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Dirty-South Blues Harp forum: wail on! >
Eye vs Ear
Eye vs Ear
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wolfkristiansen
259 posts
Jan 12, 2014
12:43 PM
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This has been discussed before. How many people in this forum learned to play harmonica by sight? How many by ear? Or, more realistic, how many learned primarily by sight and how many primarily by ear?
I learned, and still learn, by ear.
I tried to learn by sight. In 1974 I bought Tony "Little Son" Glover's 1969 book, "Blues Harp". Great book. For the blues lovers of that decade, it was THE harmonica instruction book. It was "hip". I read it, used it, and learned from it. It was words and diagrams, no accompanying record or tape. A few years later, I lent it to a casual friend, and never got it back.
Here are the playing instructions I remember, conveyed by way of tab: "Blow or suck in the hole shown by the number. Arrow pointing up-- blow; arrow pointing down-- suck; bent arrow-- bend". That was basically it.
Glover's tab system said little or nothing about the subtle nuances of timing, note length and pitch shading that inform every instance of great blues harmonica playing, but it was a start. The book's strength, for me, was its ability to inspire me to keep practising; keep learning. It did that, in spades. I read it from cover to cover, many times. It's a classic book and still in print.
My greatest learning, however, came from listening to and copying, as best I could, recordings of blues harmonica players. It all came together in 1974 for me. That year I lived alone; the only year of my life I've found myself in that situation. I could make whatever noise I wanted, whenever I wanted. It was great; try it some time. 12 hour practice sessions. I memorized and learned to play these songs: Little Walter-- Juke; Little Walter-- Mellow Down Easy; Junior Wells-- Messin' With the Kid; Slim Harpo-- The Music's Hot. The rewind button on my Philips tape recorder was my best friend.
Nothing in print, be it tab notation or classical musical notation (quarter notes, rests, etc.) can come close to accurately capturing what is actually happening when a blues harp is played. I go further to say that classical musical notation cannot capture the exact timing in most black music. Winslow, Iceman and Adam, feel free to jump on me.
Learning by ear is easy for me. It may not be so easy for others, I understand that. Different strokes for different folks. My ears have served me well, but I acknowledge that the ability to read music (i.e. use eyes, not just ears) makes for a better musician.
Back to my question-- who mostly use their eyes to learn, and who mostly use their ears? There might be a few who started out with one approach but switched to the other. There will be many who say "I use both". I get it. But I'm still interested in what you MOSTLY use.
Cheers,
wolf kristiansen
p.s. I know a classically trained pianist who can play any sheet music placed before her with feeling, rhythm and grace. She once asked me, "You play by ear. How do you do that?" I didn't know what to say to her. I thought about Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder; they stroked the keyboard and made beautiful music looking at nothing but the images in their mind.
In the end, I told her to turn out the lights in her music room, hit the piano keys in the dark, and listen.
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Gnarly
866 posts
Jan 12, 2014
1:02 PM
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I am an ear player, but playing complicated music I am less familiar with is easier if I have a visual cue.
In particular, I find that playing jazz heads on the chromatic is easier if I have staff notation.
Since this is a blues forum, I have to think that audio is a better guide than written materials.
But probably having both is the best route.
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Jehosaphat
649 posts
Jan 12, 2014
1:39 PM
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1974 is when i bought the Tony'little sun'Glover book too.
He must of sold thousands of them over the years.
Until i got it i had been playing along to Juke for instance on an E harp...in key but it didn't sound right.
Tonys book was the first time i heard about second position,viola!
But that was the last time i ever looked at Tab,for blues anyway, since then it has all been by ear.
I have checked out the occasional tab to get a start on a 'regular' tune though.
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Gnarly
867 posts
Jan 12, 2014
2:52 PM
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Tab is one way, I really think of audio as "notation" too.
I like Winslow's tab font--
But staff has the rhythm notation, mo' betta.
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MP
3047 posts
Jan 12, 2014
5:03 PM
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Ears.
