Break Away II

Learning to read music is essential to communicating with other musicians.

Music is as much of a language as French or Spanish, all must learn before speaking.

All musical groups must have this written roadmap before they begin. As soon as man could sing he wanted to pass on his songs to the next  generation, hence the need for written music.

Before even the greatest musician improvised, he knew where he could or could not go within the framework of his song.

It all comes down to if you cannot read; you cannot be with a group that reads. This leaves you as a performer left out of a large portion of musical performance venues.

You cannot follow music theory without the notes on the page. All of the structure of chords, melody, harmony and so forth can only be understood completely through the written note. Music theory is the building blocks of harmony and melody and must be understood first. It may seem hard, but it is worth the effort.

Learn a song without any other reference. When you understand music you can learn a song without an instrument in your hand. If you can read music you can go straight to the book and get all of the basic information on your own. Have you ever learned a song from someone else and not known if you got it right or got all of the information you need? Knowing music enables you to take a piece you have never heard before and make sense of it on your own.

You can learn exactly how the author of the song meant for it to sound. I have many times been very surprised to find out a song was written very differently than I have always heard it performed. In “Georgia On My Mind” by Hoagy Carmichael, for example, no ones plays the intro. Even if you have known a song all of your life you may not know the entire version or the way it was meant to sound. I know as a songwriter myself; if I wrote a song and no one ever included a large part of it I would want them to know they are doing it wrong!

If you can read, you can detect new music. It is a wonderful thing to “discover” music just because you are leafing through a songbook and you find something that really speaks to you. I have found many songs this way. These are songs that I absolutely love. I would never have known they existed without being able to read.

Detect new music you would never know otherwise. It may seem a little hard at first, but so was riding a bicycle as I recall. In fact the first time my father let go from holding me on a bicycle I ran into a post and knocked it over! I rarely do that these days now that I have learned how. In fact there are days when I don’t knock anything over.

Learning to read music will make you a better musician.    Are you prepared to discover new music, perform with people you  might never have met otherwise, speak with authority about the origins and intent of a particular piece of music or composer? Learn to read music, you will not be sorry.

Tags: how to sing, learn to read music, read music, singing, songwriter, songwriting