brya31 - Posted - 11/04/2008:  08:01:54

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I was sittin here practicing last night and noticed that singing seems to make learning the song a bit easier. I am a wondering if I should start looking for lyrics to songs and listen to how they are sung before I ever think of looking at the sheet music<---which I hope to never have to do if I can learn to play the dern things by ear.

lucky - Posted - 11/04/2008:  08:46:03

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When I took a class from Bruce Molskey he would ask us to sing the phrase, particularly if it seemed we weren't getting it. I think it may help with difficult phrases.

scrubber - Posted - 11/04/2008:  09:27:46

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Playing the fiddle is singing with bow and strings!

Music comes from our heads, not our fingers! It is always best to have an idea re: what you are going to play before you start crankin'...

Although many fiddle tunes are quite 'notey' they have basic 'backgound' lines that are easily singable. My approach to learning a fiddle tune is to learn the singable melodic line behind the tune before I start workin' out the notes!

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Edited by - scrubber on 11/04/2008 09:28:26

Bird Dog - Posted - 11/04/2008:  09:45:15

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I think everyone learning an instrument should also sing. Of course if your pitch is really bad it could hurt you - but then if it's bad you'll have trouble playing the fiddle anyway. Can't hurt to learn notation too, though. It's an error to think that you always have to learn one thing before you learn another. There are steps, yes; but learning in more than one area at once is fine. Learn to sing, learn to play, learn to read. (Easy for me to say - I can't read.) (But I wish I'd learned!)

Robin

bj - Posted - 11/04/2008:  11:42:12

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Kiva Rose made the same discovery and wrote about it on her blog. She couldn't play songs by ear until she tried playing songs she knew very well-- the ones from her childhood. They just started stumbling out her fingers once she gave them a try. Yes, some missteps, but she found she could play them by ear, where before that she was struggling. So yeah, there's a lot of validity in this.

Me, I've always been an ear learner, despite the best efforts of my childhood guitar teacher to make me learn from the dots.

Once you find the first note and the last note to a song (which are often the same note!) then it's easier to find the notes in between.

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bsed - Posted - 11/04/2008:  12:21:02

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It was the earliest and most important piece of advice I ever got when I was trying to learn to play by ear: If you can sing it, you can play it!
That includes tunes (music with no words) as well as songs (music with words).
If a melody has no words to sing, you learn how to hum it, or I suppose you could invent some lyrics that fit.
I've been playing by ear for many years now, but I still use this axiom a lot. It absolutely works!

Just call me Dwight.

brya31 - Posted - 11/04/2008:  13:02:52

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Good advice Bruce, I was just thinking I wonder what to do if what I want to play is just a tune with no words...Ill hum it

Dick Hauser - Posted - 11/04/2008:  13:36:24

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A studio guitarist once talked about his early days as a violinist. His instructor was an old Italian violinist who emigrated from Italy. Before he allowed his students to play a piece of notation, they had to be able to read the music AND sing the music. This technique probably helps the musician memorize the melody before they play the music. And, if you use notation, reading the notation and hearing the melody in your head helps.

An excellent musician once told me to make music with my voice because it is my oldest and most experienced musical instrument. You often hear the suggestion to play a tune the way your sing it.

gulfguy

fiddlepogo - Posted - 11/05/2008:  08:57:10

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quote:

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Originally posted by Bird Dog

I think everyone learning an instrument should also sing. Of course if your pitch is really bad it could hurt you - but then if it's bad you'll have trouble playing the fiddle anyway.
Robin

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This is a really good point- if someone asks me
"Is the fiddle hard to learn?", I often ask them if they can sing on pitch.
My reasoning is that if you can't control the pitch of your voice,
you'd have a hard time controlling it with your fingers. I'm sure there
are exceptions, but IMO, if you can't sing on pitch, it's best to take up
a fretted or fixed pitch instrument."

I agree with the other statements about singing a melody to learn it, too.
In addition, being able to sing the verses to fiddle tunes like Molly Hare, Soldier's Joy and Turkey in the Straw helped give me a concept
of the difference between the core melody (which is sung)
and the more complex melody as it is fiddled (which is where
a fiddler really stamps his/her mark on a tune).
Now it's pretty easy for me to take almost any simple tune and "fiddle-ize" it the same way.
I have to admit though that banjo playing helped with that too-
the banjo often plays a simpler form of the melody than fiddle.

