TEACHERS- Yes or no?

[Billy's Little Trip]

An anecdote.

When I was teaching myself how to play many years ago

Never heard that one, can you hum a few bars? *budump bump*

[Spud]

If you have a weak musical mission or lack of vision, a teacher will mold you into a standard musical product, which in that case, would be a good thing. Otherwise, you are just picking up more tools to help you on your mission, and no amount of training will knock the creativity out of you. So you know, either way, you win.

[jb]

What if I had just asked a guitar teacher "What's the most horrible sounding chord possible?" and he replied "Oh, a tritone. Here, it's like this."

What if you had asked a guitar teacher "What are some great sounding chords other than the three you just showed me?"

[Märk]

What if I had just asked a guitar teacher "What's the most horrible sounding chord possible?" and he replied "Oh, a tritone. Here, it's like this."

What if you had asked a guitar teacher "What are some great sounding chords other than the three you just showed me?"

I guess in my case anyway, discovering these things on my own was, and is, infinitely more rewarding. It's what made me fall in love with the guitar in the first place. Had I, in the early days, taken a bunch of lessons, I don't think I'd have viewed guitar with such a sense of intrique.

The whole reason this thread exists is because Leaf thinks everyone should goose-step down to their guitar fuerer and learn the way of uberguitarmensh. (ignore that last sentence, I'm just trying to get a rise outta leaf. I expect angry PMs any minute. C'mon leaf, you know sven loves ya) Jolly Roger asked for advice on learning how to solo, I suggested against getting lessons. He's stated himself that he's not very experienced with guitar, and in my opinion, figuring things out for yourself is the best route at that point in your musical learning. I even commented that getting lessons later on, after you've taught yourself some stuff, is a good idea. You've already developed a rudimentary sense of personal style in your playing by that point, and no amount of lessons will change that.

Another anecdote: I was friends with this guy in highschool, his parents put him in guitar lessons. For a long time. He got pretty good (at being flashy/a Randy Rhodes clone) I ran into him like 10 years later, and he asked if I still played guitar, we ended up going to his place for a beer/ to jam on guitars a bit. I played 'Dee' by Randy Rhodes (because I remembered he was such a RR nut) and he was all "Dude, you're fingering that all weird, that's not how you're supposed to play that. But it sounds really good." I admitted that it was just my best approximation of how it goes, because I learned it by ear. He couldn't fucking believe that you could learn a song like that by ear. He had theory up the yingyang, and was, technically, a *much* better guitarist than myself, but couldn't learn things by ear. At all. If he didn't have sheet music in front of him, he was lost. Maybe he was tone deaf? Or maybe he'd never *used* that part of his brain because he didn't have to? (he could sight-read music in real time)

It all depends what you want to do with your music. If you want to play for an orchestra, then music lessons are pretty much mandatory. For a long, long time. (I think fluffy said this already) If you want to play commercial pop or rock, or play in a cover band, they're probably a good idea too. If you want to play original garage rock on weekends (which is that camp I fall into, hence my opinion on it) lessons are not necessary, and I'd go so far as to say they will hinder you.

Please direct all hate-mail to whitehouse@us.gov.org

[Märk]

Who has a better chance of creating something novel and unique: The virtuoso with a deep, passionate knowledge of music history, playing technique, and chord theory? Or the hack in his bedroom with a stiff wrist, a badly tuned guitar, and a Mel Bay book?

All depends on what you consider 'novel and unique', I guess. I hate commercial music, mostly, and I get the overwhelming feeling that you thrive on it. Also, you've basically just insulted every self-taught 'hack' like Frank Zappa, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, Tony Iommi, Keith Richards, Joe Perry, Jimi Hendrix, BB King etc. WTG.

[deshead]

Also, you've basically just insulted every self-taught 'hack' like Frank Zappa, Eric Clapton, etc. WTG.

Oh give me a break.

guess in my case anyway, discovering these things on my own was, and is, infinitely more rewarding. It's what made me fall in love with the guitar in the first place. Had I, in the early days, taken a bunch of lessons, I don't think I'd have viewed guitar with such a sense of intrique.

That's a lot of supposition .. I took all kinds of lessons, and I fell in love with guitar too. In fact, the lessons did so much for my sense of intrigue that I also learned piano and drums.

All depends on what you consider 'novel and unique', I guess. I hate commercial music, mostly, and I get the overwhelming feeling that you thrive on it.

What's with all the straw man arguments in this thread? Why are formal education and commercial-sounding music conjoined?

One more question: Do you suppose that, for every self-taught guru you care to name, I might be able to name a classicaly-trained genius of equal or greater stature?

OK, then this is just a semantics/matter-of-personal-opinion issue like most fabulous Internet debates, so why do I care?

Because it bugs me to think of beginners reading this thread, and concluding they don't need lessons after something you said resonates with their "indie" sensibilities. Everyone needs lessons. And whether you care to admit it or not, Sven, you'd be a better musician if you'd studied under some experts when you were younger.

[pegor]

So avoiding weather a teacher is 'valuable' or not. Is it fair to say elements of personal sound, or style come from querks and misconceptions in ones playing? I think the wacky way a person teaches themselves to play contributes to the things that differenciates them from others.

