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[Sandy]

The more I learn, the more I realise there is to learn. That is really exciting but I get a bit confused as to whether I should focus on the one point or practise a range of things all the time. (eg rhythm, ornamentation, scales, clarity of notes etc). I tend to just do what I feel like doing at the time but should possibly be disciplined a bit more.

I think I really need to work on 'not' sacrificing the rhythm for a complicated bass arrangement. (The East Anglian workshop with Rees was a real eye or ear opener for me.) I must also stop and listen more, especially at sessions.

Is it just me, or do others get into a bit of a whirl with their thoughts on learning 

Cheers

Sandy
 

[juker]

Your observations about learning are astute Sandy and apply, I think, to any field where one strives to improve. However I don't know much about the melodeon, but from what I have heard of your playing I would say that your learning methods so far are very effective indeed 

[Lester]

The more I learn, the more I realise there is to learn.  

Tell me about it, and I'm 30 years into the process

That is really exciting but I get a bit confused as to whether I should focus on the one point or practise a range of things all the time. (eg rhythm, ornamentation, scales, clarity of notes etc). I tend to just do what I feel like doing at the time but should possibly be disciplined a bit more.  

Think the key is "do what I feel like doing at the time", in my estimation this will have far more success than "be disciplined a bit more" as you will enjoy it more.

I think I really need to work on 'not' sacrificing the rhythm for a complicated bass arrangement. (The East Anglian workshop with Rees was a real eye or ear opener for me.)  

Get yourself a 1 row, solves all those fancy bass arrangements, mind you opens up a far more complicated world of how to do fancy bass arrangements with just two buttons (it's all in the timing)

I must also stop and listen more, especially at sessions.
Is it just me, or do others get into a bit of a whirl with their thoughts on learning  

No it's definitely not just you, in fact if someone is not having these thoughts they are not thinking hard enough  

[OwenG]

Completely agree with all that's been said so far.

I've recently hit a bit of a block and realise that I'm just playing the notes and my playing / musicality is actually quite sloppy in places. I've started stripping tunes down to work through them really slowly to see where I can improve / waht is going wrong so I guess I'm addressing all of the points made in Sandy's original post with each tune. A key challenge at the moment is in leaving gaps between the notes and so I'm making a real effort to play as cleanly and crisply as possible whether on the row or across the row.

Watching all of the showcases at Mendlesham was a real eye opener and I think that even just watching taught me an awful lot.

[zubz]

...I must also stop and listen more...

That's not always easy to do - to hear yourself playing. So often you hear what you meant to play rather than what you actually played. I've done some recording of practice recently - and very ear-opening it was too! Very useful for (rapid) improvement.

It won't always be pretty, but it's a great way to really listen to your own playing.

 

[Sandy]

...I must also stop and listen more...

That's not always easy to do - to hear yourself playing. So often you hear what you meant to play rather than what you actually played. I've done some recording of practice recently - and very ear-opening it was too! Very useful for (rapid) improvement.

It won't always be pretty, but it's a great way to really listen to your own playing.

 

I know I've found you tube and totm very good for self critique ! I actually meant I need to stop playing and listen to other people more, especially in sessions. It's great to fumble my way through some tunes but I could also learn more from some of the others playing just by listening.

Cheers

Sandy.
 

p.s. It also struck me that at workshops I tend to come away with a few little gems to work on. Things that I couldn't find in a book or on a recording. Guess I'm going to have to kidnap a few tutors and return them after six months 

[Anahata]

I get a bit confused as to whether I should focus on the one point or practise a range of things all the time.
...
Is it just me, or do others get into a bit of a whirl with their thoughts on learning 

Everything at once, unless you've identified a particular problem that you need to focus on.

I learn most when there's some external (or sometimes self-motivated) pressure to learn a new tune or the accompaniment to a song that's going to stretch me. The "doing what I feel like" goes out of the window when I have to do whatever's needed to fit in with someone else or an unfamiliar musical style.

Sandy - I agree with Juker that you must be getting something right - I've really enjoyed what I've heard of your playing and it sounds as if you've got good ears, which are of course essential to the learning process. And thank you for your enthusiastic remarks elsethread about last Friday's session in Stowmarket, but listening to you playing a couple of Andy Cutting tunes the other day (on the web somewhere) and trying them myself made me realise I am complete rubbish in the top octave and I really need to sort myself out because I simply can't play them to save my life

So that's a specific area I need to concentrate on as soon as this weekend in Shropshire is over.

