they don't.

I am inclined to feel that people that are uncomfortable with my manner of writing my thoughts should try and see my comments for what they are, not what some believe that they are. I try to be clear and I don't wish to preach. If some see this in me, I will try and convey my thoughts in a nicer way so that you aren't as negatively affected by my tone of writing.



Thank you all for your honest interaction.

 

[JeffBerlin]

i agree in part. I believe it is "unskillful" delivery in Jeff's replies to ignorant arguments that gets in the way of his fundamental points. He should simply ignore them and let his beliefs stand on their initial merits.

Very good point! But realize that I ignore WAY more comments than I respond to. And although I KNOW that this next statement will annoy some people, as a non-Christian, I still know that Jesus came to preach to the sinner, not to the saved. The philosophy makes sense to me; people that get what I say on its first read don't need any more interaction from me. I give people my best effort, but sometimes I have to just drop things with them as well.

 

[JeffBerlin]

I'm not sure I understand the premise here.

Is it that you believe that paying to learn is only "validated" method for everyone to learn to play electric bass while those that choose to teach themselves to play are not seeking to improve musically?

Or is that that you are incredulous that not everyone shares these beliefs?

Well, people have to make their own decisions. I have no feeling about the decisions that musicians make for themselves. I just wish to balance the scales a little bit by advising people that their financial investment could be made to a far more reliable educational source rather than people emphasizing metronomes, groove, feel, technique, locking with drummers. These are performance principles and most people that learn how to play will figure out all of these musical deficits eventually and far more profoundly.

I believe that if you pay to learn how to play bass, there is only one proven method to get you what you financially invested in acquiring. This is the study of harmonic, rhythmic and melodic academically written music. If my statement seems to bother some people, here is a little test to either support or disprove my view.

Select twenty people from music history that play different instruments and who come from any period in music history. You will find that they are either self taught players (or in charge of what they decided to learn with) or they were only taught how to play or compose by practicing academic written music assigned to them by their teachers. If your research verifies my belief, then it is a safe bet that bass education has greatly shifted away from teaching via the only proven academic method of teaching that every trained musician learned by, exceptions aside.

Try out this little examination and let me know who you find in music history who weren't self taught or were't only taught musical content. List your discoveries here and we can chat about this.

 

[Lesfunk]

Honestly Jeff, I think the reasons some may find your views controversial may be..
Your past reputation for being so aggressively adamant that people mistook it for closed mindedness , perhaps even zealotry.
More importantly, I believe some folks overthink the subject and miss the crystal clear simplicity of your message.
It's not rocket science. You put in the work and results will be realized
You will never improve musically by string skipping exercises or slap lessons.
You will improve musically by studying harmony, listening to the masters and getting it in your head and under your fingers.
At least that's my takeaway.

 

[Bryan R. Tyler]

Well, people have to make their own decisions. I have no feeling about the decisions that musicians make for themselves. I just wish to balance the scales a little bit by advising people that their financial investment could be made to a far more reliable educational source rather than people emphasizing metronomes, groove, feel, technique, locking with drummers. These are performance principles and most people that learn how to play will figure out all of these musical deficits eventually and far more profoundly.

I believe that if you pay to learn how to play bass, there is only one proven method to get you what you financially invested in acquiring. This is the study of harmonic, rhythmic and melodic academically written music. If my statement seems to bother some people, here is a little test to either support or disprove my view.

Select twenty people from music history that play different instruments and who come from any period in music history. You will find that they are either self taught players (or in charge of what they decided to learn with) or they were only taught how to play or compose by practicing academic written music assigned to them by their teachers. If your research verifies my belief, then it is a safe bet that bass education has greatly shifted away from teaching via the only proven academic method of teaching that every trained musician learned by, exceptions aside.

Try out this little examination and let me know who you find in music history who weren't self taught or were't only taught musical content. List your discoveries here and we can chat about this.

Appeals to authority don’t work with a lot of people because they are fallacies- they don’t help to prove a point. Go back to the 18th century. Have any physician name 20 people from medical history who didn’t solve certain diseases by bleeding people. The practice of bleeding probably far, far exceeds the length of time that academic music teaching has been around. It was the best method they had and it seem to provide the best results. That’s why it waters down your ideas whenever you try to use an appeal to authority- just because something has seemed to work for a duration of time does not mean something else won’t work or work better.

