• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Double Bass Teaching Someone Who Does Not Read Music

#21
Anonymatt, sing - that's the best thing you can do for your aural learning, as you call it.

I recently started playing from John Patitucci's, "60 Melodic Etudes." I played through the first one a time or two, but then put down my bass and bow and sang the entire thing, starting slower than the indicated tempo, working up to just faster than tempo, and using the European names of the notes (what people called "fixed do") as my "lyrics." It's great exercise for your ears - just do it with whatever an appropriate level of difficulty is for you, and no one cares if you sound like a frog or have to switch octaves all over the place. All musicians should be able to sing, and sing in tune.

-S-
 
  • Like
Reactions: Anonymatt
#24
Jeff Bonny said:
Take away reading and you still have music.
Click to expand...

Very good remark! I don't understand why not wanting to read is a problem for a teacher. The reading part is not the most important part of the music especially when you are not playing classical. Consider it a challenge for you as a teacher to teach someone who doesn't read. You will be forced to use different teaching methods which brings you out of your comfort zone which is good. I also teach guitar and electric bass and have many students who don't want to read. It takes many years to be able to read music fluently and that can be distracting and demotivating in the beginning to make (real) music. You might even want to teach them some tabs or another method just for memorization. You can teach them the names of all the tones on the neck so he still knows what he is doing and he will still understand the music theory. And don't forget there are many other cultures where music is never notated and is always taught orally.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Rebop
#25
Theres a great little iPad and iPhone (+ Android) App called iRealB which is well worth exploring - you may already know it? It places the person in a trio situation and they can practice one bar at a time / loop over chosen chords or several bars of their favourite jazz tune, learn scales, improvise, turn the volumes of the other instruments up and down compose their own chords and jam along etc. Like all things when first starting out the experience has to be engaging and enjoyable. There are plenty of skills to learn and the App brings structure to practice.

I don't however envy you the challenge to teach bowing and communicate ideas without being able to refer to notation or written music. I suspect you would need to devise an alternative way of recording bowing concepts and desirable sounds. Perhaps getting underway with absolute basics first and then trying a more sideways approach to see if the writing and reading part can discretely evolve into the mix.

For me the biggest leaps I have made in jazz have come from the experience of reading the classical dots , i.e. being taken out of my comfort zone to areas I would never have discovered and then putting that learning into back into improvisation where the fingers know intuitively what and were to play. Thats maybe something to grow into over time. Good luck with it!

 
#27
I just saw "Keep On Keepin' On" - the documentary about Clark Terry who passed recently. It focuses on a gifted student of his who is blind and the film often shows CT teaching him verbally. CT himself at the time of documentary was virtually blind himself due to diabetes.

Food for thought and the film is definitely worth any teachers time much less if you love CT's music.
 
#31
neilG said:
I wouldn't have a problem teaching someone who didn't want to learn to read. Imagine if you had a blind student.
Click to expand...

How DO they learn, Neil? As you once told me, we play what we see, play what we feel, we play what we hear, and these ideas are frequently interchangeable. Not so for a blind person.? "Chapeu" to both musicians and educators, though!
 
Last edited:
#32
Andy Mopley said:
How DO they learn, Neil? As you once told me, we play what we see, play what we feel, we play what we hear, and these ideas are frequently interchangeable. Not so for a blind person.? "Chapeu" to both musicians and educators, though!
Click to expand...
I can't really say how they learn but I don't think it's any different than when a sighted musician picks out a tune without music, except that they probably have a heightened memory for sounds.
 
#33
Andy, "chapeu?" Isn't that French for a hat?

DoubleBassBass, I just bought that iRealPro app last night - was $13, I think. OMG, what a wonderful thing that is. It took just a minute to find song lists, and I put All The Things You Are on, muted the bass, connected the headphone output of my iPad to a combo amp, grabbed the upright and had a great time playing. What a great use of technology!

-S-
 
  • Like
Reactions: Jeff Bonny
#34
Steve - thats good to hear! If you haven't already discovered it theres an impressive free library on the App web site (accessible via the App itself) where there are literally thousands of tunes - theres one called '1300 jazz standards' or something to that effect which I found real rich pickings …keeps me out of mischief anyway! All the best with it, Peter (doublebassbass).
 
#35
Peter, I think that 1300 standards list was where I looked for, and found, All The Things You Are.

To bring this back to the original topic, this app would be a great way for someone who cannot read music to practice playing tunes. Although I used the tempo it came up with, I think you can slow down or speed up anything you want.

-S-
 
#36
Steve well come to 2015. :)

If you like iRealPro, then you need to also get Drumgenius and Time Guru. All my practicing revolves around my phone now, either through playing along with music, listening, apps, etc.

IRealB is cool. Drumgenius is a godsend.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Jeff Bonny

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back