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rbeetsme
1471 posts
Jan 12, 2014
5:49 PM
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I used to play by ear, but I hated the taste of wax. Actually, like most, I learned by listening and finding the notes by rote. Eventually the notes came easier. Instruction came later. I have since learned to play stringed instruments. Started out with chord charts and music sheets. But I didn't really get the hang of them until I could "hear" the music, playing by ear.
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nacoran
7492 posts
Jan 12, 2014
7:05 PM
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I'm not sure those are all the options! I was mostly by ear, but there was also a fair amount of pulling stuff over from other musical instrument training- a bit of theory helped me get some of the foundational stuff.
Now, if you define it as 'by ear' vs. 'by what someone wrote down or told you'- I can, and do key songs, but I still hate it. I can grab a harp and play it and see if it's the right harp, and I can use the circle of fifths to speed up how quickly I find the right harp based on how close it sounds, but I still don't have the ear to hear something and say, 'Oh that's in Bb' (although again, knowing odd music facts help there too. It seems that if you hear piano in an 50s-60s rock song the guy is cheating by only playing the white keys, which tells me what to grab.)
rbeetsme- I wonder if that's something you could improve the taste of with diet? I know asparagus makes my pee smell funny, so maybe sugar would make ear wax taste better.
To take it one step further, there is also instruction by ear or by sight. For instance, I was over at a friends house learning a new board game tonight, and someone was reading the instructions out loud. I had no idea what was going on, but as soon as we actually started playing those rules started to make sense. I think it was because actually playing gave me structure to understand things. When I'm playing harp I'm not bad at playing a riff back, but, for instance, when I learned about the 12 bar structure it wasn't done purely aurally. (It was actually Adam's video, where he drew out the chords and pointed to each one, over and over, as the song progressed), and having a bit of theory so I knew, for instance, what chords were, helped gel that new information in.
So, do I learn by ear or sight. Yes.
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Nate
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BronzeWailer
1180 posts
Jan 12, 2014
9:28 PM
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Ears.
WARNING, the following sentence contains traces of nuts.
K Rudd, former Aussie PM, was captured on TV eating his own wax at a Parliament session. Yech!
BronzeWailer's YouTube
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Kingley
3385 posts
Jan 12, 2014
9:57 PM
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It's way to early to for me to tell. I'm still learning and have been for over twenty years now. Ask me again when I'm dead and maybe I'll have a a better answer. So far in life though most of my learning has been by ear.
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jbone
1461 posts
Jan 12, 2014
10:09 PM
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A friend bought me that Glover book, probably hoping I'd get better in a hurry. I was renting a room at his mom's house then and he had sort of gotten me started on harp. I think I knew maybe 2 bends and really not a lot else. He was a budding guitarist and also played some harp, with feeling and a bit more competence than I did. He's a really fine guitarist these days, 40 some years later.
The Glover book was minimally helpful but for me it's been a lot of ear. There did come a time when I had a few different people explaining what different positions involved, tb for octaves, etc etc, and that also helped a lot, kind of visualization.
I also learned a long time ago, when you hear something that grabs you, find a copy of it and work until you get it down. When it comes to jazz solos I am not great but 3rd on a chromatic is a wonder for swing blues. 3rd on a diatonic is also very cool in blues.
I still find myself baffled sometimes by a piece I hear
by guys like Sugar Blue, some of Musselwhite's stuff, etc. I have plenty to keep my busy for the rest of my life!
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JInx
701 posts
Jan 12, 2014
11:18 PM
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both
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Sun, sun, sun
Burn, burn, burn
Soon, soon, soon
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Rubes
781 posts
Jan 13, 2014
2:31 AM
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Ears for me
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ej
49 posts
Jan 13, 2014
6:56 AM
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Using my ears gets my interest going on a song, but I find I sometimes have to rely on music or tabs to figure out the difficult parts. If I don't search out the music or tabs I often lose interest in the song if the difficulty is high or the key changes or something and I simply move on to the next. That's one problem with the internet, it makes access to harmonica materials too easy sometimes, so you tend to jump around, only learning parts of songs. I'm learning bass guitar right now and I find I have the same issues. Isn't that some disease?
