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The tradition of teaching jazz has always been aural.

The black slaves used to sing and dance together, doing call and response, and dancing to the African rhythms.

Jazz musicians have always had a mentor/student role where new players learned by sitting in and listening to the older guys.

Every player today listens to tons of records and tries to imitate and emulate the sound.

How do you think all those rock guitarists learned music. Certainly not by pouring over a score 100 times!

They blast that album in their basement and jam along.

I think we're comparing very different things. I still believe most "classical" piano students don't spend enough time analyzing the score. And note-reading is still the key to success if you want to play classical music.

I don't play jazz, rock, and other genres of music, so I can't comment on that.

Why would you bother analyzing the score when you could listen to 10 interpretations by different people.

Music is meant to be listened, and you'd pick up far more. I bet even the composer never played it exactly the same way each time.

It figures that you don't play any jazz or rock or anything else.

Could you play Happy Birthday in Db or F# if you didn't have the score? If not perhaps it's something you need to work on.

Huh, again you make it sound like the two activities are mutually exclusive. When our daughter starts in on a new piece both activities occur. The score is analyzed to help with memorization and to pick out potential problem spots as well as general familiarization, we also end up listening to various versions of the piece (always fascinating to compare "professional" versions to the youngsters). Both activities seem to have their place and in practice, being familiar with the score actually enhances the listening, _especially_ when you are actually comparing multiple recorded versions. You almost seem to be asking "why read the book when you could see the movie(s)". The answer is you can do both and get more than either activity alone can provide.

I'm not sure why we're rehashing all this either/or stuff again - note-reading OR listening OR improvising OR singing. Good teachers do all of these.

I still can't understand why this argument has to be an either/or one. Surely music education is about both - aural training/playing by ear - and being able to read music and read from a score. Why limit yourself to one or the other? Why not analyze a score and listen to different interpretations?

Wizard - you began with note reading and classical training - do you think you could do what you do now without that foundation in music? You understand what you are listening to - you have a musical background which informs your 'playing by ear'.

If someone chooses to only play be ear - that's fine - but it doesn't make note reading redundant. Even jazz musicians can get something from being able to read music.

And yes - I play classical, jazz and rock. And yes - I could play happy birthday in any key without a score.

(Edit - I see that others feel exactly the same way )

It's not about either/or. It's about the approach piano teachers take when teaching students how to play piano. I say it's better to start with a chord-based approach because it's a natural (and easier) way to speak the language of music.

Which is why guitar is so popular. Students can learn a few chords and then can happily create music on the instrument.

Great analogy. Those who discount note reading and score analysis won't go very far in their classical piano studies.

ah the usual suspects are back! hahaha, same ol' same ol'.


When I learned jazz, I had to train my ears to hear melodies, harmonies, rhythms. Completely new skills.
Reading a score doesn't help you one bit to learn how to improvise.

If you play classical solely by reading, the tendency is to go on "auto-pilot" once you learn a song. You just follow the score and put your fingers where the notes are. In a way your mind is actually shut off, because you are relying on the sheet music to guide you, rather than your mind and inner ear.

Jazz musicians read music differently than classical. Most times it is a fakebook which only has the melody and a chord. It is up to the musician to interpret the chord and there is freedom to add or subtract notes. You could also change the melody and that would be fine.


My classical training gave me good finger technique, but not a solid foundation.

Maybe you guys should try and sit at the piano for an hour and improvise something completely new.

Reading a book and reading a score are 2 completely different things. You get enjoyment out of a book, but I don't know any musician that sits back with a glass of wine and reads a score. No, you turn the stereo on, chill on the couch and LISTEN.


If all you play is classical then yes, you need to read, but if it's anything else you better have good ears.

Another thing is that in classical piano, 99% of the time you playing solo.

In jazz, rock and roll, pop, most of the time you are playing with other people. That forces you to interact with your fellow bandmates, use your ears to see who's in tune and time.

Must just pick up on this. 99%? Simply not true. So many classically trained pianists play chamber music, accompany choirs, accompany singers and instrumentalists, play duets etc. I'd say 99% of my (classical) piano playing is with other people.

You assume that we don't do this already?

To be fair, I think you need to count practice time plus performance time, not just performance time.

Consider that we're not talking about simply consuming content, we're referring to learning to produce content. If you want to be an screenwriter, then "reading a book" goes beyond reading for enjoyment. You are interpreting the content with the goal to reproduce it in a particular way, so the analogy isn't as far off as it may sound at first.

Also, your statement about classical piano being a 99% solo endeavour is only true if you don't consider chamber music. I'd agree that the majority of kids taking piano are unfortunately not exposed to chamber music, but many are and for those kids the most of the skills you mention apply just as much to them. This is especially true for the pianist as it's usually their responsibility to hold things together for the group and respond/adjust when necessary (they have the complete score for the other instruments as well as the piano part). In this situation sight reading _and_ using your ears is paramount. You may even be forced to improvise a bit when things really go pear shaped.

They can start playing music almost immediately with other instruments also, such as an ocarina, a harmonica, a recorder, etc, but those instruments are not very popular with young people. So ease of making music quickly is not a viable reason for the guitar's popularity. In fact, many quit because of the pain beginners have w/the guitar until they develop finger calluses.

The main reason the guitar is so popular among young people is it has a huge amount of peer pressure / image support for young people to emulate (rock stars, etc) of which the piano has very little, except now for Ms Gaga!

And if Ms. Gaga were not so roundly skewered by so many, even here on these forums, perhaps people could use her as an example for kids to learn the piano.

She is actually a pretty decent musician. Google "Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta" her real name, and check out her music prior to the Gaga incarnation.

And jazz musicians as described by Wizard don't practise by themselves at home?

Absolutely. And frequently.

You forgot the most important, guitarists get all the chicks!!!

Wait, or was that drummers.

Nevermind.

Anyone want to comment on the gender distribution between guitarists and pianists in relation to the the two teaching styles being discussed and it's effect on that distribution

I would point to what I see as a more basic difference (and perhaps even more basic than the ear vs eye split being discussed.)

Guitar is learned almost from the beginning "in real time."

Piano is approached, at least by beginners, disconnected from time, then with time added at slow tempo, then brought up to tempo.

Something different happens with the learning process when the playing is in real time from the beginning. Notes are missed but fluency is learned.

Guitar players don't have a metronome. They don't need one. They have the CD playing. Or their friends.

Pianists don't have a metronome either, because it might cause their playing to be mechanical. Hee, hee.

Actually, all the guitar teachers where I work use a metronome or a drum machine with their students.

And what makes you think "their friends" have perfect rhythm and tempo?