Beginner impro Scale numbering

[atwl77]

Our first half-hour of rehearsal this evening focused on this, and we practiced concert Bb both singing and playing. Two of our directors had to learn these in their college days and that there were seven more pages available. We're told that learning them will make us better musicians.
View attachment 31112

Are these arpeggio patterns?

 

[Tenor Viol]

Are these arpeggio patterns?

Looks like it.

 

[ESJohn]

Are these arpeggio patterns?

He didn't refer to them as such, but I'll ask him at the next rehearsal. I'd always thought of arpeggios as simply going up and down the scales, usually skipping every other note. However, I'm very weak as to music theory. Others can chime in if desired.

We also did a facial exercise that involved placing the hand, horizontally, in front of the face. 1 would be at the chin, 2 at the mouth, three at the nose and so on with eight being at the crown. All of this while singing the notes. The goal seems to be to make all of us more musical in our playing and less mechanical.

 

[Pete Thomas]

I'd always thought of arpeggios as simply going up and down the scales, usually skipping every other note.

AFAIK arpeggios skip every other note of a scale only insofar as they are chord notes. So it isn’t random skipping of scale notes.

 

[turf3]

Those handwritten "number patterns" are just that. Mixture of chord tones and non-chord tones. These are the kinds of patterns that are common in all types of melodies. If you practice each of those patterns over and over, covering the full range of the horn, in all 12 keys and the several common chord tonalities (major, natural minor, harmonic minor, melodic minor, whole tone, diminished) until they come naturally to your fingers, you'll have a nice starting vocabulary to work with.

Of course you don't waiit till you have mastered all these technical exercises before you start playing music, or start playing improvised music; the development of your ear for improvisation and the acquisition of mechanical skills go along together.

 

[Pete Effamy]

And using abstract words to describe that sound is a great way to then hold it in your mind.

Only if that is potentially for you and it hits the spot every time. Adding further abstractness to music en masse (like teaching) can be a recipe for losing an entire class - happened to me and most of the classes in 3rd year harmony at college - at which point you think that the tutor is amazing and 95% of the students couldn't keep up; until you get a bit older, completely understand the concept (and how much easier it is to grasp using real English), and realise that he was the one at fault for losing pretty much the entire class - and it happened every year..

 

[PiccoloPirate]

Not keen on colored names for sound.
Learn the sounds.
After the Kodak song was called, the leader said, let's play Verdigris.
What's that, I asked?
Look out the window, was the answer. 🙄

 

[mrblackbat]

Only if that is potentially for you and it hits the spot every time. Adding further abstractness to music en masse (like teaching) can be a recipe for losing an entire class - happened to me and most of the classes in 3rd year harmony at college - at which point you think that the tutor is amazing and 95% of the students couldn't keep up; until you get a bit older, completely understand the concept (and how much easier it is to grasp using real English), and realise that he was the one at fault for losing pretty much the entire class - and it happened every year..

Oh yeah I get that. But to discover and assign them for yourself is great. There are also some sounds that I almost guarantee folk will hear with the abstract; e.g. Jaws

 

[mrblackbat]

Not keen on colored names for sound.
Learn the sounds.
After the Kodak song was called, the leader said, let's play Verdigris.
What's that, I asked?
Look out the window, was the answer. 🙄

View attachment 31122

Who said anything about colours?

 

[cappers]

Not keen on colored names for sound.

?? Q was about numbering notes.

Some people can see sounds and music as colours. A type of synaesthesia called chromasthesia. Our band leader has it. I had it once but it involved some mushrooms

 

[Pete Effamy]

Oh yeah I get that. But to discover and assign them for yourself is great. There are also some sounds that I almost guarantee folk will hear with the abstract; e.g. Jaws

That’s not an abstract example though, it’s a theme that everyone on here will no doubt know.

 

[mrblackbat]

That’s not an abstract example though, it’s a theme that everyone on here will no doubt know.

I disagree. It is abstract, there’s nothing at all about semi tones that immediately describes a shark; but it’s become a common and well understood theme that one can conjure and associate the images alongside: to me the very definition of abstraction.

Almost all thematic music, tone poems and the like are abstract. The real things they are depicting in no way sound like the image they conjure. Non abstract music is rarer - where the sound imitates the real sound; e.g. birdsong imitation, doors banging via drums, the literal use of cannon in orchestral pieces like in the 1812.

