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I used to be both. Now, after blood clots, I can't memorize to save me. But I can still sight read concerts if I have to.

bloke wrote:I believe that "intimate familiarity with all keys" and "reader vs. memorizer" issues are closely related.

Or you may have added several distinctions here -

• reads (only)
• memorizes notes
• memorizes a tune (independent of key)

compounded with

• acquires "play by ear" skill in commonly used keys
• somehow has equal "play by ear" skill in any key

Unfortunately I don't have the BB skills to render the matrix, but if they're mutually exclusive, we're talking about 10 different types of people (and we know the world isn't that complicated - there are really only 2 kinds.)

(OK, 4 different types - for the first two read/memorize variants, skill at playing by ear is arguably irrelevant.)

goodgigs wrote:Joe, I disagree.
I mentioned the "TEST" in my post.
I can sing in every key even if I don't know what key I'm singing in.
Sight singing is the best "TEST" there is, though most tests have flaws.

This is a very hard subject for some people to comprehend.
Remember a year ago a thread where a guy asked us to read a badly misspelled page ?
There were people on the board who claimed they couldn't read it at all. (I could speed read it (to some extent)).

I used to go to tutoring with a PHD laurite and author of two books on the subject.
She never tried to cure people. She just taught coping skills.

Sight singing and sight READING are two different skills, but they ultimately serve the same purpose.

If you can sing it, you should be able to play it. I learned this in college. Go figure...

An old friend of mine often says "If you know the tune, it doesn't matter what key it is in".

But singing is not the same as playing.

Most of the bands I play in I've been playing in for years. SO the music is stuff I've seen before, even if I haven't played them in a few years (when you have 500-1000 tunes in the book, some don't get played much), so I remember the bones of the tune when I see it, and rely on the actual notes as reminders.

But about 5-10% of every rehearsal is sight reading, and I pick up a lot of gigs that are almost all sight-read. The exceptions being tunes I've heard before, or maybe played once or twice in 50 years.

So ... you gotta balance. Read as much as you can, but learn to remember what you play, so you can do it again later with fewer errors.

dershem wrote:but learn to remember what you play, so you can do it again later with fewer errors.

The question then is, what is the best way to "learn to remember"?

It is like most things, those that can do well, can't understand why others have a problem.

I'm definitely a reader. I'm quite good at playing and singing at first sight, and have sight read a number of gigs both as a tubist and singer. My memory, however, isn't all that good, and even if the music does become more familiar after rehearsing I find that I still rely heavily on my reading skills. This is especially apparent when I'm tired or unfocussed, then I can make all sorts of elementary reading mistakes in pieces that I have played or sung many times before.

I do learn some lines by heart and can sing them (but usually not play them - I'm not very good at playing by ear) after repeated rehearsing, but which ones is quite arbitrary; in a choir, it is quite as likely to be a nice alto strophe, rather than the bass line I should be singing and learning.

Neptune wrote:

dershem wrote:but learn to remember what you play, so you can do it again later with fewer errors.

The question then is, what is the best way to "learn to remember"?

It is like most things, those that can do well, can't understand why others have a problem.

I never said it was easy - it can be very difficult! But yeah, this is one of those areas that vary greatly from one person to another.

Remembering songs, like remembering patterns of any sort, is something you learn by doing a lot, at least in my case. If there are songs you like a lot, you remember them, right? Just expand that to more specific things, I guess, is the way to learn to remember parts.

Good luck. Seriously.

(I just wish I had a memory like Bill Watrous, who remembers after one run-through.)

bloke wrote:confession: I have to admit that sometimes when I'm playing in an orchestra I begin to "play by ear"...and sometimes it happens when perhaps I should (instead) be reading/counting.

It happened the last time I played the Firebird Suite. Instead of counting sevens, I just hit those big percussive notes near the end "when it felt right". Frankly, it was a bit unnerving, but I fell into it before I knew I was doing it (listening, instead of reading/counting), and it was too difficult (as I was kinda busy...) to shift back to reading and counting. I'm pretty sure that I know what happens; When an orchestra/quintet/etc. is playing really well, it affects me more like when playing in a jazz/funk/etc. band (music flowing, etc.), and I fall into the musical habits/zones that I'm in when performing in non-sheet music types of ensembles. This NEVER happens to me, btw, when I find myself playing in mediocre sheet music-reading ensembles.

I think that's because you knew the part so well......inside and out. When you really know the music that well, you don't even have to count or do much reading - you are in "the zone", so to speak. I have done that on parts of pieces I have played a few times; wish it happened more often. The scary part is when you "awake" from "the zone" and then you have to start counting again and wonder where the hell you are in the music. But that could just be my ADD

goodgigs wrote:A few weeks ago I went looking for more information on the plastic trombone and found this question on a trombone discussion board.
If you need an instrument of any kind to render what's on a page (by sight singing) then you’re probably not a reader.

For me, "reader" has a simple and obvious meaning - "one who reads" - and if you can read your part in a piece previously unknown to you, on your instrument, then you have read and thus are a reader. I understand that this sight singing skill is another dimension of that, but there are plenty of people who aren't much at it, who read music anway.

I played ONLY by ear for many years and have only come back to reading in the last ten years or so. I am a terrible sight reader and wish I had the twenty years back when I didn't. Having said that, though, once a piece is learned properly it is no longer being read. The sheet is still there as a crutch, and it isn't ACTUALLY memorized, but if you are to play it well and with feeling, the music must be learned beyond the note reading phase and into the artistry phase. So, when I have learned the piece, I am, essentially, playing it by ear. Or at least this is how it seems to me.

I am a reader that memorizes. I found, particularly in Army Bands, by the time we hit the stage I knew the piece well-enough that I might have all of the music in order in the folder, but performed most pieces with little or no reference to the sheet music. The time with the sheet music had been earlier, alternately studying the part before rehearsing the section, and practicing the part.

Memorization is an odd issue - memorizing music comes easy for me but I have great dificulty remembering people's names, whereas some people remember the name of everyone they have ever met, but may not be musical at all. After about 4 years in the Army I realized that I had basically memorized about 20 marches, and only looked at the flip-folder in marching band if the piece was one I'd never played before. One skeptic asked, "Did you memorize every dynamic marking, too?." This person was a reader-only person, and read very well. My answer was that I had memorized it as an aural memory, a piece of music with dynamic swells, etc., not just a series of markings. And yes, once I reached a certain level of memorization and mastery of scales and keys, I was able to play memorized pieces of music in different keys, although the original, written key normally sounds "most right".

I'm primarily a bassist, but my school background is on tuba. I never memorized tuba pieces, although I can appreciate the merit in it, just never got into it. I can learn jazz tunes/standards off the cuff from just doing it so much and developing a method for it, but if it's a band arrangement, it takes a bit of time for me to absorb it. I sight read pretty well but at times, as bloke was saying, I might go into "ear" mode by accident and have to guard against it by paying better attention. There's been discussion on talkbass as well on this subject lately, interesting stuff.

Ike