How important is reading music?

[AbrasiveScotsman]

But surely that's the very essence of trad (aurally transmitted too), with appropriate new twists more satisfying to player and listener alike than carbon copies of others' settings!

Well I'm new at this so feel free to correct me, but I always viewed the role of a good musician was to make his own mark on a piece of music while respecting both it's technical structure and it's underlying essence.

Think your 'original spirit' will be just as lost after generations of evolving aural transmission as through sympathetic recovery from contemporary notation!

I disagree here. I think there are at least 3 components to a good piece of music: the "skeleton", the personality of the musician playing and the essential spirit imbued by its author.

That's why it is garish when a vulgar musician makes a piece of music all about himself, or a soulless when a passionless musician plays a piece like it is a Midi file, or upsetting when some trendy modern "musician" places an old classic in a twisted and inappropriate context.

There is a balance to be struck there.

[Peter Duggan]

Well I'm new at this so feel free to correct me, but I always viewed the role of a good musician was to make his own mark on a piece of music while respecting both it's technical structure and it's underlying essence.

Which is why I said 'appropriate new twists'...

That's why it is garish when a vulgar musician makes a piece of music all about himself, or a soulless when a passionless musician plays a piece like it is a Midi file, or upsetting when some trendy modern "musician" places an old classic in a twisted and inappropriate context.

And wasn't talking about anything like that!

[AbrasiveScotsman]

Which is why I said 'appropriate new twists'...

And wasn't talking about anything like that!

Yes but if all that remains is the written notation, how would you know what is appropriate?

Here's a hypothetical example.

Let's suppose an Irish composer created a beautiful slow air to commemorate a local tragedy that occurred in his home village. This piece was as a result was always played in a subdued fashion and with reverence by those who had learned it in the living tradition. Even if the original back-story were forgotten, it was "remembered" within the character of the piece of music itself.

Now let's suppose that the last man who knew this tune in it's living form wrote it down one day, and then went out and was killed in a war. The long dead piece is found on a bookshelf 80 years later.

The modern-day musician who reads it then plays it with universally accepted phrasing and ornamentation, but puts a slightly cheerful inflection on his playing because that is what his personality brings. He has no knowledge of the context to the piece, no knowledge of what the author meant when he wrote it. He has no way of knowing that what he is playing would be regarded as grotesque and offensive by it's creator were he alive to hear it.

What comes out when music is transmitted to a new recipient via a piece of paper frequently bears little or no relation to the original either in its intent or its spirit. Even a subtle misunderstanding on the part of the musician could easily make a piece of music "all wrong" in relation to it's original form.

That's not to say what the modern musician creates is without merit. Just that what arises is frequently a new piece of music and should not be assumed to reflect the original.

[Peter Duggan]

The modern-day musician who reads it then plays it with universally accepted phrasing and ornamentation, but puts a slightly jaunty and cheerful inflection on his playing. He has no knowledge of the context to the piece, no knowledge of what the author meant when he wrote it. He has no way of knowing that what he is playing would be regarded as grotesque and offensive by it's creator were he alive to hear it.

Despite the likelihood of it being visibly titled something like the 'Lament for the Village Tragedy'?

This is just a hypothetical example - but I think conveys the point that what comes out when music is transmitted to a new recipient via a piece of paper frequently bears little or no relation to the original either in its intent or its spirit.

It's an extreme example and, since you're (by your own admission) both 'new at this' and clearly have little understanding of how notation might be appropriately used for trad repertoire (including what it would/wouldn't normally attempt to notate), you're really not in a very strong position to be arguing this case!

[AbrasiveScotsman]

Despite the likelihood of it being visibly titled something like the 'Lament for the Village Tragedy'?

What if it had a name like "Children at play"?

It's an extreme example and, since you're (by your own admission) both 'new at this' and clearly have little understanding of how notation might be appropriately used for trad repertoire (including what it would/wouldn't normally attempt to notate), you're really not in a very strong position to be arguing this case!

Well absolutely. I defer to your knowledge in that regard.

[AvienMael]

Which is why I said 'appropriate new twists'...

