The Arrangement is Not the Song (Different Ways to Play Songs)

A common problem when learning a new song is whether to learn an exact rendition of a recording or to play your own version. And if there are many versions of the song available, which one should you learn?

An experienced player has a better chance of copying it exactly how it is recorded and choosing which version to play, whereas a beginner should play a song in the easiest playing-style possible.

Here are some guidelines to clarify this area:

Any song you hear or see on a sheet of music is made up of five elements: melody, chords, lyrics, form and arrangement. The arrangement consists of the instrumentation and all of the specific musical parts including any audio effects like ocean waves or children laughing. (And without getting too technical: song form, the order of verses plus the other sections, are often considered part of the arrangement. Which instruments play what music is called orchestration. And putting it all together with any sound effects and final touches is called the production.)

My point in all of this, is that the arrangement is not the song—it’s the arrangement of the song. It’s how the artist performed it or the producer envisioned it.

Learning a specific arrangement is great—I do it all of the time. Learning a guitar solo, piano piece or finger picking pattern is a good way to learn your instrument, as well as different styles of music. Plus, it directly accomplishes a musical goal so it’s fun and rewarding! Right? People have often asked me how come I know so many different styles of music. Well, I’ve transcribed a lot of music! When you copy the music note-for-note you gain stylistic knowledge and a new bag of tricks. And if the music is new or challenging, you gain musical knowledge and increased technical skill as well. Nice!

However, you don’t need to learn an exact arrangement in order to play a song well. You can, but you don’t have to. And at a beginning level it is sometimes impossible, therefore extremely frustrating when attempted.

For example, one of my intermediate students is learning “Angeles” by Elliot Smith. He printed out the TAB and started learning the piece going bar by bar. However, Elliot’s playing was a little advanced so this process was frustrating and would have taken about two or three months to learn. My student was not having fun, so I wrote an arrangement that was close to the recording but much easier to play. In a few weeks he had learned most of of the song, then fine tuned it on his own as we went on to other things. These other things are the musical skills that will enable him to quickly learn more complex arrangements on his own with minimal to no difficulty.

My beginning students often want to learn songs that are too hard, so I create an arrangement for them that they can play NOW, then we get into further specifics as we proceed throughout the upcoming lessons. My more advanced students learn material note-for-note, whether piano piece, bass part or guitar riff.

So if you want to have some satisfaction playing music right now—find something that you can play in a short period of time, and work on the more difficult pieces as time goes on while studying the fundamentals that enable you to play any song well.

It’s a winning procedure.

Marty B.
Studio: (818) 242-7551
Mobile: (818) 517-3164
Email
Personalized Music Lessons
Buttwinick Musical Services
http://Personalized Music Lessons Facebook Page

Holiday Music Lessons Discounts!

I normally don't promote at this blog, but I have some very cool Holiday Discount packages I want you to know about. 

Check them out!

 

Hello!

It's time for my Holiday Music Lessons !

Alright..., so it's getting towards the end of the year. For some people life just continues as usual. (Which is cool.) For others, however..., it's time to get caught up on those music lessons! Right? Maybe you've been wanting to get some musical enhancement all year but haven't?

So get yourself or a loved one some musical enhancement for the next few months. Only watch out--lessons with me can be addicting :-) (I also provide a wide array of musical services that you can contact me about.)

Browse through my teacher pages to see what I do, then get some lessons for yourself or as a gift!


Here are the specials:

• Normal rate: $65 / lesson (an hour)
• Gift Rate #1: $55 / lesson -- Buy two lessons (minimum) at $110
• Gift Rate #2: Same price with a four-lesson package at $220 (Normally $260)
• Gift Rate #3: A five-lesson package for $275 and you get one free! (This is a great deal.) This applies to anyone paying by May 13th and starting before the end of May. (Gift Packages apply to new or returning students only.

All lessons need to be weekly, at least one a week. (More is always fine.) Until a student is stable with the learning process, it's easy to get off track when a week is missed. Once someone is grooved in, occasional misses aren't an issue. (If/when the student continues after these lessons are taken, lessons would be at my regular price).

Here are some starting links to see how things work: Introduction Teaching Method Student Comments Clearing up Confusions About Music

Take advantage of this offer! Click on the Gift Certificate above to download, print and give to someone.)

Marty B. (818) 242-7551 Email (And remember that I deliver lessons by phone and Skype to your out-of-town mothers, mothers-in-law, and other people's mothers if you really like them :-))

How to Fix Practicing Frustration

Do One Thing at a Time!

Students at any level can get frustrated when a passage, riff or chord-change doesn’t lock in quickly.