Michael- Old Time 90% of the time!

"It''s hard to take yourself seriously when you''re singing about chickens!"

http://www.ezfolk.com/audio/bands/1088
for mp3s, blog, and "Michael''s Old Time Fiddle & Banjo Hour" (hifi & lofi audio streams)

carroll - Posted - 11/05/2008:  11:32:03

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When I'm having trouble with a phrase on the piano, my teacher will ask "How would you sing that? Make the piano sing!". Admittedly, many fiddle tunes are not particularly lyrical, but they do have a melody and if there are words, then of course you would like to play it as you would sing it.

This aspect of singing is slightly different than has been discussed, but here is a case where I have a fixed pitch instrument *and* the music ,which is taken fairly literally. But I still need to hear it in my head as I would sing it to express it properly. I wish I could sing better!

I think singing is one of the innate things that make us human. Making music with instruments is, fundamentally, singing by proxy. We have learned how to expand on our musical nature with the creation of instruments and ensembles of voice and instrument, but it all comes back to singing.

- Carroll

dlight - Posted - 11/05/2008:  13:16:55

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I remember doing band and orchestral rehearsals during which the conductor directed us all to sing our parts. It certainly gets it "off the page" and into your conscious mind. I've always been a firm believer that you must be able to hear it in your head before you have any hope of getting it into your hands. I hold to that belief to this very day.

So who''s smarter?? You or the stupid fiddle??

fiddlepogo - Posted - 11/05/2008:  14:30:06

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Carroll,
yes, that's another very good point-
it's kind of a shorthand way of saying:
"Play it in a non-mechanical way".
Playing instruments involves motions that
can be made very mechanically:
sawstroke, flatpicking, playing a piano.
Somehow singing it instantly removes it from the mechanical
realm into the realm of our soul and emotions,
and instrumental playing also needs to make that same
deep connection.
Apart from all the technical aspects of it, success in music
ultimately boils down to a player's ability to convey emotion with
the instrument- if you can make people happy enough to dance, or sad enough to cry in their beer, they mostly like that,
and are more inclined to pay money to support your music
(by hiring you, buying CDs, mp3s, etc.)

quote:

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Originally posted by carroll


When I'm having trouble with a phrase on the piano, my teacher will ask "How would you sing that? Make the piano sing!". Admittedly, many fiddle tunes are not particularly lyrical, but they do have a melody and if there are words, then of course you would like to play it as you would sing it.

This aspect of singing is slightly different than has been discussed, but here is a case where I have a fixed pitch instrument *and* the music ,which is taken fairly literally. But I still need to hear it in my head as I would sing it to express it properly. I wish I could sing better!

I think singing is one of the innate things that make us human. Making music with instruments is, fundamentally, singing by proxy. We have learned how to expand on our musical nature with the creation of instruments and ensembles of voice and instrument, but it all comes back to singing.

- Carroll

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Michael- Old Time 90% of the time!

"It''s hard to take yourself seriously when you''re singing about chickens!"

http://www.ezfolk.com/audio/bands/1088
for mp3s, blog, and "Michael''s Old Time Fiddle & Banjo Hour" (hifi & lofi audio streams)

Sue B. - Posted - 11/05/2008:  17:27:16

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I teach my little string students to sing their music-reading books. They can all play at least 8 or 10 simple tunes (Suzuki base) already. They end up being able to play and sing notation at sight. Many of them shortly can also hear the written page in their heads w/o first singing or playing. Sue

ladymuse - Posted - 11/16/2008:  14:24:39

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Man - if you can hear it in your head and sing or hum it it, you're there - then it's just the mechanics of finger placement -

If you have trouble with pitches, fiddlepogo mentioned fixed pitch instruments - take up the soprano recorder - it's simple, same notes you play on fiddle, (no transposistion) and that pitch will get into your head and you will also be prob able to sightsing.

Got Sing? You got the world

jen!

duke13 - Posted - 11/24/2008:  11:44:33

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The reverse would be to play it the way the singer sings it. i always try to start my breaks that way then if it's a more progressive jam expand it with the second half or second break (if i get one)

FIDDLE PLAYERS DON''T FRET