Welcome to one of the most active flamenco sites on the Internet. Guests can read most posts but if you want to participate click here to register.
This site is dedicated to the memory of Paco de Lucía, Ron Mitchell, Guy Williams, Linda Elvira, Philip John Lee, Craig Eros, Ben Woods, David Serva and Tom Blackshear who went ahead of us.
We receive 12,200 visitors a month from 200 countries and 1.7 million page impressions a year. To advertise on this site please contact us.
|
|
|
PDL says you dont need to study !
|
You are logged in as Guest
|
|
Users viewing this topic: none
|
|
Login  | |
|
   
tele
Posts: 1464
Joined: Aug. 17 2012
|
 RE: PDL says you dont need to study ! (in reply to Mark2)
|
|
|
You can disagree as much as you want. I still think like I do. but when you speak about knowing a palo and how to play it I think it is basically knowing the theory of the palo. All music lies on theory more or less, it's just not necessarily the theory that is teached to all(the western ABC naming for example or naming scales). Palo is based on a scale and if you know how to play the palo you know how to play the scale. Even if the scale has additional notes not found in any traditional scale. still the basics of the palo and the theory is the same. just the methods of naming it or teaching it vary. Basically all music is based on scales, you can mix them up so much that you end up with the chromatic scale if you wish. If someone plays by ear it doesn't mean he doesn't know theory, he just has his own theory of music and way of looking at the fretboard, which most often in the end is pretty much often based on the same old scales.
quote:
ORIGINAL: Mark2
I can't really disagree more with your post. First, there are good flamenco guitarists in most cities who can show you how to play by teaching in the oral tradition. Second, many of the great players don't know phrygian from a refrigerator. The idea that a flamenco guitarist needs to be able to run scales is wrong. Not that being able to do it is a bad thing, but flamenco playing is not soloing over changes or vamps.
Making up falsetas isn't a matter of knowing what notes are in what scale, or what scale you can improvise with over what chord. It's a matter of knowing the palo, and what sounds right. People historically have learned that by listening and copying before trying to compose their own falsetas. The rest is knowing how to play for dance and cante.
If what you thought was true, jazz players would be tearing up flamenco, but they aren't. A rumba backing track? That has little to do with flamenco. Go back a few decades and there were no backing tracks....
quote:
ORIGINAL: tele
I think every flamenco guitarist would like to learn through oral tradition like paco did but very few have the chance. I suppose we have to study something to say the least.
Flamenco is largely based on dominant phrygian scale with some occasional notes outside the scale and not to know and understand theory in terms of scales and how the notes of scale can make a chord would make playing for me a whole lot more difficult. I agree there's no necessity to study too much as paco said but not to study music theory at all would make it a whole lot more difficult to play anything outside pre-learned pieces or falsetas. Basically you would have to have heck of a musical ear to know what your next notes are going to sound like without knowing theory at all. To learn all basic scales and modes on the whole fretboard takes only about a month and after that one can become much more fluent in improvisation and writing/understanding music. I personally like to use the basic scales as a base and occasionally include chromatic off-scale notes depending on the situation when improvising with a rumba backing track for example.
_____________________________
|
|
|
|
REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Nov. 1 2013 21:44:57
 |
|
guitarbuddha
Posts: 2970
Joined: Jan. 4 2007
|
|
RE: PDL says you dont need to study ! (in reply to tele)
|
|
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: tele
Basically all music is based on scales, you can mix them up so much that you end up with the chromatic scale if you wish.
Hi Tele.
I agree with the broad spirit of your posts on this thread and with most of the others also.
But I personally do not believe that music is based on scales.
First comes the thing itself.... either the song or the Palo or the Raga or a blues or whatever.
When I began to study Jazz I found it very confusing that a lot of the music seemed to have weird exotic scales and impenetrable chromaticism. But it only seems that way when you are thinking in terms of scales. If you look at connecting chord tones with passing tones, some of which may sound chromatic, then it all gets pretty damn simple.
Well at least it does on the guitar. On the page it looks like crazy random stuff.
Here is an example. In the key of Bb D7 is often used to get to Gm. Now is that Fsharp in the key of Bb ?
As far as I am concerned it is.
So what about E natural, is that in the key of Bb ? Well E natural sure sounds great over Gminor, when a Gminor chord is in the key of Bb. So, yes of course it is.
So what is the scale for the key of Bb major? Well you could say it is the chromatic scale but that would be saying nothing at all. It sure aint the Bb major scale either though because so much of the harmonic moves which reinforce the key have chords with notes that are not in the Bb major scale.