Did that ever happen to you?

Playing music involves doing many things at once. Whether you are reading, improvising, playing by ear, or just foolin’ around, many coordinated actions are happening simultaneously. Much of the time, you need to break things down into smaller pieces in order to get all of the elements working together. The more practiced one is, the quicker the process will be. Learning a new chord-change might take a pro 20 minutes to nail, while an intermediate player might take four hours on that same chord change.

If you are not already used to the process, here it is:

1. Isolate one part of what you are learning and work on it. Take a short section of a guitar riff, piano fingering, scale, vocal passage, whatever it is, and work it out. Get it smooth and correct: coordinate the motions and master it. Break it down to just the right-hand picking directions on guitar, the left-hand piano shifts, where to breath, etc. Start with whichever element interests you the most, or is the easiest thing to tackle.

2. Isolate another element and work that out.

3. As you gain control over each part-of-the-whole, start combining them until the passage or section is complete.

It could take ten minutes or ten days to master one small thing, so have patience! Go for the new skill and don’t worry about time.

 

Common isolations:

1. The rhythm of the melody, or passage, without the pitches: Tap or clap the rhythm, and count it out if you can. I suggest doing this to a pulse: metronome, drum machine or internal pulse, if your “time” is good.

2. The pitches of the melody in any rhythm: Concentrate on the fingerings, attack and the ear training. Sometimes a passage is difficult simply because you don’t really hear it.

3. The accompaniment rhythm: If you can count and clap it, do so. If it’s not something that can be clapped easily, tap it with your fingers, “drum” it with your hands and feet, or clap the main feel or accents.

4. Fingerings and hand/body positions: Left hand, right hand, together.

5. Feet and leg motions: Pedals and levers.

6. If it’s in an odd-meter, like 5/8 or 7/4, drill the meter first by counting it out, then work on the rhythm.

7. Stabilize your technique and articulation (attack): Picking, plucking, bowing, blowing or percussively attacking like piano or percussion. At this point a singer could focus on timbre and vocal technique.

These same principles apply to all instruments—everything really :-), whether you play flute, trombone or bagpipe!

If you isolate troublesome passages and practice them correctly, you should have them under your control in less time than you might have thought!

 

Marty B.

Email: marty@buttwinickmusic.com

http://buttwinickmusic.com

http://Personalized Music Lessons Facebook Page

 

How to Play and Sing at the Same Time

Playing and singing at the same time is usually a challenge for the beginner, and sometimes the professional as well! The secret is Rhythmic Independence. When you know how to develop this, singing and playing at the same time becomes doable; and the better your rhythm is, the easier it will be.

Each instrument has its own type of learning curve, but the procedure I lay out below is the method to follow. Once you get used to this procedure you can learn to sing and play almost anything! Really. However, as I stated above: the better your rhythm is the easier it will be, and the poorer your rhythm is the more difficult it will be. If your rhythm isn’t good you’ll just have to work a little longer on the procedure.

Make sure that each step is easy before going on to the next. If Step #1 and Step #2 aren’t easy, Step #3 could be impossible. If a step becomes too difficult just go back to the early steps and work on those. That’s the secret to this: if something is too difficult go back to an earlier step. You should also use a metronome. You can do it without one, but it’s best to use one. There are many online metronomes if you don’t have one.

FUNDAMENTAL INDEPENDENCE DRILL

1. Play the instrument part evenly while counting aloud, i.e., 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &, or whatever the count of the song is. Get used to deliberately placing your rhythms in time. (The steady flow of beats.) Don’t add the vocal yet. If the instrument part is tricky or difficult, play a simpler one. Align what you are playing to the count. If you can’t count while playing, at least get a feel for the exact placement of your instrument part to the flow of beats.

2. Speak the lyrics of the song in time. Deliberately place the rhythm of each syllable in time. Be as exact as possible, and exaggerating the rhythmic placement is very helpful. Make each syllable short and precise. You might feel a little silly doing this, but you need to develop rhythmic precision and this is the way to do it. (If this is difficult you could use some private instruction with rhythm.) Quite often, the rhythm of the melody “floats” a bit and is not strictly in tempo. If this is the case, I suggest varying the rhythm a bit so it’s easier to understand and duplicate.

3. Begin to combine the speaking-vocal and the accompaniment—VERY SLOWLY. Unless the song you are working on comes quickly, you MUST GO SLOWLY. I’ll repeat that: YOU MUST GO SLOWLY. I’ll repeat that again: YOU MUST GO SLOWLY. The only way to really nail something is to go slow enough to coordinate the rhythmic placement of all the elements. GO SLOW!

