Re: [Harp-L] 5th position



Hmmm... well I think we're all getting hung up on *words* here with talk of colours, textures, and things.

Words are fine when we use them to refer to things we each recognise in the same way... like reedplates, overblows, pearwood. And if I sing a song about 'my woman done left me for the man who ran over my dog and stole my car'... you all know what I mean and how I'm likely to be feeling about it... if I get it over right, you're going to share the emotion. If I'm explaining how a wine tastes, though, there are no words to describe flavours.. I can only refer to ones you already know.. toast, blackberries, ginger, lemon (none of em taste like wine)... and hope that you'll then be able to recognise and reconstruct those tastes in your own mind.

Instrumental music is different. The sentiments so obvious in lyrics have to be conveyed in a medium that has nothing to do with language.... OK, to an extent, there's a commonly-held knowledge of conventions in musical expression .. but basically it's up to the performer to put across some very complex emotions with nothing more than artifice. Listen to the masters... would we say we 'hear' colours, textures, patterns, shapes? Well maybe... but it's an inadequate way of expressing what we mean.

I have no idea what I 'see' when I play... it's almost instinct.. I just 'know' that if I go up (say) a tone, it will take me towards the end of a phrase in a more expressive way than if I go down. Why hold a note longer than the next.. why bend it.. who knows? Someone else would do it differently and maybe (probably) they're a better player than I am for it.

Yes, we all have to learn the basics.. and there has to be a framework for teaching. At the end of it all, though.. when we've learned enough to be able to express most of what we want through our technique... it comes down to talent.. and the realisation for most of us that some are just plain better at it it than we are. I like to think of comedy in this context... I can read, speak... do everything that's needed to be funny... I could steal a script from the best comic of them all and parrot it word for word... but would I get a laugh on stage?

I just say play what you like, how you like it... if others like it too, you're fine. If you change it so's they like what you do... you're faking it.


----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark Wilson" <markwilson53@xxxxxxx>
To: <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, September 28, 2005 7:53 PM
Subject: Re: [Harp-L] 5th position



Chris Michalek wrote:

If you truly want to go where no man has gone before > play the music that's in your head. Listen to the tone, >flavors, rhythms, colors, shapes that come to you >naturally....

That sounds great, but at some point you have to think about something. You need some sort of structure in order to get to that point where you can play the flavors and rhythms in your head, or get back to that point when the critical mind steps in and bumps you off course. Don't you think??


I know that Dennis Gruenling thinks in terms of scale degrees, Jon Gindick in terms of melody, David Barrett thinks in terms of riffs and and their placement within the twelve bar format (verse forms), and Larry thinks in terms of notes. I've spent a lot of time around all four of these guys and all four approaches are definitely working for them. I've seen them all regularly get into that zone where it's clear they aren't thinking at all, similar to what you described above. Different approaches, but in essence, the same result.

You did mention thinking in colors while playing which I found interesting.
From what I understand colors come from the right side of the brain, which
would make it impossible to self judge and criticize yourself if you're seeing the music as colors in your head while playing. Dennis has got me going on scale degrees again after a few fits and starts and I was thinking about assigning a color to each scale degree. Anything to get that critical mind out of the way, which is the toughest thing for me, especially when playing out in public..

Mark

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