Players that won't learn a note

[SteveHeissner]

I can play plenty of pop, rock, and country songs by ear. Yet, in this age, a basic knowledge of music theory is easier than ever to learn. Spend 15 minutes watching a Youtube video on music theory. You can google "which notes are in the key of..." or "what key is the song 'Mustang Sally' played in?" etc. This may be helpful when collaborating with other musicians.

If your bandmates say, "We're playing Mr. Crowley in the key of D Minor" and your ear knows what that means without ever learning music theory then you are indeed talented. Some people are like that.

 

[oldcatfish]

It is one thing to have the talent and ability to play by ear and do it well. That's sort of a rare skill and people who have it can take themselves pretty far.

The only thing is, you still have to work with others and you still have to learn the common vocabulary in order to effectively do that. It's OK to not know something because you haven't been taught it, but it's not OK to actively avoid learning things from a misguided sense of pride or "I'm better than you" or some other weird hangup that makes you defensive when you're confronted with your own deficits.

That said, if you're lucky enough to be one of those people with a great ear, it can take a bit of experience to get to the point where you understand the need to learn certain things. You might find yourself learning them gradually as you gain more experience overall. Age and experience level matter here. Someone who is relatively young and inexperienced would get the benefit of the doubt from me, but they would also get the conversation about why it's important to be open to learning about the ways other people communicate.

—Usually, even “play by ear” players pick up at least a little basic music theory eventually. Either accidentally just by experience being around trained musicians, or they go back later and learn it intentionally just so they CAN understand what their trained musician band mates are talking about.

 

[BismarckHerring]

I don't see any problem with playing with someone who doesn't know note names, as long as they can really play by ear, and you establish a basic way of communicating (string + fret number can work, I'll translate it to the rest of the band). I often enjoy playing with such people because they think less while playing.

But these people are rare, and unfortunately some people believe they are like that and use that as an excuse not to make an effort. (Like the second example in the OP)

Regarding the two people described in the OP: a bigger concern than not knowing the note names is that they apparently don't have great hearing. The first relied on her eyes over her ears to wrongly conclude that you played the wrong notes. The second one doesn't understand (either intuitively or cognitively) how scales and chords should work together. Learning some basic theory will probably be beneficial to both, but ear traing might be even more useful.

If they don't want to put in the effort, or even deny that there's a problem, then I wouldn't want them in my band. But if they are otherwise good musicians and are open to learning, then I'll give them a chance.

 

[Febs]

Once saw a guy get shamed and kicked off of this website for starting this exact same conversation. His statement was so controversial it instantly infuriated members of the site, and they began arguing with him, even though his intention apparently wasn't to start an argument but a conversation, like someone has done here. But rather than having a problem with several people who began arguing with him, the moderators told him to take his argument somewhere else and he was banned for life - or so his account of what happened went.

It wasn't even that his post was off topic, he commented on a thread about learning where the notes are on the fretboard, and his comment was that some of the best guitarists he has ever played with were self taught and did not know theory.

His opinion isn't so outlandish that he deserved to be called a troll, in fact Metallica's bass player, Cliff Burton, was the only member of the band who new theory and he began teaching the other guys at the time they were recording Master of Puppets, their third album, by which time they had been touring worldwide for years.

Similarly, Flea went to UC to learn music theory after the Red Hot Chili Peppers had recorded something like 8 or 9 albums.

I always felt sorry for that guy and thought it was wrong, the way he was treated simply for expressing an unpopular point of view. I'm almost shocked to see the same discussion being allowed, with no one attacking the OP.

I strongly suspect that there was more to the story than what you're relating here. Who was the person and when did this happen?

 

[turf3]

Those who are oddly trying to cite musicians who can't read music as idols.... you DO realize that they could all read and write nashville notation, right? or basic chord charts? Every damn one of them could figure stuff out that way or use it as a guideline to figure out where they were in the songs.

I suspect a very large number of supposedly non-reading professional musicians actually know the staff, and they say "I can't read music" either because they can't sit down and sightread Don Ellis charts at tempo, or because they want to create an image of themselves as "feral" artists whose talent is so huge that they don't need to read.

I'm positive that if you told any of the three examples above "We're doing a 16 bar blues with a bridge in Eb, the bridge is Rhythm changes" that they would immediately grasp what was needed. No, those three guitarists might not be able to sit down and read Charlie Parker solos at sight, but we're not talking about "superior sightreading' here.

 

[BassBrass]

I strongly suspect that there was more to the story than what you're relating here. Who was the person and when did this happen?

Yes for instance if "Flea went to UC to learn music theory" it was to learn an advanced aspect of it and hang out in a college setting which he probly enjoyed. He grew up around theory, he was a competant HS trumpet player so he reads trebel cleff and has done hours of arpegios in every key (I know he studdied the Arban book, a dictionary of excercises) , knows fanfairs and orchestral parts by heart, soul and bigband ryhthm parts, and probably tries jazz improv. Importantly he knows when to forget it and make a groove and transition, but it's all Informed.