For me a key or a Palo or a Raga is not best explained by its 'parent' scale because they all have the same parent scale.
Music is not based on scales. It just isn't.
Scales are based on music, and they change all of the time during the course of a piece since music is seldom static.
It is a real good idea to work outwards from the harmony of the moment with the knowledge of what the function of the harmony of the moment is in a given key.
For example in the Bb example you play a D7 to get to G. So what scale do you play?
Well that is just the wrong question. You should play what you hear. Now that is likely to be Gharmonic minor (or in this case Dphrygian major third) since that will relate strongly to the Gm resolution which will follow. But why play that.
Why not just play melodic material from the D7 arpeggio. Or an Eb diminish arpeggio. Or an Eb melodic minor scale. Or A half diminished arpeggio, the whole tone scale on D or ................ Or sing what you want to hear and find it on your instrument. Then remember what the fingering and the sounds are and they worked over that particular chord in that particular key. And if you are like me transpose those ideas to another few keys by ear on the spot to hammer the point home.
You need to know where you are, work out from the harmony to what you are hearing in your head.
If you try and shoehorn all of this into the Bb major scale then you are missing a lot of the richness that being in a key can mean. Or a palo or raga or blues or any other music.
This is kinda like the rants I have when science is being discussed. The rules don't tell nature what to do. We observe nature and devise rules to help us predict how things will work.
I have read loads of theory books which miss the point of this.
But only in music, for hard science people who write the books seem to know better. And the whole point of science is to trash the old rules and find better ones.
Anyway I do go on,,,, sorry.
D.
|
|
|
|
REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Nov. 1 2013 23:16:20
|
|
Ruphus
Posts: 3782
Joined: Nov. 18 2010
|
|
RE: PDL says you dont need to study ! (in reply to kudo)
|
|
|
Hi Todd,
I am surprised that you have not felt something like that yet.
Not that theorectically educated people would lose improvisational / compository skills on default, but indeed many times the one skill appearrs to burden on the other.
Sometime in the late seventies I became acquainted with some guitar students from a conservatory. ( At that time I was way more improvising than today, with now vastly exercising to repair my right hand.)
And the funny thing was that we admired each other. Me adored them for their wonderful sheet reading and technical skills, while they ( aside from respect for my fake `virtuouso´ playing ) were fascinated by how the stuff I did was all spontaneously generated.
Actually I had such repeatedly before and after with fully trained musicians. Folks who I envied for their skills while some of them in return would record my trivial creations in order to write that down in notes later on.
Or for popular example, look at John Williams. He ought to present the top with accuracy, understanding of theory and repertoire, but with composing he would probably yield like a Scandinavian ambassador in Russia my cousin used to know.
My cousind described him as a highly advancedc flamenco player who when presenting an own composition would merely patch standard sequences.
To my experience regularly trained musicians seem more often hampered in creation than not. The fraction capable of both, theory / repertoire in conjunction with originality of own composition appear to be in the minority. ( At a lower rate at least than the `illiterate´ fraction.)
And I have the feeling as if there was a special challenge in mastering both, sophistication and inspiration.
-
I must say that my own fundus on discography ain´t exactly productive for generatig music either ( at least not when you aim for somewhat original tune). When intentionally trying to make up new music, usually after the first three notes it will go in the back of my head like: `Ah yes, that´s piece X´. And: `That´s piece Y´.
Just like with the vast of new public releases. Almost all of them are mere modifications of some original music.
The question only being how subtley or blatantly at that. With only rarely something been created so lively that you feel not bothered through plagiatism. And more scarce even the case of a piece being so fresh that dependence on preceeding compositions feels neglectable anyway.
-
Guess if PdL was schooled in the way like John Williams, with all the sheet reading and interpretational weighing ( of how the author might have wanted his music to sound), he might have been less productive with own pieces.
Ruphus
|
|
|
|
REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Nov. 2 2013 13:34:20
|
|
 New Messages |
 No New Messages |
 Hot Topic w/ New Messages |
 Hot Topic w/o New Messages |
 Locked w/ New Messages |
 Locked w/o New Messages |
|
Post New Thread
Reply to Message
Post New Poll
Submit Vote
Delete My Own Post
Delete My Own Thread
Rate Posts
|
|
|
Forum Software powered by ASP Playground Advanced Edition 2.0.5
Copyright © 2000 - 2003 ASPPlayground.NET |
9.570313E-02 secs.
|
Printable Version
. i read the entire article... i do agree 
