What instrument do you play or want to play ?

Vkothii said:
No, I'm not defining music.

I'm saying there are musical algebras, like there are speech algebras.
Why does math have a standard way of setting out the "language"? Why doesn't everyone use a personal one, or why do written languages exist? Why do we say or write the same word for "music"?
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Well, you said:
Vkothii said:
I think playing an instrument without learning to read music must be like learning how to do algebra without learning math.
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Doing algebra without knowing math is impossible.
Playing music without the ability to read notes is entirely possible. People do it all the time.
 
Yes, there would be some people in Brazil and Mongolia who do it too. They learn math too, like counting and so on, but I don't think they would understand what passes for "math" in a science forum, say. They might even have their own local customs and ways of teaching the art of playing an instrument.

Some kind of a symbolic representation, or even a spoken language, to do with hand and finger positions and movements. It could even be a direct representation "follow the movements", sort of deal. Still an algebra, right? So doing algebra without knowing what you and I understand is "math", is quite possible, then (as in: thus, as such).
 
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i can play the trumbone guitar and drums well
i can play the bass,sax piano,and euphonium passably.
im a horrible singer which upsets me to no end.
if i could learn any one thing it would be how to sing.
or the harp,for some reason it appeals to me...
 
I play piano (look at my profile) I can also play euphonium, but who cares about euphonium, right?!
 
Vkothii said:
I think playing an instrument without learning to read music must be like learning how to do algebra without learning math.
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I know plenty of pianists who can't read music. You just have to be able to listen to a song and know what notes they're playing, and you don't need music.
 
I'm getting back into Neil's, um, younger days, coz I can't bash a piano up right now with my shoulder (I strained it on the Rach).

I like Neil's stuff. He uses a D tuning religiously, like he never learned how to play a normally tuned git, maybe. That's ok, it makes the fretting a lot easier. You get all those augmented and diminished progressions just by fretting a couple of strings any old where, and suspended chords are easy as.

It's much easier on my right shoulder too - I started getting tingling in my thumb and a couple fingers yesterday - hope they don't drop off or something.

If I can't play music I might as well walk in front of a bus, type of thing. Well, figuratively speaking, of course.
 
tim840 said:
I know plenty of pianists who can't read music. You just have to be able to listen to a song and know what notes they're playing, and you don't need music.
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Absolutely. There are no doubt hundreds of thousands of accomplished piano players who can't read a bar of sheet music to save their life.

So I guess we don't need a standard notation, then.

It would make training an orchestra a bit more time-consuming - everyone would have to listen to the music first, so the composer would have to be able to convey each part to each musician, and have them remember it as the conductor then tried to get them to play together. They would probably achieve this at some point, but it would take a while, probably, depending on how many instruments in the orchestra.

Or, they could use a standard notation, universally accepted (by the composer and each musician) as representing the music each instrument should play - then all they have to do is read it and try to reproduce it.

Could that explain why we have standard languages, and use them. You know, like the one for that algebra stuff.
 
Of course it's important that we have a system of standardization, because most people can't just listen to a piece of music and be able to play it. There are a select few that can do so, though (myself included, although I can in fact read music) - it's called perfect pitch - being able to hear a note, chord or sequence and being able to reproduce it by ear.
 
I play piano, some guitar, and mostly the melodica, which is like a piano but you blow into it like a flute. It's popular in reggae.
 
there was a dude on australia's got talent (we don't) who played the gum leaf, he made it to the finals. how sad is that.

edit: gum leaves sound shit.
 
I narrowed down my search for airguitars to 2 choices, help me to deceide! here is the first one:



And here is the second one:



I like the tone of the first one better, but that is also heavier....
 
This is kind of a plea. If anyone can tell me the chord progression in the verse part of Neil Young's "A Man needs a Maid" song, I'd be their real good friend (I spose I could download the tune and wurk ut oot on t' piano, but since I'm here). It's in Cm, right?
 
Here's another little ditty that goes back a ways. The Irish, being Celts, were very musical, and invented some unique instruments - but then the Celts were pretty widespread. This one's about uisque baugh, or drinking and the sort of thing you end up doing. You might recognise this part, which is from a much longer "tone poem":

I took all of his money, and it was a pretty penny
I took all of his bully, and I brought it home to Molly
She swore that she would love me, never would she leave me
But The Devil take that woman, before you knew it, she tricked me easy

Put your ring dum a do dum a dar
Whack for my daddy o!
There's whiskey in the jar o!

Now some men like a' fishin', and some men like a' fowlin'
And some men like to hear, a cannonball a rollin'
Me I like to sleep in, especially in my Molly's chamber
But here I am in prison, here I am with a ball and chain

Put your ring dum a do dum a dar (etc)...

You can bash this out with a D tuning and just fret between the 7th and 9th to get the runs in the "intro", or instrumental. And the C to D etc are just two or three strings down at the usual 1-3rd fret. Tuning a guitar to D is like turning it into a tenor mandolin with only six strings.
 
Just a couple of suggestions:

Drop D - standard tuning with just the bass E string dropped a step - has almost all the advantages of open D for backing a sung tune.

In a lot of Celtic stuff, and probably Celtic inspired or acculturated stuff (with the modal influence), a C major chord sounds minor.

The following:
Put your ring dum a do dum a dar
Whack for my daddy o!
Whack for my daddy o!
There's whiskey in the jar. <- (no "o")

But hey - "If you love these blues, play 'em as you please"
 
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