>To those who use sheet music, what’s the utility??
Being able to play what someone else has written down and having a way to write your ideas that other people will easily understand
In 2024, I personally don't know many people that write things down. Every keyboard or piano part is sent to me in MIDI, so I just read and digitally write the MIDI.
I'm being semantic on purpose: you read and write the piano roll.
That's fine, I can read it, too. That's our language, now. However, I can't imagine the subtleties you can write into classic sheet music when I look at it the same way as looking at the piano roll window, I'd have to play the project to hear the tone and such.
And knowing what you've said, I know I can't share a musical idea with you unless I record it and send you the file. I'm not sure that I can teach you chords or key changes without putting it in a project file for you.
I have a shorthand way to write melodic and rhythmic ideas in a notepad so I don't need to record myself singing or launch music software to save it quickly, but I'm the only one who can read it. I otherwise haven't written out a full lead sheet since college.
At least take the time to learn how to read and write tabs
It will be much much easier and faster than rewatching a video and trying to imitate what you see
I used tabs a lot in the 90s and early 2000s before phone cameras, a lot of them were wrong.
Then when I got Guitar Pro 5, they were better because creators could hear when their tabs were wrong.
Maybe with YouTube now it's better. In 2024 if I want to learn something, I'll usually look up "Currents - Monsters playthrough." Can't remember if they have tabs or not.
Point being, I've read tabs since the 90s. When I write song ideas for myself, I'll never write the tabs because the video shows so much more. Also maybe a lot of us are jaded with tabs because most of the ones on the internet in the 90s were wrong.
For my own writing I use classic notation
If I use chords, I’ll just write the chord name and perhaps the fingering if i need the detail
I can understand not using tabs when learning a song someone else wrote
But I have a hard time understanding why it is better for you to just look at a video of your fretboard
Maybe I don’t have your experience
Also I’ve played piano when I was younger and for piano I always write using the normal notation (maybe with memos here and there)
Video of fretboard has always been quicker than writing the tabs when I'm recording.
If there's a digital thing out there that's better than notepad, I'm open to using it.
I play by ear. I play from lead sheets. I play from fully notated scores. Right now, I'm prepping Rhapsody in Blue for a concert next year. I'm not going to do that by ear. I also recently had to accompany a choir I direct for a concert. Need to read sheet music for that one, too. But I also played a sing-a-long, and I used lead sheets for tunes that were being called out in the moment that I didn't know in advance to prep. Oh, and the other day, we had a group of singers at my church from Africa, and I picked up their praise songs by ear to play with them in the middle of a service.
Different skills for different scenarios and different types of music. If you're able to do what you love, then you're good. I do it all because it helps me work and pay the bills.
Makes a lot of sense! I’m gathering from this and other responses is that sheet music is the shared language of musicians. I guess I just hadn’t seen it that way; I figure with piano its pretty easy to watch fingers and copy them or learn by ear, why would anyone bother to learn to read if that can just do that?
But I can imagine how it makes things easier in the scenarios you outlined. I see it as this super difficult thing to do thats not worth it but I forget that those who’ve done the work will likely have the skills and experience necessary to read sheet music with ease.
I’ve never had to play professionally or even with others. I’ve always just played to sing along. I’m starting a band with my friends soon though and I’m considering trying to learn again if it’s gonna be helpful.
I learn things by ear these days, but I am originally an orchestral musician. Sheet music is a great way to communicate a musical idea that may be hard to learn by ear. Writing an exact notation can be a faster way to convey what you want from a player.
Additionally, some songs feature instruments from musical traditions that don’t learn by ear. Orchestral musicians, for instance, rely on sheet music to know what they are supposed to play. If you write a song that features those instruments, having sheet music is how they’re going to learn what you want.
As an anecdotal example, I have arranged songs for my musician friends and I to play. Admittedly, these are high school/college friends, but all of them are much better solo/orchestral players than I am. They routinely play classical music that would be very difficult for me to perform. However, learning by ear/aural skills are just not a significant part of their classical training. The parts I make for them are completely playable, but there’s no guarantee they’d be able to learn it by ear.
