Quote:
Originally Posted by mattbn73
Okay, but this assumption - . that the only thing being discussed here is a set of arbitrary exercises disconnected from real music - isn't what I'm talking about at all. My entire process for learning triads was through real music.
I used tunes to learn triads , and now, the triads greatly help in learning tunes as well. In the last year I have read through hundreds of tunes, chord melody style, from fake books and other charts at church, and that wasn't something I could have done as well before this. Honestly it's the most enjoyable aspect of playing for me and I don't categorize it as "exercise material " at all.
Beyond all of that, it's very practical in terms of the kinds of gigs you often get as a solo guitarist. Last time I got my guitar set up, The guy handed it to me to check out. I picked it up and started playing some solo guitar , chord melody type stuff . The guy chuckled and said, "you never make any money above the third fret". Funny but true, if you consider the amount of time that the average guitarist puts into each solo piece.
If you have the occasion to play a wedding or funeral, usually, it's a one-off, and maybe you never play that particular music again. At a certain level you kind of have to ask yourself how much practice time is really worth developing tunes for a one-time gig like that.
Being able to put together an arrangement from a lead sheet pretty quickly, and then developing it as I see fit, feels -to me - a lot more like what a pianist does for the same gig - maybe not necessarily spending hours learning a solo piece or ONLY playing pieces which you've previously spent HOURS on.
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I think you're taking my philosophical statements as some kind of criticism...which they are not. I have nothing against theory, study and practice, but I try to maintain perspective on the big picture as "loyal opposition" attempting to avoid "paralysis through analysis".
Two statements made to me by music teachers from my youth:
Music is a picture painted on a background of silence.
Music is more than playing all the right notes in the right order.
Or as Robert Pete Williams said in reply to a question about his music:
"C natural is the key. You just gotta see natural."
https://youtu.be/UH41odNr-Aw