I don't know anything about different positions, octaves and what parts of the harmonica is different keys etc. not even on the chromatic. I just freestyle a little bit with the diatonics on backing tracks and play jazz + classical music on the chromatic.
Did famous players like SBW II, Little Walter etc. learn any theory or did they all just learn by themselves? I heard somewhere that most old school players on other instruments are like this as well. Like Buddy Guy for example.
Will it help learning all the theory or will it slow down the creativity? This is from someone who's played the diatonic for 6 months on and off and chromatic for 1 month straight so i have 0 experience compared to everyone else on here haha. Excuse my English :)
There will come a time when every serious player will need to know a bit of music theory. Let's say you're playing at an open mic jam and the band calls out the key. You could wait for them to start playing and toot on each harmonica you have until you find the right one or you could just know from your studies and play the right harp from the get go.
So you're good enough by ear to just know the right harp to use when you hear them play. Now you want to call a song. How do they know what key you're going to be in if you don't tell them? Not everyone can play by ear.
I put off learning theory for a too long. Once I started learning (and I still am learning everyday) improvisation became much easier because I now understand what will fit. You could probably figure it out with some trial and error, but why not learn a little theory to reduce trial and error time? So even if you never ever ever play with a band, music theory will be beneficial, even if you don't want to go too deep into it.
---------- Brad
Last Edited by on Jul 20, 2011 10:10 AM
Why not go for anything that will help you understand music better? Sure, it takes effort, but the rewards are worth it. You don't NEED it to play, but why not improve yourself any way you can? ---------- The Iceman
When you stand back and look at Music Theory Forest, it is overwhelming to think you have to memorize every tree, every branch, every leaf of the forest. Well, it's not like that. You don't have to learn it all at once. You don't even have to learn all there is. Just learn one tree at a time as you come to it. It is useful, and I think it's interesting, too.
Try hard to learn absolutely no theory. When people try to tell you the key of the song, beg them not to. Use your ear for everything you do. I recommend you scrape off the key name of your harmonicas so you cannot read if you are holding a C harp or an A harp. Do not read any posts that talk about theory.
Get married and have two kids. Make sure your wife will not work. Quit your day job and support your family on your music performances only.
No, theory isn't necessary, nor is sight-reading. Just a LOT of hard work. Hours and hours a day: listening, jamming, asking questions of other players, copying recordings by other players in a painstaking way, learning what makes music tick. There's no shortcut to mastery. It takes a LOT of hard work--a lot of obsessive, focused hard work.
Not everybody wants to do that. Some people just want to dick around. The question "Do I really need to learn theory?," I've discovered, sometimes indicates a person who just doesn't want to work very hard. (I make no assumptions about you. I'm just speaking from experience.)
Knowing a little theory can save you a lot of time. It can clear up mysteries. "Why does the 6 draw sound particularly good as a wailing tone when you're on the 9th bar of a 12 bar blues?" "Oh, I see: it's the fifth of the V chord." That sort of thing. "Why does it sound different, a little....weird, on the I chord?" "Oh, I see: over the I chord, it's the 9th: it's a chordal extension, part of a series that goes root, third, fifth, seventh, ninth, eleventh, thirteenth." "What's the thirteenth?" "It's a major sixth played as part of a dominant seventh chord. Since the 6th and the dominant seventh are only half a step apart, there's a dissonance, but since the 6th harmonizes so sweetly with the other notes in the chord, the chord as a whole has a semi-sweet flavor."
Theory can be fun and liberating. The moment it's not, I lose interest. That's why I never became a jazz player: I didn't want to do the hard work. But the modest amount of theory that I learned at age 19 during a seven-week summer session at the Berklee College of Music turned out to have profoundly enriched my musical sensibility for the rest of my life. It's given me an edge as a blues player, in fact. It's enabled me to jazzify my blues. I can't play jazz, but I can play jazzified blues, and that's where my soul is.
But no, I'm being entirely serious in the opening paragraph of this post. If you're interesting in playing blues harmonica, you don't need to learn theory. But you DO need to learn music, in depth, if you want to play well. And there's no shortcut for that.
