Things that surprise you about other musicians...

[glocke1]

First off, my point here isn't to criticize others, so if it looks like thats what Im doing, it isn't.

That said, there are a few things I notice about other musicians that surprise me, in no particular order.

1) Metronomes....the number of people who play instruments that don't use one of these and never have used one is surprising. I get guitar players complaining that they can't feel upbeats naturally. My answer to them is to "get a metronome"...9 times out of 10 I'm met with

2) Ears....Growing up, I had access to tuners, but the teacher I was studying with at the time was adamant about NOT using them. Instead he would reinforce tuning to a piano and using my ears to tune by harmonics. While I have a tuner in my gig bag, to this day i ever so often just ask the piano player or guitar player to throw me a G and I'll use that to tune. Again I get the , and I realize that these guys more than likely cannot tune by ear.

Theres probably other things, but those are the two biggest...

 

[two fingers]

What has ALWAYS surprised me about MOST musicians is that they get stuck in one genre of music and never branch out. It blows my mind. I love all kinds of music. But most of the musicians I have worked with over the years simply can not break away from their one and only favorite. It seems to be most prevalent in the "core" music crowd. They stay in the tiniest boxes of all. But even variety band members I have known roll their eyes when a rock song comes up, or a funk song comes up if they are rockers.

Sad really.

 

[glocke1]

What has ALWAYS surprised me about MOST musicians is that they get stuck in one genre of music and never branch out. It blows my mind. I love all kinds of music. But most of the musicians I have worked with over the years simply can not break away from their one and only favorite. It seems to be most prevalent in the "core" music crowd. They stay in the tiniest boxes of all. But even variety band members I have known roll their eyes when a rock song comes up, or a funk song comes up if they are rockers.

Sad really.

yeah actually thats a good one. Im pretty much locked into one type of music now...a tribute band. The ONLY reason for that though is that I already know that material well, want to play music, it requires little effort (in other words these days I don't have the time/energy to put into learning new stuff). My musical history though spans multiple genres. The other guys in the tribute band? They only know how to play the music from that particular band which blows my mind. Songs that should by and large be stds or that they should have at least played in some jam session somewhere are completely foreign to them.

 

[blue4]

What has ALWAYS surprised me about MOST musicians is that they get stuck in one genre of music and never branch out. It blows my mind. I love all kinds of music. But most of the musicians I have worked with over the years simply can not break away from their one and only favorite. It seems to be most prevalent in the "core" music crowd. They stay in the tiniest boxes of all. But even variety band members I have known roll their eyes when a rock song comes up, or a funk song comes up if they are rockers.

Sad really.

I agree. My band is all older than me, and when I bring up something post 1989 they look at me like I'm speaking a dead language. For me, once I started learning bass, and how to listen to the rhythm section in general, music just opened up. Like this whole other world I'd missed. How can someone be a good player and not be tempted to look somewhere other than '70s rock?

 

[ASQTec]

The inability of some guitarists to "feel" a four count, and awesome drummers who have less than stellar timing are always a surprise.

Other than that, I've had the good fortune of playing with some excellent weekend warriors over the years.

 

[brianrost]

I grew up when music ed was still common in public schools (every classroom on my elementary school had a piano!) and using a metronome was a given, as was reading music.

I don't think a metronome will help anybody feel upbeats...listening and dancing to music with strong upbeats might, though

 

[Groove Doctor]

How few players know the Nashville Number System for chords.
I - iv - ii - V7 - etc.

Or how few people have relative pitch & can hear chord progressions.
C - Am - Dm - G7

I had a brilliant guitar teacher when I was 15 to thank for this.

Edit: it's called
Roman numeral analysis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[JRA]

if you're a musician, you get to be in a pretty exclusive club, i.e., other musicians: and then you get to parse your opinions on others in the club. and then you might think that's important. that surprises me.

 

[glocke1]

I grew up when music ed was still common in public schools (every classroom on my elementary school had a piano!) and using a metronome was a given, as was reading music.

I don't think a metronome will help anybody feel upbeats...listening and dancing to music with strong upbeats might, though

it helped me....i just think most people don't know how to use them.

the chord numbering system is another good one also.

 

[Biggbass]

Honestly Nothing surprises me anymore.

 

[FilterFunk]

What has ALWAYS surprised me about MOST musicians is that they get stuck in one genre of music and never branch out. It blows my mind. I love all kinds of music. But most of the musicians I have worked with over the years simply can not break away from their one and only favorite. It seems to be most prevalent in the "core" music crowd. They stay in the tiniest boxes of all. But even variety band members I have known roll their eyes when a rock song comes up, or a funk song comes up if they are rockers.

Sad really.

Agreed.

I can understand having a specific musical foundation, or a specific favorite genre, but I can't understand allowing that to keep you from experiencing other music.

 

[catcauphonic]

When I first decided to learn bass as first instrument, I assumed that I had to learn how to read music. Was soon surprised to find out how many players don't

 

[thunderbird66]

How oblivious or ignorant they are about their tone. Mainly guitarists.

How many drummers that have timing issues. Been my experience that my right hand is a more accurate meter than a lot of drummers

 

[Aberdumbie]

What has ALWAYS surprised me about MOST musicians is that they get stuck in one genre of music and never branch out. It blows my mind. I love all kinds of music. But most of the musicians I have worked with over the years simply can not break away from their one and only favorite. It seems to be most prevalent in the "core" music crowd. They stay in the tiniest boxes of all. But even variety band members I have known roll their eyes when a rock song comes up, or a funk song comes up if they are rockers.

Sad really.

I was always fortunate that the different acts I worked with forced me to embrace other musical genres. And it has serve me well in my later years playing hymns for my church...... The biggest mystery of my entire musical lifetime has been funk. It is the most moving and rythmically alive bass music out there..... Every time I try.... I look like a white guy trying to dance.

 

[Woolber]

Why people think they play better when they're stoned. You don't. If you truly do, you are one in a million.

 

[Matthew Fisher]

How few players know the Nashville Number System for chords.
I - iv - ii - V7 - etc.

But that's not the Nashville number system, which I don't know. That's, um, whatever that's called. Roman numeral chord symbols? Dunno, but I can read it just fine.

Nashville number system - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[PillO]

2) Ears....Growing up, I had access to tuners, but the teacher I was studying with at the time was adamant about NOT using them. Instead he would reinforce tuning to a piano and using my ears to tune by harmonics. While I have a tuner in my gig bag, to this day i ever so often just ask the piano player or guitar player to throw me a G and I'll use that to tune. Again I get the , and I realize that these guys more than likely cannot tune by ear.

And how did he think a piano should be tuned!?

 

[Coolhandjjl]

I was surprised to find out that Vince Furnier did not play Eddie Haskell from 'Leave it to Beaver'.

 

[enders89]

And how did he think a piano should be tuned!?

Maybe a tuning fork?

 

[shawshank72]

The inability to play the same thing twice.