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MP
3051 posts
Jan 13, 2014
11:37 AM
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From what I remember, there were two Glover books. The second was called 'The Blues Harp Songbook' and I owned both books. I'm fairly sure both had plastic records in them. in the first book he calls himself "Little Sun" Glover and the second he became "Harp Dog" Glover. I found this amusing.
One thing that bothered me is that he admitted he couldn't tell (on certain tunes) if Little Walter was playing chromatic or a G diatonic. He claimed the amplification made it difficult.
He did introduce me to a lot of blues guys. I loved the photos too.
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Barley Nectar
244 posts
Jan 13, 2014
5:14 PM
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I play harp only, strictly by ear. I don't know any theory other than some positions. I have thought about takeing some classes to better my communication skills. If I were to try another instrument, it would be piano, the mother of all music!...BN
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dougharps
514 posts
Jan 13, 2014
10:24 PM
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Ear for most, but sometimes also informed by eye if it is something new or has tricky changes or is a difficult arrangement of many parts.
If I use my eyes, seldom tab, more likely chord sheets or regular sheet music, or lyrics with chords.
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Doug S.
Last Edited by dougharps on Jan 13, 2014 10:26 PM
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JInx
703 posts
Jan 13, 2014
11:01 PM
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Here is something I learned by eye. Well, not really just eye, more like eye then brain and then ear.
Take a ii V I progression and use the pentatonic scale built off the 5th degree from the tonic chord to build an improvised melody over the prog. It sounds very good and very different.
So for example ii V I = Dminor7 Gdom7 Cmajor7
pentatonic scale = G A B D E
I say it's EYE learning cause I read it online. It's BRAIN cause you gotta know the theory and it's EAR because it don't make any real sense until you play around with it and listen.
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Sun, sun, sun
Burn, burn, burn
Soon, soon, soon
Moon, moon, moon
Last Edited by JInx on Jan 13, 2014 11:03 PM
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Goldbrick
279 posts
Jan 14, 2014
5:28 AM
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Ear- harmonica is kinda like guitar in that your touch or breath make a unique sound as opposed to a keyboard type instrument where a note is more defined. I am way more interested in feel than copying notes ( but then again I am primarily a drummer not a musician ;)
Last Edited by Goldbrick on Jan 14, 2014 5:29 AM
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TetonJohn
181 posts
Jan 14, 2014
7:26 AM
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Ear.
I had taken very basic music lessons (eye) in high school on somethign called a tonette (a plastic recorder type thing). I was convinced I had no musical ability -- but loved the music on the radio, especially the soul music of the time; was always "groovin" in my head while walking down the street; something musical was going on in me.
Anyway I eventually learned to get around on the harmonica (ear) by having one continuously with me.
Much later, I attended an Augusta Blues Week. Phil Wiggins wrote a tab on the blackboard for a way to play along on "Louis Collins." I could already play along (in my own way) on Louis Collins, but was totally frustrated by trying to translate the tab into music (I suppose if I had a ton of time to sit with the tab by myself, I could eventually do it).
Anyway, I meet Phil in the restroom and told him that my brain just can't do it that way. He agreed and said something like he couldn't learn that way either! That helped me feel less frustrated.
Edit: Wondering. Perhaps it is easier to teach the eye way. Slight hijack -- how many teachers teach MOSTLY the eye way (even though this thread indicates that most of us have learned mostly the ear way)? When asked for lessons, I usually say I wouldn't know how to teach becasue I learned by osmosis -- I suppose if i really wanted to give lessons, I could find a way.
Last Edited by TetonJohn on Jan 14, 2014 7:37 AM
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kudzurunner
4488 posts
Jan 14, 2014
8:12 AM
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I learned to play blues by ear. I pulled licks off records by ear. I jammed along with records by ear, participating in the groove. You can't learn to groove with your eyes.