And wasn't talking about anything like that!

Yes but if all that remains is the written notation, how would you know what is appropriate?

Here's a hypothetical example.

Let's suppose an Irish composer created a beautiful slow air to commemorate a local tragedy that occurred in his home village. This piece was as a result was always played in a subdued fashion and with reverence by those who had learned it in the living tradition. Even if the original back-story were forgotten, it was "remembered" within the character of the piece of music itself.

Now let's suppose that the last man who knew this tune in it's living form wrote it down one day, and then went out and was killed in a war. The long dead piece is found on a bookshelf 80 years later.

The modern-day musician who reads it then plays it with universally accepted phrasing and ornamentation, but puts a slightly jaunty and cheerful inflection on his playing. He has no knowledge of the context to the piece, no knowledge of what the author meant when he wrote it. He has no way of knowing that what he is playing would be regarded as grotesque and offensive by it's creator were he alive to hear it.

This is just a hypothetical example - but I think conveys the point that what comes out when music is transmitted to a new recipient via a piece of paper frequently bears little or no relation to the original either in its intent or its spirit.

My own feeling on the matter is much the same as yours - in fact, I'd go as far as to say that you really can't argue with that, and it's a very strong argument in favor of aural tradition... except for one thing...

In your hypothesis, when the last man who knows the tune dies, should the tune then die in it's entirety with him? Is nothing good served by preserving the skeleton? Only if no one knows how to read it.

Many times a piece of music will have a written notation on it. For example, "played slow, with feeling," and so forth... what of that?

I am in favor of aural tradition in a day to day sense. I have learned most tunes this way, whereas my father is more a "student of music." His playing and mine are radically different, with his seeming much more 'clinical" to my ear, whereas I play more expressively. He has more difficulty folding over a mistake, and it can be immediately obvious, whereas I can work it out by somehow "working it in" a lot of the time. This then, to me is soul. What I find between every two notes is itself the essence of the tune. What he finds is nothing more than a precise measure of time. I have often wondered, if I took the time to be able to do both equally well, would I find new meaning in the music? I have seen musicians who can sight read anything - and play it as if they wrote it. They can also hear a tune for the first time and play it back to you almost note for note. I have seen others that have practised only method for decades and still fumble through almost every new piece of music you put in front of them.

In the end, I think both traditions have their place.

[Peter Duggan]

Despite the likelihood of it being visibly titled something like the 'Lament for the Village Tragedy'?

What if it had a name like "Children at play"?

So the 'last man who knew this tune in it's living form wrote it down one day' and, despite therefore being aware of its tragic origins, headed the page 'Children at play'? (Now go on, tell me that someone else added the title later!)

[mutepointe]

Do the people who follow the aural tradition consider the possibility that they are not creating carbon copies of the original piece of music? The moment that piece of music gets transferred from one person to another, one day to another, one anything to another, it gets changed. Recordings have helped that out but I would find it hard to believe that anyone could say that they are playing the tune identically to the recording. Even recordings mess with the actual sound of a tune by the artist.

[Peter Duggan]

Do the people who follow the aural tradition consider the possibility that they are not creating carbon copies of the original piece of music?

If they're truly following the tradition, I'd say of course they do.

but I would find it hard to believe that anyone could say that they are playing the tune identically to the recording.

And I'm not sure why anyone would want to do that (in any tradition) unless it's purely a technical exercise. Otherwise we're just talking slavish (and likely sterile/robotic) imitation!

[cboody]

This will be my only comment on this topic. It is done to death in trad worlds, and I haven't read anything new about it literally in years. That said:

1) NO kind of music is completely represented by the notation. The only possible exception I can think of is a handful of extreme contemporary works from an era that is now mostly behind us (Elliot Carter's music comes to mind).

2) Any competent player of any style of music, whether a music reader or not, must learn to understand the cliches and stylistic traits of the music s/he plays. A truly gruesome example of lack of that was the 1950s symphony orchestras trying to play show tunes. Equally gruesome is what some players "by note" do to traditional music of almost any type. Orchestras (and their conductors) have long since learned to understand at least the most important stylistic traits of most of the types of music they are asked to play. Some of those trad players have not and seem to resist it mightly. There really is no excuse for "that's not the way it is written down in xxx book" kinds of comments.