Does formal instruction homoginize ( god I wish I could speelll) your sound?

[Sober]

'Different' and 'unique' can just as easily be bad as it can be good.

Yes, you should absolutely develop your own style. No, that doesn't mean be terrible and call that a style. Man is a product of his environment, and you will therefore sound like whatever you listen to at least to some degree.

A teacher will probably try to make you play chords and scales, but the teacher is your employee. If you want to play a certain style or song, a teacher should show you everything you need to know to nail that style or song.

By that token, you should be able to tell a teacher you want to be technically skilled enough to play whatever is in your heart and in your head. If you have a good teacher, they will take you down that path.

I think I just nailed the issue.

[Billy's Little Trip]

No, that doesn't mean be terrible and call that a style

crap!

[Spud]

Sober, I think I can help you nail it further. I have had a significant amount of formal training. Has this turned Octothorpe into just another commercial poppy boy-band?

[Leaf]

Sober, I think I can help you nail it further. I have had a significant amount of formal training. Has this turned Octothorpe into just another commercial poppy boy-band?

EXACTLY.


Spud, when I jammed with you, I was in awe. You, in my opinion, get music in a way so many wished they would. You are intense...formal, and completely contrary to the "rules" all at once...with big huge balls to boot.

It was risky, fun, exciting music to play. I felt completely crazy and rock and roll and wild...and deep down inside, the whole time, I knew that it actually all made sense.

That's my take on it.




As far as this debate goes..here is a simple version of my opinion:

Teachers teach techniques, rules, concepts just like english teachers teach grammar, spelling, sentence structure.

Musicians create and speak what is in their hearts and minds using the techniques available.


If you want to discover techniques by yourself, fly at it. It is a noble, exciting adventure filled with genuine discovery. Columbus didnt' discover America, but he certainly gets the credit. (Hope that analogy makes sense).


As far as HOMOGONIZING your sound. Oh no. Do NOT think that's coming from teachers. Every kid I've every taught sounds remarkably different. I sound very different from my teachers.

NO. It's MTV and Muchmusic and top 40 radio and executives that bring about an homogonized sound. At least in my opinion.

I mean, do you write and talk like everyone in your grade 11 english class? If so.. I must have had a real shitty grade 11 english teacher.

[Caravan Ray]

Sober, I think I can help you nail it further. I have had a significant amount of formal training. Has this turned Octothorpe into just another commercial poppy boy-band?

EXACTLY.


Spud, when I jammed with you, I was in awe. You, in my opinion, get music in a way so many wished they would. You are intense...formal, and completely contrary to the "rules" all at once...with big huge balls to boot.

It was risky, fun, exciting music to play. I felt completely crazy and rock and roll and wild...and deep down inside, the whole time, I knew that it actually all made sense.

I felt the same way when I jammed with NSync.

[Leaf]

..and of course, by jammed, you meant...

[Märk]

it bugs me to think of beginners reading this thread, and concluding they don't need lessons after something you said resonates with their "indie" sensibilities. Everyone needs lessons. And whether you care to admit it or not, Sven, you'd be a better musician if you'd studied under some experts when you were younger.

Wanna 'cut heads'?

[Mogosagatai]

I think it's safe to say that formal training, or lack of it, will influence your style/sound/skills/creativity. If you had done it the other way, you'd have developed differently and, a zillion out of zillion+1 times, you'd've turned out differently as a musician. As far which method is better for the initial learner, I'd say that's hardly even worth a debate. If you think you'll learn well enough on your own, go for it; if you think lessons are a good place to start, they probably are--either way, you'll soon realize if it isn't working and hopefully try something else.

For my part:
I've learned almost everything I know about music from tinkering around myself. I've gathered gabillions of ideas from listening to others, which, as someone pointed out earlier, is kinda like taking lessons anyway. What very little formal musical knowledge I have was weaned from conversations with my snobby opera singing friend, and those convos did two things: 1) slightly improve my ability to create music, by sort of increasing my bag of tricks as well as increasing my understanding of why my music worked (or didn't) before, and 2) make me wish I knew a shitload more about music.

[WeaselSlayer]

Whereas I've studied music all my life and still have worse ideas than Phunt.

I guess what I've done is learn every kind of music other than the kinds I like to play. I studied classical piano for years, my first guitar teacher was a country western player whose idols were people like Hank Williams and the guy from Pozo Seco Singers, my second guitar teacher worshipped Malmsteen and played cheesy-ass shred metal. All that plus an undercurrent of good old church choir singin' (and a program through the Royal School of Church Music that I somehow got through). Now everything about this spells out boring, tired musician but the things is - all of these people tried to imprint their way of doing things onto me and all I had to do was try something else. Confront all their knowledge with my own (most of my guitar lessons were me bringing in my heroes and swapping music with my teacher) and of course, the biggest most valuable part of my education: listen to as much great music as I can. Never good, certainly never bad. Great music. Every spare cent I ever earned has been spent on music (or movies sometimes, I can't be that one-dimensional). That's the ultimate foil to the very rigid training I've received, and I think ultimately it's worked pretty well for me. Learn it all, and then throw it out the fucking window and play. Paraphrased from Page Hamilton.

