Re: Interesting comment re players coming from "pop" or pre "pop"

"Bob Ross" <bross@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote

Actually, I think it has more to do with how many years someone has
committed to the Tune Learning process!

That's an interesting distinction. As an instructor I've noticed how
differently students absorb musical material. Some are ear players, some
have great reading abilities and some focus on developing the dexterity
needed to execute the various fingerings, etc. With most it's a little of
each, but listening is always crucial. Listening is the way non musicians
learn things like Christmas songs, Happy Birthday, etc. They couldn't
recognize it on the page or find the fingering on an instrument, but they
have heard "Jingle Bells" often enough to be able to join in singing on the
chorus, more or less.

Someone with well developed skills as an instrumentalist can usually play a
melody after hearing it once or twice. It's not unusual at all. The old line
about "hum a few bars and I'll fake it..." is for real and good listening
skill are an important part of how a tune is quickly "learned" in this
fashion.


I'm 45, but any 20-year-old kid with half a mind to be a professional
jazz musician knows more tunes than I do. That doesn't mean I'm *not* a
more capable, sensetive, and stylistically-informed musician, it just
means I never made memorizing tunes a priority so now I have a
non-existant repertoire.


I've worked with students in their teens and twenties for years. The best of
them are good readers with good technical abilities who get a good sound
over the range of their instruments. Some can even improvise convincingly.
The major deficit in this age group is the repertoire. The development of a
repertoire requires the hand of time. The listening and practicing has to be
brought into various performance settings over a period of time until the
player becomes comfortable with a good range of material. After a few years
of this they may reach a stage where people begin to refer to them as
having a repertoire.

To me this is a big issue. A student who had great sound, great technique,
great reading ability, and improvisational skills, but couldn't play Autumn
Leaves without a chart would be a good illustration of this problem. Lots of
student fit this description, too.

I know it seems like an oversimplification, but one explanation of what a
jazz musician "does", is that he plays the jazz repertoire. I've heard this
one several times over the years and it has a ring of truth to it. It's hard
[impossible?] to separate a music from it's repertoire; and I don't see how
you can overstate it's importance either.

--
Visit me on the web www.JoeFinn.net



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