Let me repeat that, because it's the whole ballgame: YOU CAN'T LEARN TO GROOVE WITH YOUR EYES. Period.
So in a groove based music like blues, there's a limit to what can be learned with the eyes.
Also, a second almost-irrefutable stipulation: YOU CAN'T LEARN TO PLAY BLUES PITCHES--which is to say, not just specific pitches (i.e., static frequencies, such as 440), but pitches that actually vary in time, they way B. B. King squeezes his notes and the pitch rises very slightly into and through the blue zone--BY EYE. Blues pitch-knowledge can't be developed through sight reading.
And a third point: YOU CAN'T DEVELOP TONE BY EYE. Duh.
So three things that I consider to lie at the core of what blues harmonica is can't be developed with the help of your eyes: groove, blues tonality, and tone.
Still, the eyes are helpful for a blues harmonica player--and they've been helpful in my own development.
How?
Although chord progressions and lyrics must eventually be committed to memory, chord charts and lyric lead sheets have helped me, both when I'm learning new songs and when I'm recording fairly new stuff in the studio. And when you're learning long instrumentals, such as Juke, it's helpful to have a sense of exactly how many choruses the song is, and what sort of patterns and riffs characterize each chorus. Believe it or not, I haven't memorized Juke. I've played along with it countless times, and I pretty much know each of the choruses. But because it's not a song that I've ever performed in its entirety with a band or duo--not once in forty years--I don't have it completely committed to memory. I was thinking during my run this morning that I really should add it to my repertoire, just to have it. The first thing I'll do is listen to the song and make a note--actual written notes--of each 12-bar chorus, just to remind myself of the order in which LW strings together the parts.
Eventually I won't need the "eyes" and I'll throw the sheet away. But it will be a useful learning tool at a particular moment in the process.
I sell lots of tab sheet on this website, but I never intend for students to learn songs from them in the absence of the original recording. In other words, I intend the tabs--the eye-stuff--to supplement the ear-stuff.
The ears are paramount, but the eyes can help.
Last Edited by kudzurunner on Jan 14, 2014 8:12 AM
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Slimharp
98 posts
Jan 14, 2014
8:35 AM
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Fully agree with Adam. I teach harp and my students ask me to right out a tab for a certain lick once in a while. I do my best not to. Hey, they are paying me so if they insist I do. What I will do is record the licks on a portable cassette player and have them learn from that and get a reference from the tab. A few students have insisted I write tabs and those students never progressed. They could play those tabs and nothing else. The harp is the only instrument I know of ( except may be Jews Harp ) that you can not see when you are playing it.
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Shaganappi
76 posts
Jan 14, 2014
9:46 AM
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Once tab becomes too detailed, it distracts - which I think, is one thing that I hear from these posts. I don’t even like to see much of the chording and many other nuances in the tab. I like skeleton clarity and think the player should be encouraged to fill in the rest. I agree that ear is king in terms of the best results. But sometimes written detail is the only way to clearly communicate certain points.
Rhythm is one of those points IMO so I usually suggest a bare-bones tab with the rhythm shown. I find that if it is not written down, then in a few weeks (or less), I have forgotten the rhythm and without access to the audio, I am floundering. The rhythm tab allows sufficient reminders to enable me to kick in to the piece. Then I put the tab down asap.
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nacoran
7496 posts
Jan 14, 2014
10:49 AM
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The one student I did try to teach, (0-1) :(, wanted tab. I think the most important thing is learning what the different intervals between holes sound like. There are three ways to attack that- you can say 1-3 and then play 1-3, and then 1-4 and play it, etc. etc. or you can just play notes for a while until you start to get it, or you can just play along with things. For frustration levels at the start all 3 have their strong and weak points. I learned mostly by just playing notes. I figured if I just thought of it as a party horn for a while I'd eventually get the intervals and songs would progress naturally. That was partially a response to the way I learned baritone, which was over regimented. I know I go on about how important learning a little theory is, because I think some basic theory is important, but I'm still looking for a better way to impart it. I would have had an extremely hard time sitting down and making myself learn it outside of a classroom setting where if I didn't do it on a certain time table I'd fail the test. It was later when I was learning harp that it started to mesh together (singing didn't help- but that's I think sometimes because singing is too natural. I had a similar problem with language- I was particularly bad at memorizing what different parts of speech were because when they were being taught they didn't really seem useful (but not learning them came back to bite me in the butt when I was required to study foreign languages.)