Here’s a question that would likely help people move to your views: are you willing to change every view you hold about music education?

 

[ICM]

Appeals to authority don’t work with a lot of people because they are fallacies- they don’t help to prove a point. Go back to the 18th century. Have any physician name 20 people from medical history who didn’t solve certain diseases by bleeding people. The practice of bleeding probably far, far exceeds the length of time that academic music teaching has been around. It was the best method they had and it seem to provide the best results. That’s why it waters down your ideas whenever you try to use an appeal to authority- just because something has seemed to work for a duration of time does not mean something else won’t work or work better.

Here’s a question that would likely help people move to your views: are you willing to change every view you hold about music education?

I think everyone should reply "yes" to this question. It's good to be open to change.

 

[Rev J]

While I agree with about 90% of what you say Jeff there are 2 points that you have made that I disagree with you about. I think that that is a good average as I can't think of a single individual that I agree with 100% of the time.

The first is regarding the Metronome. If you listen to some of the most rhythmically complex music on earth particularly African Drumming, Brazilian Samba and Japanese Taiko Drumming you will notice that there is at least one drummer in the group that plays a simple pulse the same way that a metronome does in western music granted it is a human providing that pulse and to me there is no real substitute for that human feel providing that pulse a metronome can be used for the same purpose.

The other is the advice you give the student at the end of this video regarding trying to be a "Great" bassist:



In my opinion you should advise any bassist especially a beginner to be the best bassist that they can be.

C/S,
Rev J

 

[JeffBerlin]

How one says things is often as important as what is said. Promote your ideas without contrasting them to others, and without attacks on the thoughts/methods of others. Based on the evidence, this is not something you are capable of doing. Inevitably your educational ideas are presented in an oppositional and antagonistic fashion.

I think you are right! It is only that the contrasts that you mention aren't the odd point of learning. It is the industry itself and the people that seem to want things to stay as they are. Bass education is flawed and it has gotten far more worse since the time that I was banned from Talkbass. For me, it is sort of is like telling people that smoking can kill you and having people offended by your criticizing the tobacco industry instead of telling people how eating vegetables is a good thing to do. Doctors that are qualified to state opinions tell people that smoking is bad. Political pundits criticize politicians and party functions. People criticize everything and often go to rather mean spirited levels to comment by, something that I never do. But, if I criticize a corrupted educational industry (in my opinion) suddenly people are offended. I have to say that I'm not buying it. I mean no harm and I know my subject extremely well. It isn't a couple of strange bass teachers I am talking about. Most people reading this are influenced by incorrect views of learning and ten minutes with me or someone that has the musical academic background as we do can show this to people. Then maybe a real renaissance in learning could begin to take place. This is my wish.

 

[JeffBerlin]

How one says things is often as important as what is said. Promote your ideas without contrasting them to others, and without attacks on the thoughts/methods of others. Based on the evidence, this is not something you are capable of doing. Inevitably your educational ideas are presented in an oppositional and antagonistic fashion.

I sincerely appreciate your thoughts. Thank you for sharing. I just thought to ask that if so many people criticize so much on the internet, often using language and comments that I would never use, can you share why it is not acceptable for me to offer my thoughts and comment what I view as a flawed educational bass system and advise that there are better ways to learn if one is seeking this for themselves?

While I am no hero, people have written me stating that my thoughts alone, literally without anyone else's input got some people to turn away from today's non-music centered bass instruction and inspired them to go into the learning of music itself. Because I seem to be fairly alone in affecting a directional change in learning by pointing people toward learning the true elements of the language of music, isn't this a good thing?

 

[JeffBerlin]

In my opinion you should advise any bassist especially a beginner to be the best bassist that they can be.[/QUOTE]

I appreciate your sharing. I just don't think that this piece of advice makes any different in how someone learns. I never heard anyone offer this in any class where a subject is taught, to try and be the best chef or the best attorney you can be. I kind of think that this is obvious.

Rather, I would share that the new bass player is going to make a lot of mistakes and that this isn't a bad thing. So many bass players think that it is.

