edkarch - Posted - 01/25/2011:  14:33:12

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Originally posted by Andah1andah2

"Hot fiddler from Maine" that wouldn't be me, probably Mudbug or Swing

I can only learn tunes by ear anyway since I've never learned to sight read (I did learn banjo tab once upon a time). I'm getting better at it while at home with the recording there to play back. At jams it is much harder, especially when the tune is being played and I'm trying to hear myself and the speed of the tune is cruising by. Hopefully, I'll get better at that too.

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1&2
When you can't hear yourself and your fingers are walking and your bow is talking you are in the groove and blended like a smoothie.

bj - Posted - 01/25/2011:  15:05:16

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When you can't hear yourself and your fingers are walking and your bow is talking you are in the groove and blended like a smoothie.

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blended like a smoothie? Yowza! I like it!

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To get the full charge, ya gotta be willing to go out on a limb and maybe fall flat on your keester. Ya gotta be willing to fly or die.

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Yes. And some people are frightened to DEATH of failing. Me, I said aw the hell with it and spread my wings when I hadn't been playing all that long. I think as you get older you either don't give a flying fart what others think, or you care way too much. I'm glad I've gone the first way, makes it easier on so many counts.

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Edited by - bj on 01/25/2011 15:10:53

fiddlepogo - Posted - 01/25/2011:  21:46:02

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Originally posted by alaskafiddler

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Originally posted by fiddlepogo

Keeping a short list of tunes that you polish for performance helps make certain things like improved tone and intonation part
of your normal playing... after a while, ALL of your tunes get lifted to a higher level of tone and intonation.

Yes, audiences prefer the creativity IF the tone and intonation don't take a hit to get it.
Screeches, squawks and dubious pitches are NOT popular.

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How would improved tone (whatever that means) and intonation get lifted to a higher level (whatever that means) - or have anything to do with creativity? How would they take a hit? You will play in tune (or not) based on how well you can play in tune, whether from a very static set of notes and rhythm, or with improvising. When you improvise, the finger placement does not change. Screeches, squawks and dubious pitches do not gain any popularity by keeping it to a static performance.

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They don't have anything to do with creativity per se, since you can have good tone and intonation, and play in an orchestra string section without a drop of creativity. But good tone and intonation DO make what you create more listenable to more people.
Kind of to get away from the conventional classical vs. oldtime tonal controversies,
I used to think I HATED saxophone, especially jazz saxophone. In hindsight it's because in the '60's when I heard most of it,
the style was for sax players to overblow... it may have added intensity, but it was very harsh, and harshness on sax has a metallic edge, and it totally turned me off the instrument. Then when I got into blues guitar, I noticed I REALLY liked the sax player in B.B. King's band on one recording-
smooth as butter... and I realized I LOVE the sax.... if it's played the way I like it.

Tone and intonation CAN take a hit, in that improvisation can introduce uncertainty in the player, and this can translate into uncertainty in the bowing and fingerplacement. Bowing especially is very vulnerable to a drop in quality caused by hesitancy.

Now this CAN be overcome... you have to learn to bow boldly, even when you don't have a clue what you're doing!!!

And the correct fingerings have to be practiced so much that they are hardwired into your brain.
But it's surprising that with the tune-orientation of most Old Time players, the good intonation is partially connected with the tunes rather than the individual notes- take away the familiar tune, and the intonation takes a hit.

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Edited by - fiddlepogo on 01/25/2011 22:53:34

fiddlepogo - Posted - 01/25/2011:  22:47:32

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Originally posted by bj

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Screeches, squawks and dubious pitches are NOT popular.

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Ya know, you keep saying that. And I admit I don't often suffer from squeaks, screetches and dubious pitches but rarely anymore. But I've seen players who are playing heart and soul WITH all those things and the audience is totally appreciative.

