Just curious... Can anyone here sight-read tab?

[Winton]

Here’s an illustration as to the purpose of tab notation. This is traditional Koto sheet music:

They use numbers (the Chinese characters, or “kanji” as we call in Japan) to refer to which string and where to play it. Very similar to tab notation. However, because of how the koto is physically, you can’t really sight-read with that instrument. People memorize the music. So with tabs, ultimately, it’s a tool to memorize the song you’re trying to learn. I think with many, if not most non-classical Westerm music, people would play by memory anyways. That’s what I had to learn to do for the last 6 years, play songs by memory. But I’ve also been learning pieces by Bach on bass and I’d have learn those by memory if I want to play it even half-decently.

 

[brianrost]

The single one thing that a tab has that sheet music does not is that it shows you where exactly you should fret the note, since most notes can be played in more than one position.

It's anybody's guess how accurate any tab is for the notes, never mind the fingerings. What if the original bassist used a 5 or 6 instead of a 4, tuned down, etc.?

 

[brianrost]

Have you seen the way they write tabs on Songster? It does show rhythm. And yes, I can sight read it pretty well.
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Hmm, that is so weird. It uses portions of standard notation!!?? You need to understand what the rests and flags/beams mean. I can see how it could be sight read, but for someone like me who already can read notation I'd have to teach myself to sight read Songster tab

 

[LBS-bass]

why would anyone bother with those at all when for a long time now there have been proper tab resources that you can sight read from - as per my previous post, tabs can include rhythm (note durations and rests), articulation, etc.

Legit question: Are these widely available in printed form? The reason I ask is I think some folks are forgetting the question is about sightreading, which doesn't really imply sitting in front of a video at home, but rather being able to walk into a gig and play what's on a paper someone gives you. I never look at TAB so I don't know how much printed resources have improved (or not).

 

[dkelley]

Great illustration. The title text was a little blurry, but it's a Bartok piece and the I believe the first two words in Cyrillic say Redacted, Part 1? I couldn't read the rest. Being a trumpet player I haven't been exposed to a lot of Bartok, but was in a performance of Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra.

thanks, yea it's amazing. Part 1 (movement 1), redacted is pretty accurate, yes. Amazing stuff, for sure. This is brilliant on the violin, with super fast complex runs all over the place, complex chords, crazy jumps, very complex intervals, and even 1/4 tone parts (half fret steps) on later pages. Incredible music... he was a true genius and opened the door to new tonality for classical music.

 

[dkelley]

Well, I would argue that 90% of the notation I’ve come across, even the free stuff, is much more accurate than tab. MUCH, MUCH more accurate. It indicates to me that people who are doing notation know what the heck they are doing much more than the tab crowd.

that is absolutely correct.

 

[dkelley]

The funny thing to me is that tab has become almost semi-legit.

I corrected this line (was missing critical meaning words, sorry!): It was made popular and commonplace by people who were aiming to distribute music to those who couldn't read/write music, who wanted to share guitar parts in magazines and stuff like that to their readers easily. That was the origination of it.

It was never meant to replace standard musical notation, and standard musical notation DOES indicate what strings to play and what fingers to use, however standard musical notation also assumes a certain level of expertise on the instrument to realize what placement of the hand is possible and logical and standard, versus something highly unlikely or even impossible.

With tab, anyone with a guitar can, slowly but surely, work out how to play the notes of a song in the correct order on the correct strings, with zero musical knowledge at all. You can't with traditional notation.

Very different target audiences, but tab has now apparently taken on a second clef which is a simplified version of traditional notation for rhythm. So it works... it's much better than not having rhythm in it. So yea, I can see sight reading that effectively with practice and skill.

Having played classical guitar though, it isn't as though classical guitar composers used tab for guitar.. they notated things with traditional notation. It worked just fine. It's been a LONG time since lute was a popular instrument, and to be honest it was more of a folk instrument at the time and that coincides somewhat with the tab (advanced tab though it was) music that exists for lute. Music for it was simpler, while amazing and beautiful of course, and very constrained by the period of popularity, the instrument, and the genre that was popular at the time. The tab style notation they adopted for it worked great, and still does for lute. However bass, and guitar, and other instruments we see commonly today are not the lute. They can do and are expected to do much more complex things with much more versatility of style and playing technique and genre.

For an example of classical guitar music (spanish classical), let's look at the rodrigo guitar concerto. Guitarists never needed more than this standard notation to learn it and play it just fine. Young students having never heard it could learn it just fine from this.

sorry it's blurry. not trying to spread sheet music around, just proving a point. you can see, through the blur, the fingering information where it is needed... position information... the rest if self explanatory if you play guitar.

 

[crazyBassClown]

There's plenty of songs where there are multiple versions that all sound quite different. I learned a song recently from the version I had heard on the radio years ago. The chord progression was I-iii-ii-IV-V. Then I heard the composer recently play it solo on guitar. He played it as I-V-IV-V!!!

Not sure how that reflects differently with sheet music than a recording? The sheet music will also only tell you how a particular versions sounds, but less precisely than a recording. It simply can't convey as much information.

 

[crazyBassClown]

can you give an example? on the face of it: "composers" who use standard notation do so for a reason. and some modern recordings are best described as an "arrangement." also, there weren't any reference recordings for those who wanted to learn the latest mozart 'hit' in 1780.

Maybe if you want to get into semantics, then performers would be a better choice than composers, but for example sheet music provides very little to no information on phrasing, relative volume between notes, exact note durations and a whole lot of other stuff that a recording conveys.
When mozart had hits the only way to send music around the world was via sheet music. How much popular music from the last 70 years has spread via sheet music? I has been completely replaced by actual recordings of the music everywhere except in the world of classical...(partially)

 

[crazyBassClown]

There's not always a recording available. The most obvious example is when you're the one playing the recording session for a new piece of music. A perhaps less obvious example is when you're handed music for the first time at a rehearsal or gig and expected to read it.

There's not always sheet music available either, so what's your point exactly? For any style of music popular this century or last you'd be far more likely to get a chord sheet or a demo recording than sheet music for a recording session, orchestra's excepted.

 

[dkelley]

Not sure how that reflects differently with sheet music than a recording? The sheet music will also only tell you how a particular versions sounds, but less precisely than a recording. It simply can't convey as much information.

Interesting point. I agree that the sheet music would tell you how a particular version sounds... so I don't see the relevance of his post either that you replied to.

However, I'm wondering about your comment of the precision. What sort of precision are you talking about that standard musical notation misses out upon? I mean, there are things that are left up the artistry of the performer to decide upon, always, which as a result are not articulated often (although sometimes are)... and I'm just interested in your experience with the specifics of the information that you've encountered missing from scores that are in recordings.

I'm a huge fan of the detail and accuracy of properly written musical scores, but I am fully aware that there is room left for interpretation. It's an interesting topic. It's off topic of the thread, in theory (cuz recording > properly written traditional notation > tab > chord chart > "can you hum a few bars" LoL, but it's really interesting to talk about while we're here.

As a performer, I like the lack of specifics and therefore tend to push the artistry quite far into my own hands, with interpretation that is uniquely my own (assuming classical solo music, for example, or my take on a jaco classic, or on a jazz standard, or on something by the chili peppers). But there are those in the classical world who dislike how I do things... screw 'em LoL. Because if we played without adding any emotion or other obviously ideal emotion into our playing other than what is on the paper, it would be a perfect performance, but perfectly forgettable and emotionally distance as well imho.

Cheers

 

[crazyBassClown]

so where are the rests? The articulation?

Only slightly less missing than with sheet music

 

[crazyBassClown]

However, I'm wondering about your comment of the precision. What sort of precision are you talking about that standard musical notation misses out upon? I mean, there are things that are left up the artistry of the performer to decide upon, always, which as a result are not articulated often (although sometimes are)... and I'm just interested in your experience with the specifics of the information that you've encountered missing from scores that are in recordings.

Left up to the artistry of the performer is just a nice way of saying "can't be conveyed reasonably within the medium".
What I am saying is missing applies in the rock/pop/blues/modern music rather than the classical world, but what is missing is the subtle variations of pitch, vibrato, timing subtleties, all the stuff that the sheet music "officianados" like to call artistry to avoid admitting that sheet music can't convey it either, at least not in a practical way.

 

[dkelley]

Maybe if you want to get into semantics, then performers would be a better choice than composers, but for example sheet music provides very little to no information on phrasing, relative volume between notes, exact note durations and a whole lot of other stuff that a recording conveys.
When mozart had hits the only way to send music around the world was via sheet music. How much popular music from the last 70 years has spread via sheet music? I has been completely replaced by actual recordings of the music everywhere except in the world of classical...(partially)

I will point out though that musicians of a certain genre know the way to perform and perform all quite similarly and consistently when they choose to. Orchestras in Mozart's time no doubt played quite similarly when trying the new piece they hadn't heard. Tempos are quite clear, and phrasing and leading of melodies is well understood by classical musicians.

And for classical music, recording have absolutely not surpassed scored music. Every orchestra plays from printed music, and every orchestra performing music that is new to them do so without first going and listening to it (I'm sure there are exceptions in groups, but I've played in several orchestras... there just isn't time to go listening to new music to see what it should sound like first).

But for other styles of music, it is MUCH easier to learn it and record it on record than to score it out for distribution for other musicians to perform. Also, this sounds like an excuse, but the licensing involved in distributing music in different formats costs money.... and it is much more likely a musician will make money from a recording of a piece they composed than from a printed music publisher ripping them off to get printed parts into other musician's hands. So while what you said is true - I'm not convince that it is because recording are the superior medium for the music being played, versus recordings being a much simpler, easier, quicker, and more cost effective, and much better selling and money making way to get music distributed.

 

[N4860]

Hmm, that is so weird. It uses portions of standard notation!!?? You need to understand what the rests and flags/beams mean. I can see how it could be sight read, but for someone like me who already can read notation I'd have to teach myself to sight read Songster tab

Yes, you need to understand what the rest, flags, beams, etc. mean. But that is true of reading any type of music. You have to learn how to read it first which is true of tab and standard notation. Here's another example of a tab using windows notepad which shows the rhythm of the music as well, but in a bit less conventional way:

 

[crazyBassClown]

and every orchestra performing music that is new to them do so without first going and listening to it

As a non classically trained person who doesn't listen to classical music I have probably heard 90%+ of the music that an orchestra plays. To claim that someone who has dedicated the sort of time required to get into an orchestra hasn't heard/played virtually every piece of classical music they are likely to be asked to seems like a stretch...
Not saying they can't sight read sheet music, but the nature of an orchestra also means that a lot of the subtleties on timing are simply unachievable due to physics for such a large group so it is simply different than music based in african rythym(virtually all 20th century music).

 

[dkelley]

Left up to the artistry of the performer is just a nice way of saying "can't be conveyed reasonably within the medium".
What I am saying is missing applies in the rock/pop/blues/modern music rather than the classical world, but what is missing is the subtle variations of pitch, vibrato, timing subtleties, all the stuff that the sheet music "officianados" like to call artistry to avoid admitting that sheet music can't convey it either, at least not in a practical way.

ah, but it CAN be conveyed. It often isn't, for the reasons I've described.

It is the choice of the composer and publisher.

Standard notation has "standard" descriptors for using vibrato or not using vibrato, pitch bends, sliding into or out of notes (glissandos as well), artificial and natural harmonics, notes and rests of up to the most explicit and specific lengths.

I've performed music of that type. It's academically interesting but artistically lacking, as most of us prefer to interpret music ourselves - we are artists, not machines. Most composers (not all though) are not very great performers, and they are much happier to have an artist add their flare to the performance. However there certainly have been many who were brilliant performers as well, some of whom chose to write the interpretation in detail into the music, while others left it up to the performer. Most leave it up to the performer - by choice, not due to lack of tools to do so.

Standard notation tells you exactly how to play it, up to the level of detail that the composer wishes.

Tremolos (the real kind, not the misnamed fender kind because he had no idea about musical terminology) are not always detailed as to the speed of the tremolo - but they always sound the same in a group. As a soloist, normally you are supposed to decide yourself how to do the tremolo... but it can be specified as groupings within the current beat, or as general terms as fast or slow.

All of this is accounted for in standard notation, for anyone who wishes to write it down.

 

[dkelley]

As a non classically trained person who doesn't listen to classical music I have probably heard 90%+ of the music that an orchestra plays. To claim that someone who has dedicated the sort of time required to get into an orchestra hasn't heard/played virtually every piece of classical music they are likely to be asked to seems like a stretch...
Not saying they can't sight read sheet music, but the nature of an orchestra also means that a lot of the subtleties on timing are simply unachievable due to physics for such a large group so it is simply different than music based in african rythym(virtually all 20th century music).

I was speaking about newly composed music, which comes up several times a year for working orchestras. I was a member of a professional orchestra and two semi professional orchestras, as well as university orchestras. I've premiered several works in orchestras, in my string quartet, and as a violin soloist (and on bass guitar), just to lend experience to my claim.

And yes there are members in orchestras who've played nearly everything. But there are plenty of members who have not.

 

[Winton]

Interesting point. I agree that the sheet music would tell you how a particular version sounds... so I don't see the relevance of his post either that you replied to.

However, I'm wondering about your comment of the precision. What sort of precision are you talking about that standard musical notation misses out upon? I mean, there are things that are left up the artistry of the performer to decide upon, always, which as a result are not articulated often (although sometimes are)... and I'm just interested in your experience with the specifics of the information that you've encountered missing from scores that are in recordings.

I'm a huge fan of the detail and accuracy of properly written musical scores, but I am fully aware that there is room left for interpretation. It's an interesting topic. It's off topic of the thread, in theory (cuz recording > properly written traditional notation > tab > chord chart > "can you hum a few bars" LoL, but it's really interesting to talk about while we're here.

As a performer, I like the lack of specifics and therefore tend to push the artistry quite far into my own hands, with interpretation that is uniquely my own (assuming classical solo music, for example, or my take on a jaco classic, or on a jazz standard, or on something by the chili peppers). But there are those in the classical world who dislike how I do things... screw 'em LoL. Because if we played without adding any emotion or other obviously ideal emotion into our playing other than what is on the paper, it would be a perfect performance, but perfectly forgettable and emotionally distance as well imho.

Cheers

^This
Sheet music is the music composition in written form. Not the recording or interpretation.

 

[dkelley]

As a non classically trained person who doesn't listen to classical music I have probably heard 90%+ of the music that an orchestra plays. To claim that someone who has dedicated the sort of time required to get into an orchestra hasn't heard/played virtually every piece of classical music they are likely to be asked to seems like a stretch...
Not saying they can't sight read sheet music, but the nature of an orchestra also means that a lot of the subtleties on timing are simply unachievable due to physics for such a large group so it is simply different than music based in african rythym(virtually all 20th century music).

I'm confused.

Did you just state that virtually all 20th century music is based on african rythym?

So you mean composers like Stravinsky, George Crumb, Bartok, Penderecki, Boulez, Shoenberg, Debussy, Elliot Carter, prokofiev, Shostakovich, Britten, Ravel, Rachmaninoff?

Maybe you were excluding "classical" composers. I just thought we were talking about orchestras a second ago. Oh well, sorry if I messed up the train of thought

Cheers