[roymond]

What if I had just asked a guitar teacher "What's the most horrible sounding chord possible?" and he replied "Oh, a tritone. Here, it's like this."

And he would be doing you an incredible disservice. My god, a chord on it's own? The whole reason for harmony is context. What you experienced at that moment is an isolated dissonance, and its "horrible sound" is purely subjective, based on your previous exposure to music and whatever perspective you've had engrained in your ears. Listen to an isolated major 7th on its own. Sound nice or horrible? Fill in the major third and fifth within the same two tones and now you have one of the prettiest, calming and potentially schmalzy harmonies you've ever heard. Go figure.

Listen to some Beethoven, Chopin or Liszt and you'll find tritones with extraordinary beauty. Or much jazz for that matter, or Elvis Costello or many, many others. In the right context tritones carry you from one place to another unlike any other harmonic relationship, and indeed with tremendous beauty. Dissonance has a purpose and the push and pull of harmonic dissonance can change entirely our perception of what's ugly or "horrible".

I'd like to say I learned all this myself, but no, I've had dozens of teachers.

Deshead wins this argument and JB wrote the treatise.

Sven - Zappa studied music very seriously. Whether he sat in college courses makes no difference. He pulled apart classical, jazz and rock compositions to learn how they work, just as a good teacher would have had him do it. Christ, if you base your own education on the extreme and almost imperceivable (percentage wise) successful souls who are gifted beyond anything ANYONE ON THESE BOARDS WILL EVER EXPERIENCE, you are truly living a fantasy and cutting short your opportunity to expand your horizons.

[Märk]

People used to get literally burnt at the stake for using tritones in their music (diabolis in musica), and while I absolutely agree with you re: the importance of, and the underlying beauty of dissonance (hell, why do you think I was trying to find that chord in the first place?), you can't honestly tell me that playing 3 sequential semitones together sounds good on its own, alone.

[edit] correction: a tritone is not 3 sequential semitones. It's an interval 3 whole tones apart. Maybe I should hit the books to refresh my memory, or perhaps take some lessons!

And come on, Roymond. Do you think I haven't listened to Beethoven? I studied (on my own, remember) classical music for several years. I'm a better fingerstyle player than plectrum player, much to my chagrin

[erik]

Everyone needs lessons.

No they don't. You can sing the praises of teachers all day long, and you'd be right. But having a teacher is by no means <i>necessary</i> for making music. Not even for making good music. Untrained or self-taught musicians can and do make good music.

Zappa studied music very seriously. Whether he sat in college courses makes no difference. He pulled apart classical, jazz and rock compositions to learn how they work, just as a good teacher would have had him do it.

But if he did it without a teacher, then that means that teachers aren't necessary. Just because you don't have a music teacher doesn't mean you can't have a strong desire to learn things on your own about music.

[Märk]

Finally, erik chimes in.

Anyway, the chord in question, Roymond, is this:

Code: Select all

O|----
 |--4-
 |--7-
O|----
X|----
X|----

[roymond]

Zappa studied music very seriously. Whether he sat in college courses makes no difference. He pulled apart classical, jazz and rock compositions to learn how they work, just as a good teacher would have had him do it.

But if he did it without a teacher, then that means that teachers aren't necessary. Just because you don't have a music teacher doesn't mean you can't have a strong desire to learn things on your own about music.

I never said he had one, and I never said you need one. I did say that there are great people out there that can seemingly do anything they put their mind to, including Frank Zappa. There are amazing musicians who can't read music, who don't know formal music theory, who never took lessons, and who are blind. Probably some who are also mute. And deaf for all I care.

You ain't one of them. Neither is Sven.

This has nothing to do with enjoying music, or even making pretty damn great music, which both of you do.

Even though I've taken lessons all my life, I think the most important thing teachers have taught me is how to learn on my own and how to think and listen critically. I too learn tons of stuff on my own through experimentation, letting my ear guide me, and occassionally (gasp!) doing covers. Not that I have all that much to show for it...its all relative. But I don't limit myself to what teachers taught me. Hell, that would suck. I've been told I make some pretty unique sounds while working 80 hour weeks [edit: ok, that's now, up to this summer it was more like 60], raising a family and trying to be a participant in society. But in the past 12 years, I've never played live except for 2 Songfight Lives, never played with other people (except the same SF Lives) and I don't practice. I don't like it this way, that's just life. But I don't think I could have done this with out having had lessons and the foundation they gave me.

[boltoph]

Teachers teach techniques, rules, concepts just like english teachers teach grammar, spelling, sentence structure.

It's up to the writer or musician to then utilize their knowledge, both intuitive and "taught", to create the impending masterpiece.

Of course, the ear can also discover, on its own, that which can be taught. This is a sort of intuition, I believe. But hell, it's alot easier to be showed and played the way, rather than having to feel around and listen for it, in the dark.

Teachers, you ask?

My opinion = YES!