Last Edited by on Jul 20, 2011 10:45 AM
Obviously, I am kidding although I think it would make a great experiment. My Youtube videos are all about theory basics as they apply to the harmonica. Here is the first video. The overwhelming loud distorted harmonica is fixed by the second video. There are 41 videos so far.
First, let me confirm Michael Rubin's Meat and Potatoes youtube theory tutorial is an excellent place to learn some theory. I'm using his lessons right now in conjunction with a book entitled How to Read Music by Howard Shanet. Those two resources combined are helping me in leaps and bounds with the theory aspect of learning to play blues harp.
Having said that, I concur with Adam's opening statement 100%. If you could only do one, most would obviously have fun trying to play rather than learn theory (who wouldn't?, and even michael would agree with that, see his first lesson). In the end, it all boils down to how serious you are about that little pocket full of soul. If you're a non-serious hobbyist (and there's nothing wrong with that) by all means skip the theory. But if you're committed in any way, learning a little theory can only help.
If you've got any intellectual curiosity at all about this little instument, michael's youtube videos will be a blast. You can knock off the first ten lessons in about an hour.
I'm nowhere near where I want to be, but at least my eyes don't glaze over anymore when hvyj gets his keyboard typing. I fade in and out now. Based on a few days of working on it, I probably wouldn't have had to ask the question I did about major and minor keys a while back.
Actually I still would have to, but now the answers are starting to make sense to me.
Give it a whirl...you can always drop it if it starts to bore you.
My theory is mediocre, but what I have helps me a lot and every new piece I pick up is like finding another missing piece of a jigsaw puzzle. It's like having words for things you didn't know there were words for.
DUDE!!! You're a HARMONICA player!! You don't need no stinkin theory!! I'd just blow that stuff off and solo your way onto the big stage!!!!
Last Edited by on Jul 20, 2011 11:50 AM
I suppose it depends on where you want your harp playing to take you. I'm sure medieval minstrels didn't know much theory but they probably got on OK. The trouble starts when you want to play with other people. That's when you find out how little you know. ----------
I've got a degree in music, and I don't believe for a moment that you need to understand music theory in order to play harp well. As has already been said, it can help you to understand certain things, e.g. a 9th is the same thing as a 2nd, and, as such, would be treated the same in terms of harmony.
There are a zillion other things like that, which can be written down and presented as theories, but to learn them is analogous to learning to speak a language and then learning the rules of grammar. The latter is not strictly necessary, unless, that is, you intend to teach those rules.
Don't forget that the conventions that make up most types of music came before the theories that were later used to describe those conventions. There are exceptions to that (Schoenberg's 12-note system comes to mind) but the Blues ain't one of them.
EDIT: Those conventions, in the case of the Blues - are what musicologists would just call aural traditions, i.e. they're generally picked up and passed on by ear. ---------- YouTube SlimHarpMick
Last Edited by on Jul 20, 2011 1:59 PM
After your done with Theory then you can start with Harmony. Classical and Jazz. ---------- Emile "Diggs" D'Amico a Legend In His Own Mind How you doin'
"There are a zillion other things like that, which can be written down and presented as theories, but to learn them is analogous to learning to speak a language and then learning the rules of grammar. The latter is not strictly necessary, unless, that is, you intend to teach those rules."
Yes, there are some things you can learn which will make it easier to play the harp, but they don't constitute music theory.
When someone asks, "is music theory necessary?" the answer is, "it depends what you think you mean by music theory." Or rather, the simple answer is no, but that's only because you don't really mean music theory.
I read things on this forum that a bassist or a drummer would laugh at. The guy who asks, "what key is this chromatic harp in?" clearly doesn't even know what a piece's tonic note is or what one even sounds like. These are things you learn at school at the age of 10. They aren't music theory.
"What's the difference between major and minor?" may be verging on theory, but you should still already know it by the time you are 10.
That's why I say, buy the cheapest keyboard you can find and pay for a piano lesson or two, or find some on YouTube.
----------
Andrew. ----------------------------------------- Those who are tardy do not get fruit cup.