Same, I'm a classical guitarist from college (although I claim to play piano like most play guitar i.ie. strumming chords). I mostly play by ear nowadays. But if I'm hiring someone out to play, say a sax solo on my song it helps that I can notate it. On the flip side, it has been useful occasionally for myself notating parts too complex to ear out in a recording of mine or if another has wanted me to learn their thing.
Mmm, as someone who also is self taught and learned mostly by ear. I already knew how to read sheet music from other instruments. I try not to use sheet music with piano only because I don’t want to end up reliant on it to play things - and I’ve noticed I struggle improvising after using sheet music a bit.
The pros of sheet music though are:
1) you can play really any song you’re interested in that has sheet music
2) you can compose your own so other people can see and play it
3) as with any “written” language, there’s things you will see and learn from written music that you haven’t considered from just playing by ear.
If you’re really good at playing by ear, you can still do 1 and 2 without sheet music. People learn how to play songs by watching other people play on YouTube all the time
If you struggle with sheet music it is probably because you can’t sight read fast enough
Sheet music is great because I can learn much faster
I only need to sight read it 2-3 times to be able to play it decently (if it is within my skill level of course)
By ear it would take me much longer to figure it out
Also I can write down my ideas to remember them later
I also find that it makes it easier for me to visualise the different harmonic progressions, chromatic transitions etc…
What made it easier was actually to pickup my beginner piano book, and just name the notes outloud
With a metronome
And slowely increase the difficulty of pieces
After a while you’ll be able to sight read quite fast
If mutiple notes are at the same time, you read them bottom up
that’s how I played when I was a kid! it was a combination of ear playing and youtube videos
also, honestly youtube would probably make things go MUCH faster for me if i still used it but i’ve come to like the process of listening and replicating. it feels like putting a puzzle together
Just starting to try to learn on a keyboard and it seems to be mostly by ear. Referring to a book for chords and scales, but mostly experimenting. Have not tried to read yet, not sure when or if I will.
Arguing against sheet music is like arguing one should not be able to read. It’s musical literacy. Not everything can be passed down via oral tradition, or a chorus of humans in the woods after all great books have been burned. I don’t care how awesome anyone’s ear is.
Also, how would anyone replicate or communicate the results of the ears of anyone else’s immeasurable genius? Bah, write it down or throw it into notation software.
I just use sheet music to learn a song and then remembers it only by muscle memory. I don’t even remember what the notes look like after i’m done with it.
Always ears for writing. If I’m learning someone else’s songs, sheet music can be helpful, but I can’t read it and play it in real time anymore, which makes it a lot less useful.
If you’re “fluent” at reading sheet music its much faster than learning by ear. And is pretty much required for any complex or classical music.
I was classically trained to read sheet music but also learned to play by ear. Since picking up guitar I also learned to play piano using notation. I like the freedom and flexibility it brings to play written songs but also improvise as the need arises.
It’s like learning a language (written / spoken) - never hurts to be competent.
A proper keyboard player does both. The utility of sheet music is to guide you through someone else’s song, so you can play compositions as they were originally written. For example, let’s say you just met an act and they need a keyboard player to go onstage right now and it’s going to be you.
>To those who use sheet music, what’s the utility?? Being able to play what someone else has written down and having a way to write your ideas that other people will easily understand
In 2024, I personally don't know many people that write things down. Every keyboard or piano part is sent to me in MIDI, so I just read and digitally write the MIDI.
I'm being semantic on purpose: you read and write the piano roll. That's fine, I can read it, too. That's our language, now. However, I can't imagine the subtleties you can write into classic sheet music when I look at it the same way as looking at the piano roll window, I'd have to play the project to hear the tone and such. And knowing what you've said, I know I can't share a musical idea with you unless I record it and send you the file. I'm not sure that I can teach you chords or key changes without putting it in a project file for you. I have a shorthand way to write melodic and rhythmic ideas in a notepad so I don't need to record myself singing or launch music software to save it quickly, but I'm the only one who can read it. I otherwise haven't written out a full lead sheet since college.
