Andydrumster4
New Member
True
drummers who can't read music notation
- Thread starter Billy Boy
- Start date
toddbishop
Platinum Member
You're inferring that, I didn't imply it. I'm just reporting a factual matter to you: reading is a day 1 item. Do you want me to say it's not? I don't know what you want to hear.
I don't know why it's so difficult. There are 5-6 professional guys here trying to make a point about the value of something basic-- to everyone, not just professionals-- and getting this resistance. Nobody's trying to waste anyone's time with something useless or disparage them for not being "good" enough.
bud7h4
Silver Member
What about the technical perfection of those who don't?
I stress (again), reading notation is profoundly useful. Yet there are mountains of books, lessons, courses, all on music theory, without so much as a single bar of notation involved. Not reading is no excuse for not learning all of the theory involved in what you're playing or want to play.
It's not like you either learn to read notation or be relegated to playing blues rock at your local corner pub.
The only correlation between not reading and not being very technically capable is that if you haven't bothered to learn to read, there's probably the chance that you haven't striven to learn much else either.
Edit: when I say "you" I mean "a person" in general.
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dcrigger
Senior Member
This where you seem to be conveying a lack of understanding what it means to read as drummer. First off, 90% of all drum set reading is interpretive. Laying out enough information to make so that right out the box the drummer isn't at stumbling through the song - it's form, it's structure, where each section starts and end, where any of the important accent happen - but rather able to play all of those elements confidently. Second playing with feel and with the dynamics that the drummer feels are "right" for the song or the moment is antithetically to reading at all. In fact, it is a require part of it. This what I mean by reading at the drums being 90% interpretive.
What most non-readers don't understand is that drummers very rarely at the drums read anything that looks what we see in books and all over the internet - where ever note is written out, just as it was played on a record. Those aren't drum charts - they are Drum Transcriptions.
Typically drum charts are much less specific - or maybe specific about something - like a suggested BD rhythm - or an instruction "play snare on 2 & 4" - but traditionally tons of the details as far as what to actually play are left the drummer decide on - using their ears, feel, musicality, etc.
Drumset reading is 90% about more quickly removing the stumbling part in order to get the ability to play confidently with feel and dynamics. Reading is not an opposite to feeling... not even the littlest bit.
Andydrumster4
New Member
I agree. I wish I would learned properly or even just had a teacher.
No.....your right. I just had this burning thing inside me that dictated that I was going to play some music somehow. So I just started beating on pots and pans till I could get a kit. I fooled with it for a year or two and lost interest. When I got into high school and my buddies invited me to come to rehearsals a few times it rekindled that burning in me so I locked myself up in a spare room and played till there was blood all over my kit from my hands. I emerged with just y enough skill to play in a garage band. Within a few years by shear will and determination I was playing in a locally know pretty good paying band on the local scene. After a couple years, egos, drugs, babies and life in general put an end to it. I found myself playing in my church. After that I just hung it up. 23 years later I found that cheap kit and started again without Knowledge of tabs and charts etc. It's been two months now and I'm playing things I never thought I would be able to. This is all while being ignorant of reading tabs etc. I am quickly picking up double bass, I am three times the drummer I was. I guess because all those years I was absent I was still playing in my head. There are gobs of songs I've never played before and sit down and nail em. I do regret not learning the right way now, but back then who had time to learn that when all these honeys were falling at my feet and the partying was certainly waaaaay more important. Lol I'm sure I would ultimately have become a much better drummer/ musician if I would learned to read. I express this to all the young cats that come by to hear us jam. I can say when you nail that song and those goosebumps and the hair Standing up and that deep down thing that speaks to you in front of a crowd singing every word along with you..... well I find it better than sex, better than s any drug, better than money and when you feel it your hooked. I highly recommend learning to read, I am a proponent of that but I didn't and I still shred and get that feeling that no money can buy. Just food for thought. If you are looking to make a career of music then it is a necessity to learn to read. If your just a joe blow weekend warrior addicted to that rush I described above then it's possible to get there w out reading but you will never be a seriously professional musician that actually pays the bills with those skills. This is all subjective and my experiences and opinion only, so take it with a grain of salt.