[quote]
But who is the audience composed of?
Now, you didn't specify, so I'm assuming "general public". And in my experience, the "general public" does tend to prefer
good tone and intonation. However, if the audience may be somewhat selected for "old time aficionados", then you
may have some tolerance for a rougher tone, yeah.


I think playing your dang heart out can overcome a lot of other stuff. And personally I'd much rather listen to someone playing their dang heart out with an occasional squeak or flat note, than to someone who is so overrehearsed that it all sounds like the fiddle version of muzak.

Of course, if you can play your dang heart out and play well while you're doing so, it's the best of all worlds.

Re the two talents not being musically exclusive, your point is taken, BUT . . . and it's a huge BUT . . . most of the bands I hear perform seldom leave anything to chance, seldom leave any room for "interpretation" or for playing any bit of anything on the fly during a "performance" and I swear it's been ages since I've heard anyone (except at jams) who doesn't sound so canned and overrehearsed that it becomes dead boring to me to listen to. Why? Because much as the performer is putting the happy face on, he or she is as bored with performing the dang material exactly that way over and over and over again as I am listening to it. And anyone with any empathy and musical sense can pick up on that. Lucky for them, most club owners and bar patrons can't, or they wouldn't be getting paid to play.

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Well, I'm ALL for playing your heart out... the thing is, you don't have to change the arrangement one single bit to play your heart out... much of that is about the phrasing... the question is
"does the music convey emotion as it's being played".
if not, it doesn't matter whether the note choice is technically improv, or whether it's set in stone in advance, it still SOUNDS mechanical.
Part of that is song and tune choice. I try to pick songs and tunes that both <I> and the audience like... I try to find our <common denominator>. And I think that helps. If you are doing songs or tunes you absolutely loathe, only because you're getting paid for it, that WOULD tend to take the joy out of your playing. I also tend to perform "by the seat of my pants", without a set list... I go with what intuitively feels right that day, and that seems to be introducing some variety.

And of course, jamming tends to stretch you, and like I said, jamming helps your performing that way, making you more flexible.

You know, I think what happens is this- very often when people start performing, especially with a band, they stop jamming.
I've seen this happen a LOT. Part of the issue is time and energy, but part is that the musicians in the band may indeed be playing on a higher level than the available jams.
For a while, it sounds better, but after a while, yeah, it gets stale. And attending at least an occasional jam could help
some of those musicians you've heard that are going through the motions loosen up and get some of the fire back.

It is true, ruts happen in music. And it's not pleasant to listen to someone in a rut.

I have noticed that at paid gigs, I DO have a tendency to "play it safe". Now, most of the paid gigs are senior gigs.
I also volunteer once or twice a week in senior facilities. I keep doing it partly because the residents in those particular facilities tend to be very appreciative, very good audiences... they lift me to a higher level, to do my best.
And also, because it's "for free", I DO feel more freedom to experiment, to try something new...
I use the volunteer gigs as a "test lab" for new things sometimes... and if it works well, then I might use it at the paid gigs too.
It also keeps me in touch with the idea of playing for the sheer joy of playing and sharing music with people.
In this way, a volunteer gig can help a musician break out of ruts.
There IS a certain freedom in playing for FREE!!!

As far as the tone, one thing that helps me is that for me, good tone isn't this static thing...
there is a space between squeaking and squawking that's fairly wide- at least on some fiddles,
and within the limits of that "sweet spot" you can be pretty free and expressive.
On one side of the "sweet spot" is a hint... just a hint of a squawk that gives the basically sweet tone some bite and aggressiveness, and on the other side there's a place where the bowing gets so light that it gets kind of breathy... and it's on the verge of a squeak. If you can play around with the tone within those parameters, then it's going to add life and liveliness
to your playing.

Another factor in all this is that I'm a solo performer at this point.
There is also freedom in playing solo- you could go out on a limb if you want,
and you aren't going to throw the other musicians off, because they're NOT THERE.