I once worked with a guitarist singer who had learned the whole John Fayhe book picking method, and she was good, her strat sounded harp-like, but as far as rhythm consistancy? Didn't exist, every time was different (except for the picking patterns, but they would be shorter or longer randomly, something she called "feel" which is actually e.s.p.) It was fun for a season, but too stressful to wonder a 'what will happen? feeling all the time. I don't mind outsider musicians as long as something about them is good.
(I'm calling them outsider musicians similar to Outsider Artists, these people who invent a techniqe never went to a school or sought the usual artist contacts. Maybe live in the woods.

 

[HolmeBass]

Once saw a guy get shamed and kicked off of this website for starting this exact same conversation. His statement was so controversial it instantly infuriated members of the site, and they began arguing with him, even though his intention apparently wasn't to start an argument but a conversation, like someone has done here. But rather than having a problem with several people who began arguing with him, the moderators told him to take his argument somewhere else and he was banned for life - or so his account of what happened went.

It wasn't even that his post was off topic, he commented on a thread about learning where the notes are on the fretboard, and his comment was that some of the best guitarists he has ever played with were self taught and did not know theory.

His opinion isn't so outlandish that he deserved to be called a troll, in fact Metallica's bass player, Cliff Burton, was the only member of the band who new theory and he began teaching the other guys at the time they were recording Master of Puppets, their third album, by which time they had been touring worldwide for years.

Similarly, Flea went to UC to learn music theory after the Red Hot Chili Peppers had recorded something like 8 or 9 albums.

I always felt sorry for that guy and thought it was wrong, the way he was treated simply for expressing an unpopular point of view. I'm almost shocked to see the same discussion being allowed, with no one attacking the OP.

The two situations, as you have described them, are different. OP is not in any way justifying people who are ignorant of the names of the notes on the fingerboard. He is illustrating two examples where working with people like that has proven difficult. So pretty much the opposite of the poster you mentioned who got banned.

 

[Jazzdogg]

Most people are idiots, in nearly any field.

Half of all doctors and lawyers graduate in the bottom half of their classs...

The two most abundant elements in the universe are Hydrogen and stupidity...

 

[KevInDaBassment]

I can almost understand people who might be quicker with string and fret instead of calling notes, but not understanding that you can play the same notes in different fretboard positions is

Are they at least open to improving and learning this stuff? I have a hunch what the answer will be, but just figured I'd try and be optimistic.


EDIT: In regards to some replies, I feel it's worth noting that "theory" can mean different things to different players. Not knowing "theory" doesn't necessarily mean you don't understand a musical scale or how it works (or the patterns). Some of the artists being cited still understand these concepts and what a root note is, but may not understand the nuts and bolts of harmony or whatever. Not "knowing theory" could just mean how they pick the next chord or phrase is based on what "feels right" or "sounds good" to them. It doesn't mean you ask them to play a C major chord and they start drooling on their fretboard

 

[stringthrough]

It's not just the amateurs. Who hasn't read articles/ interviews where a well known musician will say something to the effect, "I don't know scales, I just play over patterns I've learned and used in the past". It 's laziness that causes people who gain what is to them an exceptable level of mechanical proficiency to not take the next step and work at understanding why some things make musical sense and to allow them to advance their musical ideas.

 

[Dang75]

Yes. It was the first few bars of the set, and he was making an awful row with the wrong notes. They weren't even the right notes in the wrong order. The whole song would have been awful. I'd rather stop and fix it quickly than go through the song badly.

Seems intolerant to me...

 

[MCF]

It’s funny when people use these examples. “Paul McCartney can’t read music and doesn’t know theory!” Well, you and I are not Paul McCartney….

McCartney didn’t read sheet music. But he had an implicit understanding of keys, scales, time signatures, etc. He was not musically illiterate.

 

[Koshchei]

You have it backwards. Theory describes music. Music doesn’t spring from theory, theory is a way to record and describe what musicians do.

We’d be missing an awful lot of great music if only people steeped in theory were allowed to create it.

You're right, but it goes both ways too though. Theory can explain music, but can also be used to generate music as well. It also allows collaborators to bat around ideas when creating music using a common lexicon that both should understand.

There's no downside to knowing theory.

 

[Low End Scum]

I used to not know any of my notes. I'm still not the most proficient with keys and modes as a self taught bassist. I did use studybass and hope to keep getting better. With that lack of knowledge I was still able to fund a van purchase and a record being recorded at a notable studio with band money alone, while playing a lot of shows.

All that said, if someone sent me charts or told me I needed to be on a particular note, I'd look it up. We quite literally have the pantheon of human knowledge in our pockets. Thankfully it never happened in person. By then I'd learned my neck.