Theory is one of two ways to learn which harp to grab for a song. The other is rote memorization, and I think theory is the easier way to do it, especially since later on when the next question comes up theory probably has the answer, instead of having to memorize more (even if theory does require some memorization too). If that makes sense. Having an idea of intervals and chords helped me understand why there were notes missing in the scale I wanted to play depending where I was on the harp. Understanding that there were notes missing helped me understand that I might want to move a tune to a different spot on the harp. Understanding that even though I was missing notes I still had certain intervals available made me use the whole harp, and ultimately, the fact that all those things I learned in theory- the Cof5ths, scales, modes, key signatures, all helped me understand playing better make me want to keep absorbing a bit more theory as brain space becomes available, because, even although I hated it when teachers didn't explain why we'd need something later, I now trust that I will need parts of it later.
Still, at the player level, given the choice between being able to sit down and play something without ever hearing it by looking at sheet music or listening to something and being able to play it back, I chose being able to play it back. You get to listen to more music, and it's feels more like a creative activity. Given the third choice though, of being able to do both, it would be nice to be a stronger tab/sight reader too.
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Nate
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JInx
705 posts
Jan 14, 2014
1:09 PM
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"Let me repeat that, because it's the whole ballgame: YOU CAN'T LEARN TO GROOVE WITH YOUR EYES. Period."-Kudzu
I disagree. Recently I was sitting at the piano with my 12 year old niece. She studies classical piano with a teacher using standard music notation. I'm not sure but I don't think they work together on aural transcription.
I love the blues and I always try to get her to jam with me, but she just has no idea what to play, never listens to blues, no serious exposure. So, I wrote out a quarter note walking bass line for her left hand and eighth note chord stabs for her right. And let me tell you, that kid was GROOVIN with those blues changes in no time flat! It was basically instantaneous. Lol, it kind of took over her body, suddenly she sat bolt upright and sort of wiggled the rhythm out of her spine, over her shoulders and straight out her fingers, into the keys then hammered on to the strings, out to the soundboard and off to her ears. There is tons of boogie to be learned with your eyes, if you can read it.
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Sun, sun, sun
Burn, burn, burn
Soon, soon, soon
Moon, moon, moon
Last Edited by JInx on Jan 14, 2014 3:55 PM
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Shaganappi
77 posts
Jan 14, 2014
3:44 PM
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I sometimes just tab out rhythm even without the notes. I just use 1's instead of hole numbers. Then I make up some stuff to toss in to bring out some creativity.
The rhythm is usually missing for most people when they think of tabs. But I find rhythm easy to notate in comparison to all the note and chord nuances. At least bare-bones rhythm. Maybe my memory is somewhat poor, but I find visual very helpful for rhythm. Like Jlnx says … some people can use it to a fair advantage at times.
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Kaining
23 posts
Jan 14, 2014
4:22 PM
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I use my eyes to train my ears.
Trying to copy something for the sake of learning it to me is like learning a foreign language by learning expressions and not a single thing about grammar, just hoping to "get it" along the way.
Well, you can end up monstrosity like "you is".
If you know it's a mistake and chose to make it, that's your take on art. If you don't, you are just a parrot.
My goal is to ear what i see and understand what i ear.
Knowing what is on paper is useless to me if i can't ear it because it's only some ink on paper and not music otherwise.
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Komuso
273 posts
Jan 14, 2014
6:06 PM
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I use my mouth, everything else is just inputs
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