Playing with multiple band members tends to increase the need for predictability so they can follow you...
and predictability definitely has the potential for becoming a rut!!!

fiddlepogo - Posted - 01/25/2011:  22:51:49

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Originally posted by rafa

I try to explain to my learning fiddlers to learn there pentatonic scales. That way they don`t have to struggle with trying to fiil in the gaps. They can be mostly right on and work with rythym. Gives them a good idea of being part of it. See what key the tune is in and bounce around with the pent. scale and create. Then add notes that are good for the tune after that.

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This is actually very much how I play electric guitar. And yeah, it probably works well with fiddle, although
maybe more with rock, blues, or bluegrass fiddle than with Old Time...
but then again, if you kept your notes on the low strings, it would sound more like accompaniment and would probably work
in Old Time without being offensive.

bj - Posted - 01/26/2011:  08:08:56

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But who is the audience composed of?
Now, you didn't specify, so I'm assuming "general public". And in my experience, the "general public" does tend to prefer
good tone and intonation. However, if the audience may be somewhat selected for "old time aficionados", then you
may have some tolerance for a rougher tone, yeah.

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Yes, you should assume general public. And if your experience tells you that the "general public" tends to prefer good tone and intonation, you obviously haven't been listening and watching all sorts of other types of music which purposely throw "good tone and intonation" out the window and have been immensely popular. Not to mention people like Tommy Jarrell.

I still assert that serving the music is as, if not more, important than playing each note perfectly. Midi sound files play with good tone and intonation, and they're totally devoid of all emotional content. But we're wandering far afield of the original topic, which is creating music and improvising on the fly and picking up tunes on the fly.

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For a while, it sounds better, but after a while, yeah, it gets stale. And attending at least an occasional jam could help
some of those musicians you've heard that are going through the motions loosen up and get some of the fire back.

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Some, maybe even many, never had the fire to begin with. What they had is a carefully constructed parroting of the real fire. Though theater is another art entirely, and many people enjoy it, I still prefer people who can create music on the fly.

Rote playing seldom gives a good result. Notice I said seldom, not never. There are always exceptions.

FiddleJammer - Posted - 01/26/2011:  08:13:18

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Jamming is it's own thing. Many of the 'rules' of performance, music theory, and technique go out the window.

Apples and oranges. You can eat both, but they're different.

Terri
fiddlejammer.com

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Edited by - FiddleJammer on 01/26/2011 08:22:33

fiddlepogo - Posted - 01/26/2011:  13:57:48

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Originally posted by FiddleJammer

Jamming is it's own thing. Many of the 'rules' of performance, music theory, and technique go out the window.

Apples and oranges. You can eat both, but they're different.

Terri
fiddlejammer.com

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But no reason you can have both together in a fruit salad!

Put it this way-- while I agree a jam is NOT like a normal performance
(jamming is by it's nature experimental, and that's the beauty of it... you CAN relax, experiment, and feel free to make mistakes),
I think every fiddleR (edit!!!) should get a list of about 10 of their best tunes polished up for an open mic, short gig, busking, whatever.
These little quasi- gig opportunities DO come up, and you should be ready for them.
And fine tuning a small group of tunes tends to raise your whole playing level, including when you're jamming...
detail stuff becomes second nature, and you no longer have to "sweat" those details.

We ARE talking about two different kinds of learning here, and I totally GET the kind of learning you're talking about-
I'm right-brained intuitive enough (even though my posts don't always sound like it) to know there are times like jams
where you just need to check your analyzer at the door, and fly by the seat of your pants... and learning happens!

But detail work and analyzing what isn't working in a tune has also paid big benefits in my playing.
And the two ways of learning cross-fertilize each other some how....
sometimes I apply intuitively in a jam what I've learned analytically in a practice session-
sometimes I analyze what I intuitively discovered in a jam session and uncover a principle in the discovery
that I can then apply other places, or maybe I can slow down what I learned intuitively, and work the bugs out so
it's a lot more repeatable and controllable.