 

[Targa]

I disagree. It is abstract, there’s nothing at all about semi tones that immediately describes a shark; but it’s become a common and well understood theme that one can conjure and associate the images alongside: to me the very definition of abstraction.

Almost all thematic music, tone poems and the like are abstract. The real things they are depicting in no way sound like the image they conjure. Non abstract music is rarer - where the sound imitates the real sound; e.g. birdsong imitation, doors banging via drums, the literal use of cannon in orchestral pieces like in the 1812.

With health and safety they're not allowed to use the cannon now, they don't have the balls.

 

[Pete Effamy]

I disagree. It is abstract, there’s nothing at all about semi tones that immediately describes a shark; but it’s become a common and well understood theme that one can conjure and associate the images alongside: to me the very definition of abstraction.

Almost all thematic music, tone poems and the like are abstract. The real things they are depicting in no way sound like the image they conjure. Non abstract music is rarer - where the sound imitates the real sound; e.g. birdsong imitation, doors banging via drums, the literal use of cannon in orchestral pieces like in the 1812.

Ah, I misunderstood. I thought that you meant giving Jaws as an “explanation “ to people, not whether oscillating semitones depict a Great White.

Yep agree. Stick by my evaluation of my college lecturer though: nice guy, lovely player, hopeless teacher.

 

[ESJohn]

What of Disney's Fantasia? Was the music selected for the animation, or did the animators listen to the musical selections and then illustrate what they felt when listening to the music?

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-W8vUXRfxU

I think we associate Jaws with the theme from it because we are instructed to do so. Thinking of The Swan by Saint Seans or Mancini's Baby Elephant Walk, do we see those images because the title of the piece states it to be so?

 

[Pete Effamy]

What of Disney's Fantasia? Was the music selected for the animation, or did the animators listen to the musical selections and then illustrate what they felt when listening to the music?

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-W8vUXRfxU

I think we associate Jaws with the theme from it because we are instructed to do so. Thinking of The Swan by Saint Seans or Mancini's Baby Elephant Walk, do we see those images because the title of the piece states it to be so?

This is what Matt and I have said - though I was ineloquent. Music can certainly invoke tension, menace and sound violent; but it can't depict an actual thing accurately. Because of conditioning through years of film (image + music) we tend to accept a lot more than might otherwise work too.

 

[mrblackbat]

What of Disney's Fantasia? Was the music selected for the animation, or did the animators listen to the musical selections and then illustrate what they felt when listening to the music?

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-W8vUXRfxU

I think we associate Jaws with the theme from it because we are instructed to do so. Thinking of The Swan by Saint Seans or Mancini's Baby Elephant Walk, do we see those images because the title of the piece states it to be so?

Fantasia explored all aspects of that, elements were completely abstract (Toccata and Fugue) through to applying their own imagery (The four seasons, Rite of Spring, Nutcracker) to more following the indicated invocation (Beethoven’s 6th, The Sorceror’s Apprentice and Night on Bare Mountain).

But the latter are also still abstract as Pete says above, and the fact that the imagery for the pieces that Disney chose to alter works just as well is a good testament to that. I grew up for years associating the Nutcracker Suite with dancing mushrooms….

I think it’s very valuable to develop one’s own feelings for music. One of the most common we are told is that major is ‘happy’ and ‘minor’ is sad; but for me they just don’t sound that way, especially when extensions are added. After all a minor 7 is exactly the same as a 3rd inversion major 6. So the context, what the notes play against and what feels like ‘home’ are all very important… and once you can hear that and hear the different feelings and sounds then I think the real opportunities to make music open up, especially when you think of improvising and composing: you will already be able to hear the notes that (almost) MUST come next.

I was taught this from Iain Dixon, and it’s been amongst the best musical teaching I’ve had; I think it opened the door for me really

 

[cappers]

I grew up for years associating the e Nutcracker Suite with dancing mushrooms….

I imagine walking broomsticks when I hear The Sorcerer's Apprentice

 

[ESJohn]

and once you can hear that and hear the different feelings and sounds then I think the real opportunities to make music open up, especially when you think of improvising and composing: you will already be able to hear the notes that (almost) MUST come next.

Your words practically mirror what our director had stated when he introduced the number exercises and even before that. "Music is the language of feelings" is one of my favorite quotes from him. Our minds should be just ahead of the note that we are playing at that instant.