dcrigger
Senior Member
Andy - great post and thanks for sharing that. I'm going to comment on a small part of it - but don't want it to be misconstrued as casting any kind of shade on you and your path, and the obvious joy you've gotten from it. Anyway, my comment is only directed at this one small section -
- as it speaks a lot to what some of us are saying about the foundational importance of not simply learning to read, but in learning to process and understand music in the way the "learning to read" process generally gives us. There's a reason why so many top level musicians, athletes, etc. seem to "start so young". Which I think fueled by two things - there's a lot to master and only so much time and patience (and years relatively void of responsibility to do it) and the fact that learning new neuromuscular skills comes easier to the young. Add that to common adages about the efficiencies of "learning something right the first time".
Which leads to the thought that by the time someone is "looking to make a career of music" - and using that as the time to decide whether or not to address "filling in the basics". Well I think, for most people by that time, the ship has most likely already sailed. Too much has to be re-earned, too much effort has been spent to now re-commit at what will feel like a remedial level.
I'm not saying that it can't be at an older age - or 5-10 years into playing - but that I believe it to be very, very, very rare. Just as it is rare to hear any stories of working professional musicians that started playing in their early 20's. Yes, I'm personally aware of a handful of such stories, but I'm also personally aware of hundreds upon hundreds of musicians whose backgrounds follow the cliche, the rule, not the exception.
This is really at the heart of why my answer to the OP's question is so demonstrative. Because the decision as to whether to "learn to read, to learn the fundamentals of drumming, or just learn by sitting down at a set and trying to figure it out, strictly play by ear" is a HUGE choice that, for many (most?) will directly effect their ability to play for a living, and frankly to play a lot of music that they might just want to play. And again it is decision - too often purposely made - with no real understanding of the consequences down the road. Because no beginner - heck no intermediate - drummer has any idea of how far they want to proceed down this journey. And yet this one decision - this "how to best start" decision - is so consequential.
WhereIsTheOne?!
Junior Member
I check into these forums every few days. I'm frankly astonished that this thread is still going and that we're still having to battle anti-intellectualism.
bud7h4
Silver Member
While I'm in favor of learning to read music, not doing so doesn't mean "not learning the fundamentals of drumming, and just learning by sitting down at a set and trying to figure it out . . . "
You can learn the fundamentals of drumming without reading notation. And once you have that knowledge you're not "trying to figure it out" by ear, you know what you are hearing. You don't need to be able to recognize the symbol for a quarter note rest to know the value a quarter note rest.
We act like all this knowledge is hidden in notation and can't be understood without it. That's such a bizarre concept to me.
And on the flip side, there are the non-readers who seem to feel, well it's okay if they don't read notation because they only play simple music for fun. If you don't want to learn to read music, that's unfortunate, but why not learn anything (or everything) else and be an exceptional - and knowledgeable - musician?
Edit: I want to walk that first sentence back somewhat; regardless of how well versed in music one may be, if you do happen to have a piece of music which you are unable to learn, for some reason, and you don't read notation, you're in trouble. I can't think of any such obstacle for a reader.
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MattRitter
Senior Member
I believe the entire debate has shifted into 2 camps:
1) The camp that believes reading music is "situational"...that it's only important if you will actively be doing it while performing.
2) The camp that believes reading music fundamentally alters the way that you learn and perceive music. In effect, it changes you as a musician regardless of whether or not you actively read on the bandstand.
I fall into camp #2.
1) The camp that believes reading music is "situational"...that it's only important if you will actively be doing it while performing.
2) The camp that believes reading music fundamentally alters the way that you learn and perceive music. In effect, it changes you as a musician regardless of whether or not you actively read on the bandstand.