 

[JeffBerlin]

Go back to the 18th century. Have any physician name 20 people from medical history who didn’t solve certain diseases by bleeding people.

Good point if I was referring to the medical profession. But music didn't figure into the same kind of evolution as medicine did. People today are learning fairly well the same musical content and learning it the same way as was always done; they are taught it and students practice it.

Simply doing a little research on how musicians actually learned in the past right up to today (certainly in the teaching of the classical and jazz instruments) this will show you something beyond my comments that some people seem to regard as being wrong.

 

[JeffBerlin]

Jeff, I have great respect for your accomplishments and your teaching endeavors. BTW, those new Corts look great (though I wish five had that red wood face like the four . . . . ).

You'll excuse me for asking, but what exactly is your method that seems to have generated such consternation in certain quarters? Somehow I've not run across exactly what it is that has 'em out with torches and pitchforks. Couldja gimme the USA TODAY summation ? ? ? I'll admit I've not followed everything you do, so I'm not current on what the rub is . . . .

I studied classical piano from kindergarten through 12th grade, taught by two North Texas graduates, and one had also been to Julliard. I learned to read, count the music I was reading, with some harmony and scale and sight singing and metronomes until I could hold my own internal clock, and worked up the usual Bach, Beethoven, etc., pieces you'd think. If you're along those lines (the way, you point out, most instruments are taught), I'm there. I see lots of BS Bass Methods about The Groove and Super Slap, and on and on, which to me are useless. Am I getting it?

Thanks ! !

Yes! You were taught music and how to represent it on the piano. Bass players don't generally share any of your experience in learning (or as I have learned) and find my views to be antithetical to how the bass is learned today. And they are right.

I have no method! I, or anyone like me (or perhaps you considering your background) could take anyone and in five minutes I would know what they needed to improve. It is a snap and I've done it nearly my entire life as a bass player. Four bars of written music would change one's entire view of how to learn the bass but I know that many people don't believe this. Music is THE shortcut to improving everyone's bass playing if they decide to pay to learn. My wish is to influence people interested in thinking about this that they can save themselves a tone of money and triple their playing if they spent a year doing something on their bass that some bass players haven't done in ten years.

 

[JeffBerlin]

I don't know why people get so bent out of shape from reading your (or other teachers') experiences and views on learning. I hope you take it in stride

Thank you for your kind thoughts (I read your whole post.) There is a code of behavior in the bass community where one's behavior is more regulated than what they share about learning. I only wish to point out that stating things in a clear manner isn't a point of disrespect. I would like to believe that this is how adults wish to be addressed.

Here again is my academic view but with slightly different wording:

If you pay any school, any teacher, any website, or any on-line lessons, or any source of learning to improve your playing, you will improve it for the most part only if you are told by the notes where to put your fingers on the bass neck. If you are learning lessons where the term groove, feel, technique, locking with drummers, metronomes, chops, hand stretching, warmup exercises or any form of bass playing that historically has for the most part been a part of being self taught, you are not going to acquire what you are paying for.

Many people here have been involved in all the modern online or bass lessons in schools and with teacher. Ans still, some have trouble playing their own ideas, they can't read music which instantly makes most players unqualified to earn a whole of of money and play in a whole lot of different styles of music with a whole lot of different players. Bass players here can't solo and if they aren't interested in soloing, many can't comp in time because they haven't discovered where good time comes from. I believe that some people reading this knows that this is true.

As this is a thread that I started asking why some are not pleased with my manner of communication, I agree that what I just said can appear rough. But, the truth is rough. A portion of people reading this are limited as players and they limited themselves as a conscious choice. I've read too many comments from people on TB stating that their goals aren't very high when it comes to bass playing, which is their choice. My wish is that people realize that this can all change within three to six months. My critical comments are correct in how bass is taught in my opinion and things will surely stay as they are if no one aims higher in seeking the finest bass education that they can find for themselves. My comments aren't a bell tolling the end of your musical growth. They could be a beginning and just might fire some people up to get straight into a music-centered bass player maybe for the first time in their lives. I truly hope so.

 

[JeffBerlin]

Honestly Jeff, I think the reasons some may find your views controversial may be. Your past reputation for being so aggressively adamant that people mistook it for closed mindedness , perhaps even zealotry.