@ Andrew: Thanks to you too, that is, if you're not getting me mixed up with harmonicanick, who we have also - a Nick and a Mick.
Aside from that, I think your post touches on something that causes a great deal of mystification in those who are new to harp, namely: you don't have to understand a whole lotta theory in order to get up on stage, but the guys up there do expect you to understand a few very rudimentary things about the music you intend to play with them, e.g. the difference between major and minor.
Fortunately, most - or should I say many? - basic harp tutor books cover this stuff in sufficient detail; they generally explain 1st, 2nd and 3rd position and how to use them. That should be enough to get people off the mark. If they want to explore other positions and techniques - OBs - then they should master the other stuff first and the rest will make more sense. The extra knowledge isn't hard; it's just additional. ---------- YouTube SlimHarpMick
I like better what Frank Zappa says on Live at the Roxy in the preamble to Beebop Tango: "This piece is like jazz in its own peculiar way; jazz isn't dead, it just smells funny." ---------- YouTube SlimHarpMick
Looks like I might have to do some Tofu and Brown Rice videos on Theory. That's a lot of Tofu and Brown Rice. LOL ---------- Emile "Diggs" D'Amico a Legend In His Own Mind How you doin'
"When you stand back and look at Music Theory Forest, it is overwhelming to think you have to memorize every tree, every branch, every leaf of the forest. Well, it's not like that. You don't have to learn it all at once. You don't even have to learn all there is. Just learn one tree at a time as you come to it. It is useful, and I think it's interesting, too."
Well, now I'm realizing that in one aspect (a big aspect) of music theory I disagree with myself...line for line. Once in a while y'all start talking about 3rds and 6ths and flatened 7ths and you can play a 6th over this chord but in a minor key blah blah blah. I know what you're talking about, but I can't see it in my mind's eye, while y'all spit it out like it's printed indside your eyelids.
To learn specifically what all that means, I'd have to memorize the names of notes in several types of scales in 12 keys. Yeah, I can learn to play them, but memorize all those note names??!! The thought of that overwhelms me. I can memorize one scale (meaning note names), but while I'm working on the next, I'll most likely forget the first one. Anyway, besides learning the scales, I'll have to remember where they all fit. I feel like a "counting" horse in a room full of mathemeticians!
So, in this regard, I'm with Shajan's original question: "Is it really neccessary?"
I get the feeling I'm overcomplicating the whole thing in my head. There must be something simple or obvious hidden right under my big nose.
Michael Rubin: Will your Meat & Taters be headin' this way?
Last Edited by on Jul 20, 2011 9:43 PM
That seems to be the gist of what some are saying: "Just play by ear." That seems like a good start, but I'm not sure it's enough. Some of the others seem to have those names and their sounds well connected.
Last Edited by on Jul 20, 2011 11:21 PM
Well as someone who has been playin' a loong time but who only in the last few years tried to get some theory....one message to any of you young guys starting out...yes learn some theory. The Harmonica is starting to be a valid instrument to some serious musicians(and audiences) and the reason isn't LW BW etc ,it is because some players have put in the hard yards to learn theory and can now put our beloved instrument onto any stage in any musical context and deliver the goods. You can no longer (especially if you want to have music as a career)just learn the Blues scale and wail on the 4 draw and i'm not to sure either on how long even weekend warriors will be around with that attitude either.And i am one. Learn it,soak it up and then go out on stage and use it.With all the info available these days i know that if i was just starting out i'd be into theory like a koala up a gum tree.
Gene, To answer your question, yes Meat and Potatoes is headed this way, but the Youtube process is incredibly slow. I have time and energy to make around one 10 minute video a week. After 40 lessons, I am just beginning to get to where most of my private hour long lesson students get to after two months of private lessons. With you tube,there is no way to check your mastery of the content. I am recommending private lessons if you really want to understand this quickly. Something Meat and Potatoes has gone over already is the major scales. I recommend memorizing them by playing them on the chromatic. When those are memorized, the rest will fall into place.