I fall into camp #2.
bud7h4
Silver Member
I'm in between maybe; the camp that believes reading music immeasurably beneficial (not just while performing) and it fundamentally alters the method by which you learn and perceive music. It changes you as a musician, but doesn't determine your level of musicianship.
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Hollywood Jim
Platinum Member
Now I'm wondering how many guitar players and bass players can't read musical notation.
(I did a quick search. Lots of famous players can't read music.)
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(I did a quick search. Lots of famous players can't read music.)
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Rattlin' Bones
Gold Member
Exactly. Trying to directly answer OP's original question, what are your thoughts on the importance of reading vs learning by ear/feel? My answer is the importance depends on your situation. It's important and actually a mandatory requirement if you want to be in any school band or want to major in music in college. If you want to play in an orchestra, or a formal brass band. If you want to arrange and compose. Session studio drummer. A lot of jazz situations. A lot of situations.
But if you play as a hobby you have no aspirations to call yourself a professional (unless $50 and free beer as a payment for a Saturday nite gig puts you in pro space) and the guys and gals you play with learn all their songs by ear then in those situations it's not very important.
A battle or us vs them? It's just my simple well, it depends answer to OP's question that some folks insist is wrong, hence the two entrenched camps lol.
Good discussion over these 19 pages. But hey this is a rare elite group of folks on this and other drummer forums who obsess over shell thickness and types of wood and bearing edges. Heck I lived for 60 years playing drums with knowing about bearing edges. Now since joining this forum I lose sleep over them
Rattlin' Bones
Gold Member
Every jazz player I know guitar bass every instrument in jazz they read music. Never known one who did not.
Most guitar players and bass players in blues or rock or country or whatever of those kinda bands I've played in are more like me (with one exception and he's the Godfather of blues in this town so go figure) - they learned to read music on a basic level as a kid, but now learn all their songs by ear.
toddbishop
Platinum Member
It sure helps. That's the whole point. And it does determine what areas of music somebody can get into, and the way they do it.
Suppose I want to teach somebody about flams. I can give them this page of stuff, and we can get to work showing them how it's played, then they can go home and practice it in a focused way, by playing through it a bunch times, doing extra work on any parts that are hard for them. We got a plain and direct telegram from Mitchell Peters on what to practice to get your flams together, and we're lucky to have it.
For a non-reader, learning the piece is out. They would be dependent on someone to teach it to them, while avoiding showing them how to read it in the process*-- which would be prohibitively wasteful of everyone's time. Maybe somebody made a video they can copy it from, but then they're still dependent on someone else's ability to read. The only position with any integrity is to say that's not worth doing, and not learn about flams. Or learn about them some other way they devise themselves, based on no knowledge of flams.
Part of musicianship is learning materials and knowing literature, so this is an example of not being able to read determining someone's level of musicianship. Maybe this one snare drum piece isn't such a big deal, but not reading is a blanket dismissal of all of it. Basically:
Everything written = no value to me.
That's a lot for a person serious about music to give up.
bud7h4
Silver Member
This is a very good point. My first thought was why not listen to it instead of reading? but those are different mechanics. You can't listen ahead.
JimmyM
Diamond Member
Bingo!
piston broke
Junior Member
I can't read music - and it's something I do regret - but oddly, my music theory is pretty good. And if you want a point to this confession, tune in tomorrow, by which time I might have sobered up and remembered what I was going to say.
Syncopated_1
Active Member
THIS. There are so many really, really good instructional books out there in every musical genre available. You are seriously limiting yourself buy not learning to read. It's not that hard, trust me I was doing it in the 5th grade. It's like reading a book. You don't stop to sound out all the syllables and vowels, do you? You just read the words because you have seen them on pages for so long you 'know how they go together.'
Find a good local teacher and start with the basics. You will be amazed at how fast you pick it up. My brain does not work nearly fast enough to count out all of what is on that page. BUT, because I have seen said combinations over time, and continue to read daily, the ability does not fade.