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Four years of sight reading practice

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Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#51

Post by vunderba »

As others have mentioned, I would not recommend learning to sight-read from randomly generated assortments of notes, simply because the runs/progressions are unlikely to be found in the "wild," so you aren't building up mental patterns for chunking groups.

Even though I could read sheet music, I mostly played piano by ear until around high school when I decided to properly learn to sight-read. At the time, my access to musical resources was limited, so I borrowed the Episcopal Church hymnal from our church.

The great thing about hymnals is that they are choral in nature, usually with four voices, but at the same time, they are rhythmically simple in nature since they are intended to be sung, allowing you to purely concentrate on the notes themselves.

I ran through it sequentially for months and found that my sight-reading capabilities measurably improved.

https://hymnary.org/hymnal/HPEC1940

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#52

Post by vunderba »

lucas_codes wrote: post #13

I love data visualizations like these. OP if you want to improve sight reading faster, I would recommend using non-random notes - context is very important when sight reading and if you get a professional pianist to sight read random notes they will be much, much slower. Sight reading factory is one site I know that does this a bit better

+1 for SRF. The generated pieces tend to be a bit more "musical" in nature as well and it also supports other instruments (guitar, violin, etc.)

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#53

Post by bluGill »

SoftTalker wrote: post #24
chthonicdaemon wrote: post #2

I've been tracking my sight reading practice for four years using an iPad app, storing the results and plotting them. I am still seeing progress even after four years.

I played horn for 4 years in middle and high school. Never got good at sight reading. But never really enjoyed playing either, practice was always a drudgery . Finally admitted to myself that I just didn't like it and quit.

There is the problem with music - it is many 'man-months' of sounding bad and not having fun before you are good enough to sound good and have fun.

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#54

Post by k__ »

vunderba wrote: post #51

As others have mentioned, I would not recommend learning to sight-read from randomly generated assortments of notes, simply because the runs/progressions are unlikely to be found in the "wild," so you aren't building up mental patterns for chunking groups. Even though I could read sheet music, I mostly played piano by ear until around high school when I decided to properly learn to sight-read. At the time, my access…

But isn't this a good thing?

I always try to avoid learning by pattern, because it would make me less flexible when composing.

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#55

Post by eitally »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #31
exchemist wrote: post #25

This is cool, though the notes in your example look pretty random? Are they actually randomly or is it just too modern for me to hear it without playing it? I'm a fairly average pianist, but sight reading is a (relative) strength. Being able to play random notes is definitely part of it, but I think for me sight-reading is more about getting a sense of the gist of the music (a lot of pattern matching of common phrase…

Yes, that's the problem with this approach. You don't learn random notes, you learn note patterns. It's the difference between learning to recognise letters and learning to read words. Music is made of words - scale-specific gestures, of which there are hundreds, perhaps thousands, typically arranged in some kind of harmonic context so you can make reasonable guesses about what's coming next. This matters because fin…

I was going to make the same comment as the PP, but I disagree with your point about "note patterns". When you're sight reading real music (melodies, harmonies and chords), that's when you start grokking note patterns and can reach real mastery. Sufficiently good sight readers often don't even need to read every individual note to anticipate what will "happen next" because in many cases chord progressions, rhythms and harmonies are fairly predictable (especially, especially in pop/rock music, religious music and a lot of early classical.

I think the OP would have benefitted more from programming an interface to project Hanon's exercises[1] to practice than randomized notes.

[1] https://www.hanon-online.com/ <-- perhaps the most popular fingering practice for pianists. It's boring and tedious, but it 100% works!

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#56

Post by mtalantikite »

CGMthrowaway wrote: post #28

>I am mostly counting the number of sharps and flats and translating that to the keyboard through a pattern I figured out early on. The sharps “activate” from left to right across the groups of black notes, starting with F♯, alternating between the two groups of black notes. This is easier to get into your fingers than any other memorisation technique. The order for flats is mechanically symmetrical – you just start…

"I am still not quite sure how other people are learning this..."

We practice our scales through the circle of fifths. I don't really follow what they mean by "activates" at F#.

If this is getting the author to play and they're having fun, then that's great. But having a great teacher is invaluable, particularly when you're trying to lay down the fundamentals. It's going to be more difficult to unlearn bad habits in the future.

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#57

Post by jlbooker »

klodolph wrote: post #44
EvanAnderson wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Music is made of words - scale-specific gestures, of which there are hundreds, perhaps thousands... This made me think of typing tutor programs that just prompt for random letters. I type like shit on those-- slow and inaccurate. On the other hand, I'm quick and reasonably accurate when typing English words and frequently-used command lines. The analogy would surely hold true with musical instruments. Even with my…

I remember typing tutors that started with the home row and slowly expanded. There aren’t a lot of words that use the home row exclusively, so you end up with nonsense. (You said “typing tutors programs” but my memory is of actual tutors, as in, people.) You may not like practicing random notes but maybe you want to play Schönberg or Bartók?

I remember a lot of, 'a sad lad had glad fad'. And then yes, it descended into nonsense from there on out.

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#58

Post by eitally »

k__ wrote: post #54
vunderba wrote: post #51

As others have mentioned, I would not recommend learning to sight-read from randomly generated assortments of notes, simply because the runs/progressions are unlikely to be found in the "wild," so you aren't building up mental patterns for chunking groups. Even though I could read sheet music, I mostly played piano by ear until around high school when I decided to properly learn to sight-read. At the time, my access…

But isn't this a good thing? I always try to avoid learning by pattern, because it would make me less flexible when composing.

No, not at all (imho), because if you're starting from scratch and don't even know which notes make up common chords or progressions, how in the world will you figure out how to compose something that sounds good / makes sense?

It's important to know the notes on the keyboard, but it's far more important to know how they work together in harmonious patterns. Composing entirely by ear is an option, but you still need to transliterate what your mind is hearing into notes on a page (preferably more complex than just a single note melody).

I 100% get where you're coming from, but I think a grounding in theory helps a ton with composition (even if you don't know how to play a specific instrument).

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#59

Post by -__---____-ZXyw »

jedimastert wrote: post #42
-__---____-ZXyw wrote: post #37

a. Why not get piano lessons? If you are more interested in the technical fun of messing with software, this approach makes sense, sure. But if you're interested in sight-reading, it seems a bit wild. Sight-reading involves ear training, chunking patterns, etc etc. b. What does GAS mean?

> b. What does GAS mean? "Gear Acquisition Syndrome", a common meme particularly among online musician communities around the desire for more gear whether or not you actually need it just to have it

Oh, I suppose it makes sense that we'd need a word like that. Thanks!

Re: Four years of sight reading practice

#60

Post by eitally »

skybrian wrote: post #38

Having started with traditional piano lessons, being able to sight-read notes without knowing what they are is something I’ve picked up, but not what I want. I think of this as “player piano mode.” I want to sight-read chords, chord progressions, and other patterns, and get better at playing those.

It becomes easier, especially once you have anchors for your 1 & 5 fingers on your left hand and know how to fill the space between.

One way to practice this is to pick up a hymnal (I recommend Methodist or Episcopal). Simple songs, usually in four part harmony, and will straightforward and obvious chord progressions.

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