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Edited by - fiddlepogo on 01/26/2011 21:58:57

mandopickr - Posted - 01/26/2011:  16:11:27

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RobBob lead me to the practical fingerings in Mel Bays Fiddling handbook chord studies. Much simpler than learning scales (I know, I know, I should learn my scales). I learned G, D, C and showed up for a beginning jam. It made finding the melody much easier, and when I don't quite have it, it still sounds okay. It also means I can take a chance on a variation of the melody without making people cringe.

Now I've been spending my practice time on listening to a song, and trying to come up with the melody on the fly. I don't think it makes me a better fiddler, but I think it makes me a better jammer.

ScottK - Posted - 01/26/2011:  16:31:22

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We just hosted the 12th annual Portland Old Time Music Gathering here a week and a half ago. Got in lots of jamming, but mostly on banjo and guitar. My favorite session of the long weekend was at a house party around midnight on Thursday night. There were already three or four sessions going on in various rooms of the house including one with around a dozen folk in the living room. But I ended up off in a study playing banjo with just one fiddler named Skip from Seattle. We played for forty five minutes and I don't think I knew a single tune Skip played, but he was playing some really cool tunes and I was picking them up pretty well. Skip was playing pretty quietly, so I had to play softly to match his dynamic. Made for a really sweet session. I think sessions like that make it worth the effort to try to learn to pick up tunes on the fly.

Scott

p.s. Charles Espy of Port Townsend posted some great photos of the gathering here.

bj - Posted - 01/26/2011:  17:06:43

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The best jazz musicians never play a break the same way twice. Not even when they're in the recording studio or performing at a very high level. Just sayin'.

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Edited by - bj on 01/26/2011 17:09:12

tonyelder - Posted - 01/26/2011:  18:31:36

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...and most of the time - they aren't really aware of the fact that they aren't playing it the same way. It's not necessarily planned that way - they just do it. And I would say that it is true of more than just jazz musicians. You will find it a lot in Bluegrass too.

Ask some of them to break it down for you and show what they are doing - and they can't always tell you exactly what they are doing most of the time. It's similar in nature to what John Harford talks about "Trying To Teach My Hands To Do What I Hear In My Head" - they're just playing what they hearing in their head.

But, I don't enjoy listening to endless strings of rambling notes that are suppose to represent creative artistic expression. Tastefully done and within some limits and structure - it's a real treat. But when it becomes the norm and not the exception - it gets boring pretty quick. Especially when it takes the tune far away from the melody that got it started, and every tune or song through the night is just another opportunity to do it again. Naaaaa... not for me. YMMV

When you have inspired folks to dance and sing along - you have given them what they really want. They really don't care about all this other stuff.

edited to add - The question was - Learning tunes on the fly and improv - Essential fiddle skills?

I would say yes, "essential" with respect to those skills being representative of playing the fiddle in the highest sense of the word.
But not with respect to those skills being absolutely necessary to playing the fiddle..

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Edited by - tonyelder on 01/26/2011 19:16:37

fiddlepogo - Posted - 01/26/2011:  22:50:39

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It occurred to me to explain where I'm coming from.
It comes from life experience.

When I was 10, I started clarinet, and continued with a short break due to moving until I was 14.
It was VERY performance oriented, but it was NOT fun, and it didn't really feel like music to me when
I look back on it.

I started guitar when I was 14- my dad had bought a guitar on a whim for himself, and it laid around gathering dust until
the fateful moment when my friend Murf came over, took the guitar, and played the "Man from U.N.C.L.E. theme" on the two lowest strings.
Monkey see, monkey do- I did it too, perfectly, with no practice, and I thought to myself
"I just played the guitar- if I put my mind to it, I could really learn to play this thing".
So I took the EZ guitar method that came with the guitar, and learned the chords, and learned how to apply my clarinet note reading
to the first 3 frets of a guitar so I could learn out of songbooks.
I also got into a BAD rock band... this was 1966-67.

