Playing from sheet music won't make it harder to create excitement. But the sheet music cannot be a substitute for listening and responding to what's happening around you (in the music and elsewhere). If there's no listening and there's no motion or life or flexion or growth while playing, maybe it won't be exciting. In English Country Dance we almost always play from sheet music, but the good players won't stick to the page (that applies for both melody and chords). This could be a reflection of my personal style, but if I have sheet music of the melody, I can improvise much more striking harmonies or counter-melodies, which makes it even more exciting. I generally don't use sheet music for contra, and as a result, my improvised variations are more generic and more safe, but I still take every single chance I can to briefly wander away from the melody. I think the culprit is not listening and not adapting. Sheet music makes it possible for some people get away without listening or adapting. Taking the sheet music away might help them, or maybe they'd just stick to the tunes they have memorized and still not adapt. Jonathan Werk ________________________________ From: Musicians &lt;musicians-bounces(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; on behalf of musicians-request(a)lists.sharedweight.net &lt;musicians-request(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; Sent: May 17, 2019 7:37 PM To: musicians(a)lists.sharedweight.net Subject: Musicians Digest, Vol 25, Issue 5 Send Musicians mailing list submissions to musicians(a)lists.sharedweight.net To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://lists.sharedweight.net/listinfo.cgi/musicians-sharedweight.net or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to musicians-request(a)lists.sharedweight.net You can reach the person managing the list at musicians-owner(a)lists.sharedweight.net When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of Musicians digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Re: Dots (Thomas Verdot) 2. Re: Dots (Martha Edwards) 3. Re: Dots (Meg Dedolph) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Hi Jeff, While I understand your point & agree with the outcome that you suggest, I see a sheet of music more like a dashboard in a car - the gauges are there to glance at once in a while as need be but the important thing to watch is the road. For myself, the best example is the (thankfully) rare occasion when we are asked to do an unending grand march. We string 3-6 tunes together, in different keys, 6/8 & 4/4, etc to keep it interesting. I always scribble out the first couple of bars of each tune, in order, so that I don't blow a transition or start into the wrong tune in the agreed upon order. As for "playing by ear", do we really mean learning by ear? If that is the case it doesn't matter much to me. Whether I learn a tune from a friend, a recording or a piece of paper, by the time it gets used it is memorized & has entered into a state of constant flux. Finally, It is guys like you, the "rhythm section", who can most easily create excitement via rhythmic & chord moves. If that is solid & driving, the melody instruments can float on top & add the filigree. As proof, I can remember you with the Synchpaths going several times in a row through a tune with no melody at all & without a single dancer looking perplexed. Maybe all of us fiddle players should just pack up, forget about the tune & go out on the floor & dance. Regards, Tom Verdot On 5/17/2019 8:52 AM, Jeffrey Spero via Musicians wrote: ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Fri, 17 May 2019 16:49:22 -0500 From: Martha Edwards &lt;meedwards(a)westendweb.com&gt; To: Meg Dedolph &lt;meg.dedolph(a)gmail.com&gt; Cc: Jeffrey Spero &lt;jeff(a)syncopaths.com&gt;om>, "A musician's discussion list" &lt;musicians(a)sharedweight.net&gt; Subject: Re: [Musicians] Dots Message-ID: &lt;CAJjmMcMfcwipyGyED1kag=Vu_yyywAreaU4aJWeiyb14m1SjiA(a)mail.gmail.com&gt; Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Oh, dear. You got me. I have strong feelings about this, largely because, being lazy, I have never learned to play immediately by ear. But, having made my living sight-reading for 25 (now 50?) years, I find no barrier between me and music just because the dots are, well, lines and dots. The important things, however, that the non-dot players mention, ARE terribly important - that is 1. watching the dancers 2. listening to the other musicians 3. playing "musically" (by which I mean, knowing how to phrase, that is, figuring out where the music is coming from, and where it's going to) 4. listening to great players in order to learn "style"- that is, figuring out the character of each tune, and being able to vary that character if wanted or needed That said, the dots don't have to get in the way. An orchestra player, for instance, MUST watch the conductor while playing, and a symphony violinist MUST listen to all the other violinists and play *exactly *with them, and MUST listen to the whole orchestra and understand the character of the piece. That's totally like watching the dancers, listening to other musicians and learning to play with style. The problem comes when you first learn to play. If it's done right, you have a good, musical model to follow (sounds like playing by ear, doesn't it?) instead just playing one note after another, with no shape. The Suzuki method's brilliance, IMHO, was in providing the children with recordings of people playing Twinkle Twinkle (and all the other tunes) and getting their parents to play those recordings over and over for their kids even before they started learning to hold a violin. Then, when the kids start reading music (late in the process) they automatically played what they had heard (i.e., real music), and were able to figure out pretty quickly that those "dots" are not just little lego pieces, but large sculptures of something beautiful. There's more, of course - improvisation, understanding harmonic progression, etc. - and whether you read music or not influences those things, too, in different ways, some useful, some not-so-useful. And there's playing with others - if you give me your dots, we can start playing together right away, but if I have to memorize your repertoire first, we may have to wait a while. Don't get me wrong. I totally admire people who can learn immediately by ear, and if I had it to do over, would have learned how when I started playing for dances, but please don't blame boring playing on reading music. Instead, figure out how to play interestingly, no matter how you do it, with or without dots. M E On Fri, May 17, 2019 at 9:12 AM Meg Dedolph via Musicians < musicians(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; wrote: ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Fri, 17 May 2019 18:37:08 -0500 From: Meg Dedolph &lt;meg.dedolph(a)gmail.com&gt; To: Martha Edwards &lt;meedwards(a)westendweb.com&gt; Cc: Jeffrey Spero &lt;jeff(a)syncopaths.com&gt;om>, "A musician's discussion list" &lt;musicians(a)sharedweight.net&gt; Subject: Re: [Musicians] Dots Message-ID: &lt;CACs7sFWN5F8K-t2n0vDTNvhwLjPGcJP9_CksvVxWpX0OOnPvJA(a)mail.gmail.com&gt; Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Well, having played dances with you, Martha, I think that nobody could reasonably accuse you of being too dependent on the dots. :) And in the spirit of confession, everyone in my band either has a music degree or has studied a lot of classical music before coming to traditional music, so there are some foundational educational elements we all share that are based on reading music. But in thinking about Tom's initial postings over the course of the day, boring music is boring music, whether it's written down or not. If his bandmates have their noses stuck in the music at the expense of listening to the other players, that might be a problem. It also could be that they're not playing good tunes for dances. It's hard to tell what would make a band "more interesting" to dance to without hearing. I think familiarity with repertoire makes a big difference. I called with a band recently that mostly plays old-time music, and they sound great. But I made an offhanded comment about how a particular dance worked well with jigs and the fiddler recalled a New England jig that he knew, but hadn't played for a while and decided to try it, but the guitarist was not comfortable backing jigs and ... the band did not sound as good on that tune as they did when they were playing old-time reels. Meg On Fri, May 17, 2019 at 4:49 PM Martha Edwards &lt;meedwards(a)westendweb.com&gt; wrote: