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Learning other peoples songs to improve your playing

#21
As someone who's still got a great deal to learn I find learning other people's songs to be of tremendous benefit when I go to forge my own path/groove. Granted they're still cripplingly basic they're getting better all the time. And as much as I would like to take the credit its borrowing bits n' pieces or little tricks from other's songs that made them better.
 
#22
Try to get a degree in music without doing hours upon hours of transcriptions, whether in theory class, ear training, solo technique, music history, chord analysis... all are different forms of learning someone else's music, all healthy in giving a musician a foundation on which to build their own voice. Just my opinion, but I think transcription, which is useful whether you are writing it out or just committing it to muscle memory, is a big part of the development process.
 
#26
This is common sense, no? I mean, how else does one get a handle on structure, technique, and psychology without analyzing the music of others? Without it, there is no meaningful frame of reference. You can't learn how to feel music out of a textbook, though you can get an academic understanding of the formalities.

Now, when you say 'analyze', if you mean attempting to break it down to a molecular level to identify what makes it 'work' or what makes it different (assuming it is), I submit that that's largely a waste of time, because music is not a science practiced in a lab, and music theory doesn't explain odd exceptions. On the other hand, if by 'analyze' you mean that you become generally conversant and familiar with HOW various music flows from discernible structures and how to evoke different styles of music based on rhythms and harmonies, there is no way NOT to analyze the music of others.

Trick question?
 
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#27
I have some books and DVD's by Carol Kaye. In fairness to the lady I dont think she actually means not to listen to, "borrow from," and then put your own take on things. As she is a jazz musician, it would be incredible if she advocated not listening to other peoples music. If memory serves correctly, on one of the books/DVD's she likens learning music to learning to driving a car...i.e. learn the important things like where the brake is, how to steer, change gears etc. No need (unless you want to be a D.I.Y. mechanic ) to know what's going on under the bonnet (..."hood".." to you USA guys !). :D

My loose interpretation of this would be to yes, know your theory, but dont neglect to develop your ear.
 
#28
Of course learning other peoples stuff and analyzing it is beneficial.
It's the best possible answer to "how do I apply theory?"

No one should fear a loss of originality in this process.
Original ideas come form copying the ideas of others,
understanding how those ideas function in their context,
breaking down the ideas into the smallest functional bits,
and then re assembling those bits according to your personal taste and understanding of context.
 
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#29
I don't think she's against "playing other people's stuff".........95% of music is playing "other people's stuff" no matter what you're playing ( from a basic C major scale on up to the works of Mozart).

I think she's referring to too much analysis of the "way" people did it.

You get these people on the net that will dissect the works of Thelonius Monk until hell freezes over (for example), intricately field-stripping every bar of music he ever played without realizing
that he went with basics and built from that in his way.

I agree with her..you can certainly overthink it. Thinking is not doing.

It does pay to have knowledge though........the more you know about chords, chord types and progressions the better off you'll be.

That said I wonder how many Delta blues players gave a crap about or even knew whether they were playing a pentatonic or chromatic scale....or anything else.

But as said, you get these people nowadays who will take a particular riff/song by a modern band and hold it up as the Holy Grail of Music...wanting to know the deep theory behind why they played a passage a certain way.

The answer as to why they played it that way is:-

(1) because they could

(2) because they wanted to
 
#30
Was it Stanley Clarke who said something to the effect of, when I'm in the practice room I work on technique and scales tirelessly, and when I'm performing I try to forget all of it and just play. Transcribing and studying existing music, along with mechanical and technical exercise gives you the facility to express your own creativity.
 
#31
Clef_de_fa said:
...I just find it quite deceiving to know that the music style that is all about improvisation isn't improvised at all.
Click to expand...

What is your personal definition of improvised? The reason I ask, is that as I work through the process of learning music in general and jazz in particular, I've found that my definition of what happens in jazz has shifted from "improvised", which basically means "made up on the spot" to "communicated" which I take to mean, "expressing a sentiment using an established framework".

Using the English language as an example, we communicate using 26 letters, arranged in agreed upon patterns called words. We use words in an established framework to make sentences which expresses some kind of sentiment. How you choose to arrange the letters and words can make you sound like Winston Churchill... Or Larry the Cable Guy...

In Western music we use 12 notes, which you can arrange into patterns. then you can arrange these patterns in various ways to create musical sentences, or phrases. How you choose to arrange these notes, patterns and phrases can make you sound like Chick Corea or John Coltrane. Or someone else...

But the take away from all that, is that it's not made up. To me, "improvisation" operates within a framework, but of course, music being what it is, it's simply not as tightly defined as using words and sentences. But the point is to communicate.

I saw this video which was billed as "the worlds worse music" A computer program was created to generate music that has absolutely no pattern associated with it. Since the human brain is pattern oriented, the music naturally was horrible. There was nothing to connect to. When I listen to Coltrane, I can here certain phrases that he uses a lot. Like in nearly every song he plays. It's like when we use sentences with a lot of "and" and "the" or "of", etc. There are things we just say a lot in almost all of our personal communication. Those are the "licks" of language. We don't make up words when we talk, so improvised solos, to me, is no different.

So ultimately, you are correct. It's not improvised in that it's not made up, in the strict sense of the word. But it does happen instantaneously which gives the impression of being made up.
 
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#32
I get what you're saying and I agree, where I'm still like "maybe" is because the player knows the Framework, knows the theme, knows everything and has put the time to prepare something.

Where I live we have a music artist that try to create some "sculpture musical" by making a few people play together without anything prepare. Know one know what they will play, nor what someone else will be playing and just try to create on the spot guided by that music artist.

It is like oone of the audition I did to go to college. We had to play a walking bass on one theme of our choosing and do a walking bass on the spot on something the teacher will provide. So of course nothing will be improvized on the one you know because it will be prepare, you have some phrases already ready to fit in that "subject" sure you may connect them like you want that day but you use what you prepared. While the chord progression provided by the teacher is unknown and in that case, at the same time you hear it and read it, you create. To me you're closer to improvisation in that situation.
 
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#33
Clef_de_fa said:
I get what you're saying and I agree, where I'm still like "maybe" is because the player knows the Framework, knows the theme, knows everything and has put the time to prepare something.

Where I live we have a music artist that try to create some "sculpture musical" by making a few people play together without anything prepare. Know one know what they will play, nor what someone else will be playing and just try to create on the spot guided by that music artist.

It is like oone of the audition I did to go to college. We had to play a walking bass on one theme of our choosing and do a walking bass on the spot on something the teacher will provide. So of course nothing will be improvized on the one you know because it will be prepare, you have some phrases already ready to fit in that "subject" sure you may connect them like you want that day but you use what you prepared. While the chord progression provided by the teacher is unknown and in that case, at the same time you hear it and read it, you create. To me you're closer to improvisation in that situation.
Click to expand...

Even in the case of playing something unknown with your teacher, it's still just a chord progression using one of the 5 chord qualities, right? It's not something you haven't assimilated at some level, even if the execution isn't "perfect".

I was working with my teacher once and we determined that in 12 keys, there are 63 unique diatonic chords (if I remember correctly) You don't count the ones that repeat in other keys or relative minors. So I made up these flash cards to help me work through them. Every now and then, I'll pick 5 or 6 random ones and lay them out. Then I play a line using those chords. It's not a "real" progression but it gets me into reading weird stuff.

I guess the point I'm getting at is that in any situation you can only play your experience, whether it's well rehearsed or done on the fly. But I get what you are saying in that the unknown thing will be more free. In my band I know I tend to stick to walking lines that I'm familiar with but every now and then I do something totally unexpected and sometimes, that thing becomes the thing I do. On one gig, I completely changed my bassline for Bobby Timmon's song Moanin' right on the spot. Now my band mates want me to play that line all the time. My drummer who is really a great drummer and hard to please, called it a genius bassline and I have no idea where it came from. But I'm pretty sure it came from some experience I've had before.

Also know that I'm not trying to be contrary to your point of view. I'm just starting to wrap my head around what jazz is about, so however I feel about the process today is liable to change years down the road.
 

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