Andrew, to be fair, the consensus on the chromatic thread was eventually that the song was in C, and he was using the slide, which could lead you to wonder if he was using a different chromatic harp, or if you had some accidentals thrown in to the key which can make it difficult to determine the key.
As to the memorizing all the leaves on the trees- in science there is this great thing called fractals. They are repeating patterns that can generate complex shapes. Music, keys, names of notes, you can look at them all like patterns. If you learn the underlying pattern it starts to get much easier to remember all the little branches because the parts you forget you can figure out and figuring things out is a great way to remember things. That's why I'm always pushing the circle of fifths and keyboards. With a keyboard in front of you and a circle of fifths handy you can figure out everything from harp positions, to key signatures, to major and minor chords, to modes, progressions, and a whole bunch of other things I'm sure.
<opinion> At one extreme you have people who like to break things down, analyse them, reduce them to a set of rules: give everything a name.
Other people like to simply create, flow freely and let their sense guide them.
Neither is wrong. Both approaches can create something beautiful.
But all the theory in the world won't help if you can't put it into practice. Similarly, all the creativity in the world won't help you if you need a common language to communicate your ideas with others.
In practical terms, there's no difference between playing an extension tone (taking an example from another thread) and playing a note that sounds pretty over a chord. It's just what you call it.
Nothing wrong with learning theory. Plenty you can do without it. It's not a competition. </opinion>
The most effective use of theory is to make a player very comfortable about knowing what he can play, where to find the notes, and what sounds good so that when he's actually playing, he can forget all about theory and just play.
But, on a different level, knowing theory can also be very helpful in figuring out what to play on unfamiliar material when you can't seem to do it by ear alone.
Some players just have a naturally better ear than others.
"In practical terms, there's no difference between playing an extension tone (taking an example from another thread) and playing a note that sounds pretty over a chord. It's just what you call it."
If we don't know the the name of the pretty-sounding note and how it relates to the chord, we'll have a harder time finding the right pretty note over a similar chord in a different song. Having names for things helps us remember them.
Most musicians wouldn't call that theory, just basic musicianship.
Last Edited by on Jul 21, 2011 9:19 AM
I had 2 piano jazz piano teachers in college. 1 was a longstanding name jazz player in Detroit. He came up jamming, so his teaching was "go out and play as many gigs/jams as you can, play everything and eventually you will learn which notes not to play". The other guy was introverted Bill Evans type who told me that understanding music theory will get you where you want to go sooner. Bill Evans type was right. ---------- The Iceman
"Most musicians wouldn't call that theory, just basic musicianship."
True enough, but the problem is that so many harmonica players are oblivious to what you are calling basic musicianship. As a matter of fact, most of the harp players I know personally are resistant if not actively hostile to any attempts at discussing or explaining such things. Maybe that's why so many musicians are so contemptuous of harmonica players in general.
First thing you learn in any teaching/training programme is that different people learn in different ways.
@Iceman, for you the theory road was best, for me the getting out and doing it was best. There's no right or wrong, that's what I was trying to say - we all learn differently. The OP was asking whether it was worth the time. I suspect, for his own circumstances, he already knows the answer.
What bugs me though is the idea that somehow, learning 'esoteric' knowledge allows you to join the secret musicians society from which most harp players are barred. In my experience it's your conduct and playing that gains you respect as a musician, not your knowledge of classical Greek modes. It is telling, that two posters here who have serious academic, musical credentials are the two who are playing down the importance of theory when it comes to harp playing.
As for that pretty little note - I'm sure I could find it just as quickly myself without knowing its name. :-)
"What bugs me though is the idea that somehow, learning 'esoteric' knowledge allows you to join the secret musicians society from which most harp players are barred. In my experience your conduct and playing that gains you respect as a musician,.."
Yeah, if a player plays well, that's what counts. But, for better or for worse, the ability to communicate in musical terms tends to give a player credibility which not uncommonly gets the player opportunities to play that he might not get otherwise. I'm not saying this is how it should be, but in my experience that is sometimes how it is.
On the other hand, there are formally trained musicians out there who know all the theory and lingo but whose musical abilities don't include being able to play their instrument with any skill.