Then I got into classical guitar, took serious lessons, got pretty good at it, and performed for some soiree and got a small mention in the local paper,
no big deal, really, but it was a successful performance.

Then I heard banjo and string-band music, fell in love with it, and pretty soon I was playing and jamming and learning fiddle-
I learned mostly by ear, and jammed and busked and went to festivals in California, Weiser, Kentucky, Virginia and North Carolina.

Then I moved to California and played mostly alone for years.
Then I traded off the fiddle, and was fiddle-less for 15 years.
During that time I took up electric guitar again, and learned how to do
seat-of-the-pants improv using pentatonic box scales I'd taught myself as a teenager.
Then I started playing again 5 1/2 years ago, and since I was already
performing in nursing homes with the guitar, I almost immediately included the fiddle.
And using it in performance has been a great motivator to play my best.
I've also done some busking, mostly at the Farmer's Market,
and lead one jam a month, and participate in one or two a week.

And as I look back, I've been back and forth between performance oriented music, and jamming oriented, less formal music.
Clarinet was performance oriented.
The first guitar lick learned from a friend was very much like jamming, very seat of the pants.
Teaching myself guitar used a lot of what I had learned about reading music from clarinet.
Learning rock was mostly informal, sort of like jamming, and intuiting stuff.
Classical guitar was mostly performance oriented.
Clawhammer banjo and fiddle were intensely informal and very jamming oriented.
Electric guitar as an adult was mostly very intuitive, with some jamming going on.
Busking is a wonderful mix of performance and jamming- since your audience is constantly
changing, it helps to be able to experiment and try different stuff on different people.
It's NOT a formal playing environment, and if you can relax and have fun, you can help people
have fun, and they like that.... and support the cause.
Performing for seniors is similar- in some ways it's like performing any place- you do want to do your best-
but in some ways it's a very casual gig, and lends itself to spontaneity and experimentation.
For instance, if I TRY to play something a resident asks for, it's maybe more important to them that I try and
play it recognizably than if I play it perfectly.
But it's still nice to have some stuff that's well practiced.

So anyway, all my musical life has been bouncing back and forth between performance oriented music and
casual or intuitive jamming oriented music.
While I'm more comfortable with the casual and intuitive side, the stuff I learned in the more formal
clarinet and classical guitar phases was very important, and taught me a lot that I was able to apply to
the more jamming oriented styles. For instance, classical guitar taught me the concept of using an exercise piece to overcome
a technical difficulty. I not only think about tunes as having pleasant melodies... there's also a place where I recognize that this tune isn't just a good tune,
it's good for my bowing, or my pinky finger, or whatever.
And ultimately with the electric guitar and fiddle, there has come a point where I have something I can share with people publicly in performance,
and while the venues are pretty low key and relaxed as venues go, somehow it's satisfying to have the music I've worked at so long finally help
make people HAPPY.

Anyway, while I can totally agree with you on the importance of jamming, and other fun and intuitive ways of learning music,
and while I greatly pity people who have done nothing but the equivalent of what I experienced in clarinet or classical guitar,
I couldn't see doing without those phases either. And I think people that don't want to experience that kind of music at all
may be the poorer for it. I think having had both kinds of musical experience has made me a more well rounded and versatile musician.
(on the level I play at- I know my limitations, and people that can play rings around me are a YouTube click away!)
So, as much as I LOVE jamming, no, I cannot say that performance oriented music is ALL bad... it's not complete in itself, but it has a lot to teach us,
IF we're willing to be taught.

I also recognize that for some people, the way their brain is wired, they have to learn one way or the other... they can't do both.
And others may have had some unpleasant experience where school band was like the Spanish Inquisition, and they can't go there or near
anything like that... I understand that.
And that's fine, ya gotta do what ya gotta do... but there is no need for them to diss people that have to take the opposite path.