You're right, but it goes both ways too though. Theory can explain music, but can also be used to generate music as well. It also allows collaborators to bat around ideas when creating music using a common lexicon that both should understand.

There's no downside to knowing theory.

Agreed, the more I learn the more I realize I need to learn but it's liberating. I've known musicians who outright think learning theory will sterilize their creativity which I've just never understood. I think maybe they, like me, have tried jamming with classically trained musicians (for me a flautist) and they couldn't jam. That's not an indictment of theory knowledge, it's that they don't teach you to "jam" aimlessly in music school to my understanding.

 

[ToneMonkey]

Yes, frustrating to those of us who want to learn how things work. But, I believe you have to approach collaborations based on what a person does right now, versus having a hidden agenda to change them. For that reason, I simply decline to collaborate with the willfully ignorant... most of the time. But there are extraordinarily talented folks who can rise above. So it's kind of a soft boundary for me.

 

[gln1955]

It's always guitarists. I have thankfully never met a keys player who didn't know the notes on their instrument or how to talk in chords, intervals, etc. I'm sure they are out there, but I can't imagine working with one who couldn't explain what they're playing in standard musical terms.

 

[turf3]

... I think maybe they, like me, have tried jamming with classically trained musicians (for me a flautist) and they couldn't jam. That's not an indictment of theory knowledge, it's that they don't teach you to "jam" aimlessly in music school to my understanding.

Don't assume.

Ever hear of a guy named Wynton Marsalis?

 

[SubSpec]

implicit understanding of keys, scales, time signatures, etc

I hadn't heard Paul was not educated in the technical aspects of music and certainly assumed he was to this point so not weighing in on that, but what you describe here is (at least from my perspective) what is meant by understanding music "by ear".

Obviously there are degrees to that. I mean most people can sit down at a piano and tap out a monophonic rendition of Twinkle Little Star by ear, but no reasonable person will say that makes them a musician who "plays by ear". However, if you have a woman writing songs that are decent enough that you (or OP rather) deem it worth working with them in a band setting, but she wrote those songs by ear and without knowing the note names or otherwise having a baseline understanding of theory, I think she is fairly deemed a musician who plays by ear.

Separately, and more generically to the thread:

I think there is a huge gradient here, on many levels, in this discussion of playing by ear and so everyone will have a different idea of what that means and what level of criticism it's worth throwing at people who don't understand the technical aspects of their craft.

While we discuss this on a forum some extremely talented person who knows literally nothing about any technical aspects of music is sitting somewhere making some brilliant music on some instrument or object they've made an instrument, and that person (who the world will probably never hear) is likely a far more talented musician than most all of us here.

 

[LBS-bass]

—Usually, even “play by ear” players pick up at least a little basic music theory eventually. Either accidentally just by experience being around trained musicians, or they go back later and learn it intentionally just so they CAN understand what their trained musician band mates are talking about.

Yes, I know, I am one of them. It's one reason I have so much empathy for people in this position. When I was young, I was the person who needed to play with others who knew more than I did and I had several mentors who were patient with me and helped me understand what I needed to know in order to communicate with musicians. It was trial by fire because I hit the ground running at 19 playing full-time, and I only knew as much as I'd been taught in school, which wasn't much, because I'd leaned so heavily on my ear throughout most of that.

There are still huge deficits in what I know, but I manage to get a lot done, and I know what I don't know and I'm not ashamed of it because I also know what I can do, and so do the people I play with. When I need to know it, I set my sights on learning it. I'm brushing up my reading skills right now because I'm about to start lessons again and I want to be able to read my assignments more easily.

I can only tell you where all the notes are on the fretboard because I've learned that through interval association. I know where all the C notes are in relation to each other, and I know that almost all the interval relationships for all the notes look exactly the same on this particular instrument, so if I play a G on the E string I can quickly find the rest of the G notes by envisioning where they are in relation to that note.

I've never had to memorize much. I learned where my anchor root notes are through association with chords that my mentors played, and I learned to associate octave intervals by playing those. I really only ever had to learn where one octave's worth of notes are located, and the rest were where they are supposed to be in relation to those.

There's a lot you can pick up on your own if you are observant and smart about it, but it seeps in through the cracks if you aren't actively studying. Then you can go back and fill in a lot of blanks if you need to later. It's not the most optimal path and I wish I'd had the discipline to ignore my ear and study harder when I was young, but I have no problem with this and I'm grateful for all the people who gave me a chance back when I knew very little.

 

[Nashrakh]

It's always guitarists. I have thankfully never met a keys player who didn't know the notes on their instrument or how to talk in chords, intervals, etc. I'm sure they are out there, but I can't imagine working with one who couldn't explain what they're playing in standard musical terms.

What gets me about a lot of keys (and guitar) players though is that they tend to think in sharps. So, screw Eb and Ab, those are D# and G#, no matter the key.