Last Edited by on Jul 21, 2011 3:07 PM
Ok real world practical example. I'm probably between a beginner and intermediate on adam's scale (I fit elements of both descriptions) leaning more toward beginner.
I found a song I might like to try to jam to and so I researched what key it was in (my ears aren't good enough to get it without much work..in true beginner style I was looking for a short cut). My research turned up G minor, at which point I was confused "does that still mean C harp if I want to jam in cross harp style?" So I ask on this forum and the answers were great.
toddgreene gave me the quick and dirty answer I ASKED FOR "yeah, still a C harp let 'er rip", hvyj launched into a much more intricate answer which included veering into the major/minor key thing....had my head spinning. BUT...it inspired me to circle back and review some of Michael Rubin's free theory youtube vids and some literature I already had on music.
Now did any of the theory actually help me immediately jam better to the song, NO cause my chops ain't that great to begin with, BUT had I known the little bit of theory (and I agree its barely "theory" as most musicians understand that word) I may not have had to ask the question to begin with. At a minimum, the complex answers that were generated would have made a helluva lot more sense to me than they did at the time.
I just think if you're in it for the long haul..it can only help to have a little idea of what's going on theoretically.
Last Edited by on Jul 21, 2011 3:52 PM
Learning theory shouldn't be to join some elite group or even to talk about it with other musicians. One can learn just to make better musical choices when playing and never even admit one knows theory.
How do you talk to musicians without knowing basic music theory?
I could move to Mexico City and Refuse to learn Spanish! That would be pretty stupid, Right? --------------------------------------------------
I was just talking to an old guitar player named Eddy in Waukegan today. I ran into him at the college there. He had a guitar slung across his back. We started talking about theory. Well, not theory but the need for theory.
He was talking about how he Could play but didn't have the "Education Part". He said that at Least 25 times. Seemed Heavily fixed on that. Talked about talking to his guitar player friends and not knowing what they were talking about. They would always tell him, you have to get the education stuff.
He was a cool guy. Just kept saying he needed to get "The Education Part".
..... I don't know where I'm going with this so I'll stop writing.
Where you're going with this is that he's basically saying he never bothered to learn theory, but he regrets that he hadn't.
Last Edited by on Jul 21, 2011 7:13 PM
I know little about the modes. I know that the modes are what you get when you play an octave on the white notes of the piano and start on a note other than C, and I know that the Dorian mode is what you get when you play D to D on the white keys. I also know that the Dorian mode runs: root, second, minor third, fourth, fifth, major sixth, flat seventh, octave. That's about it for me and the modes. I also know that the Dorian mode, which contains the devil's interval (flat fifth) between the minor third and the major sixth, requires that whatever song you play it over have a dominant seventh chord rather than a minor or minor seventh chord when the chord progression moves (if it moves) to the fourth. Minor-key songs that move to a minor or minor seventh chord on the IV chord require a natural or harmonic minor scale.
That's all I know about the modes. I can't tell you what the mixolydian (or lydian) mode is, or what scales you play over it. I haven't needed to know that to play the stuff I've played over the course of my career.
This cessation-of-knowledge point in my own musical education isn't a good or bad thing. It's just where I am: I got that far with theory, but no further. I happen to love jazz chords, like the V13b9, but I can't tell you what scale to play over them. I'm sure my case isn't unusual. Each of us, except for the jazz virtuosos, has a certain amount of harmonic knowledge. (The jazz virtuosos know it all; they're a different breed.) The modest amount that I have, compared with wholly untutored blues harp guys, has given me a slight edge, and I've tried to make the most of it. But my knowledge pales besides guys who play jazz chromatic, like Will Galison, Randy Singer, Rob Paparozzi, Buddha, any of those guys. Even Jason with his modal scales. I'm a primitive. Still, it's possible to go a long way in the blues harp world with a little bit of harmonic knowledge, and I would highly recommend that every player take a course in basic harmony and maybe even a course in basic jazz harmony. As a blues harp player, it's good to be able to have a conversation with a horn player based on modest knowledge rather than complete ignorance.
Last Edited by on Jul 22, 2011 1:54 AM