3) One can learn a style without playing from notation, but one can't learn a style without listening and absorbing. Thus notation is not a replacement for listening, but players who have listened and absorbed what they heard can use that skill to inform playing from notation.

4) Given 3 above then notation is a useful way to record the skeleton of a particular music. Informed listening and study of the style can allow the player to bring the dots to life. The success of that effort will depend on the player's understanding of the style.

5) It follows from all of this that notation has many roles and can be very important, but does not replace listening and learning to understand the music we choose to perform.

End of lecture. Class dismissed.

[Mr Ed]

All this time spent debating with strangers the merits of using sheet music could have been used to learn the basics of reading it. I've never met anyone who was worse off for gaining knowledge.

A lot of this IMO is just plain ol' common sense. Just 'cause ya have the sheet in front of ya to learn it, doesn't mean that some higher power is gonna take all the heart and soul out of your playing, or that you will no longer listen, or... whatever.
And if you receive any grief from those who are against using it...who cares!!!

[Denny]

I've never met anyone who was worse off for gaining knowledge.

ya need to get out of the stall more

[Nanohedron]

Do the people who follow the aural tradition consider the possibility that they are not creating carbon copies of the original piece of music? The moment that piece of music gets transferred from one person to another, one day to another, one anything to another, it gets changed. Recordings have helped that out but I would find it hard to believe that anyone could say that they are playing the tune identically to the recording. Even recordings mess with the actual sound of a tune by the artist.

Just picking you to quote here, Mute, because you were the latest of a train of thought I want to address.

I can mainly only speak to Irish and to a lesser degree Scottish Trad in this discussion. I guess I'm seeing two camps forming in this thread: those in the trad world who take the intrinsic endurance of a tune's general character as an article of faith and see variation as a virtue to be cultivated, and those generally outside or new to that world who want an exact original to be faithful to. There's one huge problem with the latter. To repeat myself: in folk musics, ITM in particular, written notation will always be only a general approximation of a general idea unless it's by the composer's own hand. And the likelihood of getting that in any overall sense is slim, slim, slim indeed. If you see written notation of the Kesh Jig, trust me when I say it's no way The Original, or if someone says it is, I urge you yourself to know better, because having The Original, or at least knowing you have it, would be impossible. No one knows who composed it, how old it is, any of that. The fact is that it was probably never originally written down, but composed in the heart and head, played, someone heard it, it caught on, and it was passed on that way and later written down. Yet whether you learn it by dots or ear, after years and years unknown the tune is still what it is, alive and kicking. Everyone in the ITM world knows The Kesh when they hear it. A couple of notes' difference from one version to the next is not a significant thing except as a conversational hobby-horse. It shouldn't be cause for a Dark Night of the Soul.

I've composed a tune or two myself, and wrote them down. Someone else played one for a look-see, and the result was slightly different according to his own playing as opposed to mine. That's as it should be. Yet the tune remained itself, all the same; it couldn't be anything other than what it fundamentally IS.

Sometimes I think people lay too much significance on how much individual touches to a tune must eventually make the tune changed beyond recognition - which, I'll be honest, is to me a patent over-concern, because to speak of the "bones" of a tune (someone mentioned the word "skeleton") is valid, particularly in folk music. Let's take the tune Jingle Bells: now there's a tune that doesn't see a lot of variation in terms of notes in standard versions, whether you play it by ear or staff notation. But if it were played to funk it up - or switched to a minor key for ironic purposes, say - is it now NOT Jingle Bells? Really? Everybody would still recognise it for what it is. The continuing aural tradition surrounding this tune sees to that.

[benhall.1]

Thanks for that, Nano. I totally agree with what I think you mean. What you are expressing there is something which I think is almost impossible to express. And you nearly managed it.

[Nanohedron]

What you are expressing there is something which I think is almost impossible to express. And you nearly managed it.

Look, if I can't get you there with Jingle Bells, well...