Oh, yes! I have a lot to own. I know my past and I surely have a long way to to to reintroduce myself to people now that I have had a lot of liberation that came from the therapy that I underwent. I know that I may never get some people to relax around me, but this is something that I earned and I will just have to live with this. Who knows what the future may bring.

 

[SteveCS]

...
Because I seem to be fairly alone in affecting a directional change in learning by pointing people toward learning the true elements of the language of music, isn't this a good thing?

I don't think you are alone, Jeff. I think there are plenty of people who agree with what you say and that maybe the reason they choose self-taught over formal bass education is that they find/have found the formal education on offer elsewhere to be unsatisfactory in the same way you do.

Personally, although I have a formal (classical) backgroumd, none of that was directly bass-related - I had to work out the translation and application to bass all for myself because that was the only way. I drew on sources such as choral SATB arrangements and Cello parts etudes, supported by my own harmonic analysis, to break my frustration with the mechanical "bass plays R-5 on 1/3 and here's the tab" or the "heres a bunch of scales and modes that you have to know (just because) and here are the box patterns" models of presentation. In that sense I am wholly self taught as a bass player.

Maybe what you (we?) believe is at odds with a perception, backed up by plenty of real-world examples, that bass is an 'instant gratification fallback' for people who struggle with guitar because it 'only plays one note at a time and you don't need to learn the chords'? The notion that actually the opposite might be true could be a pretty hard pill to swallow.

As you and others have already noted, the truth will set you free but first it will piss you off...

The other possibility is that you/I/we take too much for granted because of the early age (6 in my case) at which our formal exposure started? At such an early age stuff gets assimilated in a very subconscious way (children quickly learn the difference between hot and cold long before they know the meaning of the words), whereas people coming to music later maybe don't have that internalized framework to provide context to the formal ideas?

Just thinking aloud...

 

[Bryan R. Tyler]

Good point if I was referring to the medical profession. But music didn't figure into the same kind of evolution as medicine did. People today are learning fairly well the same musical content and learning it the same way as was always done; they are taught it and students practice it.

Simply doing a little research on how musicians actually learned in the past right up to today (certainly in the teaching of the classical and jazz instruments) this will show you something beyond my comments that some people seem to regard as being wrong.

I’m guessing you intended to quote me, not yourself

My analogy was meant to showcase why appeals to authority do not work. It is equally applicable to the learning of music in the way you describe. If every single music teacher taught every single student in the exact same way for 1,000 years, that still does not disprove or even show the tiniest bit of evidence that there aren’t other equally valid ways to learn or better ways. Appeals to authority are fallacies- they don’t prove or disprove anything. I stated in a different one of your threats that very few people argue with any of the points that you are for in teaching- nearly everything they have an issue with are because of things that you are vocally against. Rigid opposition to differing points of view simply results in one appearing dogmatic in their views.

This is why I asked if you were open to changing every opinion you hold on music education.
If you are not, then how can you expect anyone else to be?
If you are, then your presentation does not show this at all. Making analogies such as you being a doctor trying to tell people that smoking is bad simply paints those with opposing ideas as being flat-out wrong with no chance of being valid.

You can’t expect anyone to be more open to ideas than you are. You believe that your ideas on music education are right, which is fine. But when you make a point of trying to tell everyone who thinks differently that they’re wrong, you will always get people who are opposed to your educational views. Telling people they’re wrong, particularly without any solid evidence that they’re wrong, will more often than not put up a wall and put people on the defensive rather than opening them up to new ideas. Keep in mind that simply adding phrases like “in my opinion” won’t change this when presenting a negative. The addition of “in my opinion” when saying “in my opinion you’re ugly as hell and should wear a bag over your head” will neither lessen the blow nor show that you’re really open to other ideas.

We had a fairly wide variety of teaching styles and methods of learning at art school. But one thing that was consistent was they never criticized a different teacher’s methods. Even the most intimidating and nearly dogmatic professor we had, when telling him that another teacher taught us to do something in a completely different manner told us to always do what the teacher told them to do when in their class. It was simply everyone’s job to teach the best way they knew during their time., which is why even when opposing views were held, no one objected to each other’s methods. So long as you object to others, you need to expect them to object to you, and realize that’s it’s not a case of them just not getting it.