The more I learn, the more I realise there is to learn

Very true, and I'll also add, from a month of melnet and everywhere else too, that you can learn from anyone and everyone and I'm mopping up ideas faster that I can use them!

You can also learn a lot by just sitting in sessions with decent musicians, listening and joining in. There's no point in doing it if you can't have some fun, and Mary learned to play tunes on the English concertina almost entirely by that form of osmosis - I've hardly ever heard her actually practising. (but she's learning melodeon now - watch out!!!)

[nfldbox]

I generally agree with anahata but just as it is good to concentrate for a while on an individual passage until you get it fluid, it can be good to focus on one thing if it is proving a problem. Letting the fingers be a bit fluffy while you work on the bellows for a while can be quite useful.

[zubz]

I know I've found you tube and totm very good for self critique ! I actually meant I need to stop playing and listen to other people more, especially in sessions. It's great to fumble my way through some tunes but I could also learn more from some of the others playing just by listening.

I take your point.
Then it becomes a trade off between "learning (the piece) by ear" learning, and "learning (musicianship) by listening" learning   

Perhaps another thread / poll is bubbling up ... to "learning by ear" v "learning by listening". Or even ear v eye. 

Or if not a poll, then, in the words of Harry Hill, "there's only one way to sort this out ..."

 

[GbH]

Is it just me, or do others get into a bit of a whirl with their thoughts on learning 

Yes, I'm pretty much in a constant state of unfocused 'whirl'.  Having learnt via digital means (forum, YouTube, DVD...) from the start, I've always had easy access to more information and stimulation than I can realistically hope to deal with.  Although this is great in lots of ways (I would never have got started otherwise), it does seem to throw up lots of problems in regards to making sense of it all.  Having a general musical background helps, of course, but even then, the oddities of the melodeon and the culture of playing folk tunes* still makes the process seem quite alien to me.   Add to that uncertainty around what I really want to achieve (Band member?  Solo performer?  Novelty act?) and what genres of music are most suited to enable that, I find I very easily get frustrated and downheartened.  It's too tempting to flit from one thing to another, just because you've chanced upon seeing something new.  Then there's the figuring out of what I am or aren't realistically capable of doing, which isn't always easy to come to terms with.  As has been said previously, making recordings can be a very sobering experience, when getting to discover what you've actually been doing, rather than what you were hoping to do.  Yes, I probably do too much thinking about it, but find it hard not to.

Also, as you say, the more you learn, the more you discover that you don't know.  This seems particularly evident when trying to learn something that you've seen someone else playing (on YouTube, say).  You can learn the notes easily only to discover that there's a lot of hard-to-pin-down subtle stuff going on, too - stuff that's much harder to get to grips with. 



* admittedly only experienced third hand.

[forrest]

Get yourself a 1 row, solves all those fancy bass arrangements, mind you opens up a far more complicated world of how to do fancy bass arrangements with just two buttons (it's all in the timing)

I concur with Lester on this...a one row is excellent cross-training for a multi row box.

    It forces you to make the decision of what to leave in and what to leave out, as well as what to fake. You must be decisive in selecting the note you are using, as a mis-step can be alarming. Also, since the ins and outs are pretty much the same up and down the row as on a standard 2- or 3-row, you will get a  better feel of where the notes are and to anticipate if a note is a pull or push. It stimulates the mind to think quickly a bit ahead of the fingers.
   
 A one row puts you directly in the drivers seat for rhythm; since you have fewer choices melodically (no dreamy chords or bass runs or cross rowing), you have to dance the notes out of the box to make it interesting. It's more of a lesson in playing the box than playing a tune.
 
 I have found that all these things (and other subtle effects) help make my 2- and 3-row playing better, because they are fundamental to all diatonic boxes. It's also fun to see what you can do with fewer bells and whistles.

[theSmoiler]

You can also learn a lot by just sitting in sessions with decent musicians, listening and joining in. There's no point in doing it if you can't have some fun, and Mary learned to play tunes on the English concertina almost entirely by that form of osmosis - I've hardly ever heard her actually practising. (but she's learning melodeon now - watch out!!!)