Independence is a skill that needs to be developed. To gain control over physical motions, you need to go at a speed at which you can actually DO what you need to do. And until you gain control over each specific placement of each vocal sound and instrument motion you have to go slowly. I repeat over and over because THIS IS THE REASON WHY PEOPLE HAVE DIFFICULTY DEVELOPING INDEPENDENCE, AND PLAYING AND SINGING AT THE SAME TIME. Imagine driving around a corner too fast… you can screech and crash. Why? You lose control. Imagine running down steep steps too fast… you can trip and fall. Why? You lose control.

Think of something you can do well with your body. Take a minute and look this over. Now, why can you do that well? It’s most likely because you have control over whatever it is. You can only develop increased rhythmic ability by practicing something at a speed at which you can actually DO what it is you want to do. There is no way around that.

I stress this point because this is the hardest thing for a beginner or a novice to accept. A pro has learned that this is the ONLY way to go.

Enough said.

Marty B. Email
http://buttwinickmusic.com
http://Personalized Music Lessons Facebook Page

About Music Lessons - The Blog Book is Here!

Hello! After discovering that another pro musician and teacher was applying some of my blog articles successfully with her students, I decided to share the info with whomever could use it (in addition to my regular students and readers). Anyone learning an instrument should check it out. :-) Just click on the link.

About Music Lessons - Blog Book
"A Practical Guide to Learning an Instrument"
A collection of blogs and articles about learning music, music lessons, and private instruction.

How to Pick a Teacher

A good teacher should guide you toward your musical goals. Ultimately, he or she should be a good musician, a good teacher and someone you like working with. Budget is often a consideration, but how spot-on the teacher is and how much you practice are often the deciding factors. The bottom line is, are you getting what you want and is it worth the money?

Your lessons should be productive and fun. Lessons are the most fun when your goals are being addressed directly, rather than getting caught up in any personal agenda the teacher might have, which could be good or bad for your progress.


Though brief, here is a workable approach to finding a teacher:

1. Decide on what you want to do. If you’re not sure, a good teacher could help you figure it out.


2. Research. Ask friends, check out music stores, go online. Find out what’s available in your part of town, or out of town if you want to try correspondence lessons (very workable, by the way). If you see live music, talk to one of the musicians you like and see if he or she teaches or has a recommendation. Find teachers with potential.


3. Communicate with prospective teachers and find someone who seems to click. Do they know what they are doing? Do you like their approach? Do you feel good after talking to them? (If you feel worse after talking to them, move on!) Are they interested in your personal goals? Do they communicate with you—or talk at you?
   Pick someone and START! And if that teacher doesn’t work out—find another!

Since there are many approaches to teaching and learning, it could take a handful of lessons to see if things click—or it could take only just one. You’ll know when the time comes.

Welcome to the adventure!


Marty B.
Email
(818) 242-7551
http://buttwinickmusic.com

Should I Take Private Music Lessons?

First off, ask yourself, “Am I happy with the way I play?”

If you are happy with the way you play, you probably don’t need private music lessons. If you are not happy with the way you play, you probably do! (Though an experienced musician very often just needs to practice more!)

(I could actually end this blog right here!)

In compiling my student’s goals over the years, (over 1,000 one-on-one students!), here are some common reasons why people take music lessons:

1. To learn an instrument for fun.
2. To learn an instrument as a profession.
3. To get unstuck from where they are and move ahead.
4. To improve their timing (rhythm).
5. To play the sounds they hear in their head.
6. To understand what they are already playing or singing.
7. To clear up confusions from past studies and playing/singing experience.
8. To have a fun and relaxing hobby.
9. To play with other people, for fun or professionally.
10. To improve their pitch.
11. To learn songs by ear.
12. To play by ear.
13. To improvise.
14. To read music.
15. To write songs and/or compose music.
16. To play a certain style of music.
17. To play better, in general, whether beginner or pro.

There are many ways to learn musical things: instructional videos, books, friends, websites, schools, self teaching, or all of the above. Some people do well with these methods, while some do not. And even when the above work, if someone doesn’t understand something, or wants to get better faster, a private instructor is usually sought out. (And, obvious or not, if someone wants to become a pro classical player lessons are the norm.)

So, If you’re stuck, want some guidance, or don’t know where to start, a good teacher can discover what you need to do and get you going.

Personal happiness is the bottom line.

So…, if you are happy with the way you play, you probably don’t need private music lessons. If you are not happy with the way you play, you probably do!


Marty B.
Email
(818) 242-7551
http://buttwinickmusic.com