I totally agree, Anahata - have learnt most of anything I've ever learnt, that way, by immersion and absorption in the playing of people who are mainly far more skilled than myself. Rather than being fazed and put off by such players and their perceived superiority, they've provided me with an impetus, in giving me something to aspire to. And playing and being around decent musicians does tend to be great fun, as they are usually very relaxed about the playing, look happy and can have a laugh and a joke (particularly at themselves, if someone messes up!) and share non-verbal communication with others they feel to be as passionate about the music as themselves - and what they produce is a joy to listen to,.

I remember sitting in the Brewery Tap in Marsden one evening with Mary, when she was new to concertina, as we fumbled and giggled our way through some of the Ryburn tunes such as the Bill Hall's...!

Diane

[Sandy]

I would love to sit in on more sessions and workshops, it was a treat to go to the 'Melodeons and More'. I count myself lucky though, with a youngish family, that I can find a fair amount of time for the box 

Cheers

Sandy
 

[Steve_freereeder]

A one row puts you directly in the drivers seat for rhythm; since you have fewer choices melodically (no dreamy chords or bass runs or cross rowing), you have to dance the notes out of the box to make it interesting. It's more of a lesson in playing the box than playing a tune.

Spot on, J.W.! I love this! It's the sort of quote to print out and keep in the one-row case, so that it greets you each time you get the instrument out to play. 

[zubz]

[Anahata]

[mikesamwild]

I think the 'default' position of a one row or a mouth organ is the root of rhythmic diatonic playing and was the basis of the folk tradition after we picked up the tunes from fiddlers, pipe and tabor players , pipers  and whistle and fluters..  You can fudge so much that's not actually there on the  reeds or buttons anyway.

After you have internalised melody and timing, rhythm and lift and sensitivity to other musicians and learning by ear from great players  .  then  you can go on to the infinite delights of Irish, Franglonavian , Cajun and Colombian etc etc etc


If you play with other instruments you can focus on tunes not flash chords anyway.

[ladydetemps]

The more I learn, the more I realise there is to learn. That is really exciting but I get a bit confused as to whether I should focus on the one point or practise a range of things all the time. (eg rhythm, ornamentation, scales, clarity of notes etc). I tend to just do what I feel like doing at the time but should possibly be disciplined a bit more.

I think I really need to work on 'not' sacrificing the rhythm for a complicated bass arrangement. (The East Anglian workshop with Rees was a real eye or ear opener for me.) I must also stop and listen more, especially at sessions.

Is it just me, or do others get into a bit of a whirl with their thoughts on learning 

Cheers

Sandy
 

I find unless I write stuff down at workshops I forget half of it anyway. lol! So I can only work on what I remember.

[Peter G]

I've found this problem increasing as I have gone on - initially it was easy to decide what to pratise as there was only one (then two) tune to practise, and Mally's book (plus Maggie's and George's) gave a new tune every session and gave me a structure to work on. Now I have too many tunes to practice every day so have to pick and choose- and two weeks on the tunes for Steve's workshop last weekend meant leaving nearly everything else for a while. However I am aware that anything to do with biological systems operates in a non -linear way so more practice ona tune doesn't necessarily mean proprtionally better - improvement comes as a wave form - better to worse then better again, and sometimes leaving a tune for a week actually improves it. So now I'm relaxing a little and playing  whatever tune I feel like in each practice session. Each tune has a different lesson for me. And BTW what a fantastic workshop in Mendlesham - friendly, inspiring and great fun Thanks to all who made it happen. I still can't play anything right through three times without making a mistake but that's OK too!

[**DTN**]

You reach a wall! ..... The obsession begins!.... you listen to a clever tune of a melodeon hero 10 times over! .. nothing! .... eleventh time!.... you hear a little trick /an ornamentation / a rhythm shift / a chord thats 'no way' in the expected place / an interesting accidental / a passing chord / a passing note / a harmony of bass v treble!
NOW YOU HAVE WORK TO DO! .... there's another level to get to!
OBSESSION!.... OBSESSION! ..... This things controlling my life! ..... You talk to me but i'm only hearing the clever tune!...NOW YOU HAVE WORK TO DO!

OBSESSION!....... THEN !!!! ............... You can play it! ..... Its like a drug! ......NOW YOU HAVE WORK TO DO! .....You reach a wall! ..... The obsession begins!... etc!.etc!.etc!.etc!

Did you say something???

Derek