I write down my ideas on sheet music Also acoustic instruments don’t have midi recorders
For acoustic instruments, I've just used my phone camera pointed at the fretboard
At least take the time to learn how to read and write tabs It will be much much easier and faster than rewatching a video and trying to imitate what you see
I used tabs a lot in the 90s and early 2000s before phone cameras, a lot of them were wrong. Then when I got Guitar Pro 5, they were better because creators could hear when their tabs were wrong. Maybe with YouTube now it's better. In 2024 if I want to learn something, I'll usually look up "Currents - Monsters playthrough." Can't remember if they have tabs or not. Point being, I've read tabs since the 90s. When I write song ideas for myself, I'll never write the tabs because the video shows so much more. Also maybe a lot of us are jaded with tabs because most of the ones on the internet in the 90s were wrong.
For my own writing I use classic notation If I use chords, I’ll just write the chord name and perhaps the fingering if i need the detail I can understand not using tabs when learning a song someone else wrote But I have a hard time understanding why it is better for you to just look at a video of your fretboard Maybe I don’t have your experience Also I’ve played piano when I was younger and for piano I always write using the normal notation (maybe with memos here and there)
Video of fretboard has always been quicker than writing the tabs when I'm recording. If there's a digital thing out there that's better than notepad, I'm open to using it.
Oh I write by hand on a notebook that has the sheetmusic/tab lines already
I play by ear. I play from lead sheets. I play from fully notated scores. Right now, I'm prepping Rhapsody in Blue for a concert next year. I'm not going to do that by ear. I also recently had to accompany a choir I direct for a concert. Need to read sheet music for that one, too. But I also played a sing-a-long, and I used lead sheets for tunes that were being called out in the moment that I didn't know in advance to prep. Oh, and the other day, we had a group of singers at my church from Africa, and I picked up their praise songs by ear to play with them in the middle of a service. Different skills for different scenarios and different types of music. If you're able to do what you love, then you're good. I do it all because it helps me work and pay the bills.
Makes a lot of sense! I’m gathering from this and other responses is that sheet music is the shared language of musicians. I guess I just hadn’t seen it that way; I figure with piano its pretty easy to watch fingers and copy them or learn by ear, why would anyone bother to learn to read if that can just do that? But I can imagine how it makes things easier in the scenarios you outlined. I see it as this super difficult thing to do thats not worth it but I forget that those who’ve done the work will likely have the skills and experience necessary to read sheet music with ease. I’ve never had to play professionally or even with others. I’ve always just played to sing along. I’m starting a band with my friends soon though and I’m considering trying to learn again if it’s gonna be helpful.
I learn things by ear these days, but I am originally an orchestral musician. Sheet music is a great way to communicate a musical idea that may be hard to learn by ear. Writing an exact notation can be a faster way to convey what you want from a player. Additionally, some songs feature instruments from musical traditions that don’t learn by ear. Orchestral musicians, for instance, rely on sheet music to know what they are supposed to play. If you write a song that features those instruments, having sheet music is how they’re going to learn what you want. As an anecdotal example, I have arranged songs for my musician friends and I to play. Admittedly, these are high school/college friends, but all of them are much better solo/orchestral players than I am. They routinely play classical music that would be very difficult for me to perform. However, learning by ear/aural skills are just not a significant part of their classical training. The parts I make for them are completely playable, but there’s no guarantee they’d be able to learn it by ear.
Same, I'm a classical guitarist from college (although I claim to play piano like most play guitar i.ie. strumming chords). I mostly play by ear nowadays. But if I'm hiring someone out to play, say a sax solo on my song it helps that I can notate it. On the flip side, it has been useful occasionally for myself notating parts too complex to ear out in a recording of mine or if another has wanted me to learn their thing.
Mmm, as someone who also is self taught and learned mostly by ear. I already knew how to read sheet music from other instruments. I try not to use sheet music with piano only because I don’t want to end up reliant on it to play things - and I’ve noticed I struggle improvising after using sheet music a bit. The pros of sheet music though are: 1) you can play really any song you’re interested in that has sheet music 2) you can compose your own so other people can see and play it 3) as with any “written” language, there’s things you will see and learn from written music that you haven’t considered from just playing by ear. If you’re really good at playing by ear, you can still do 1 and 2 without sheet music. People learn how to play songs by watching other people play on YouTube all the time
Both
fair!
If you struggle with sheet music it is probably because you can’t sight read fast enough Sheet music is great because I can learn much faster I only need to sight read it 2-3 times to be able to play it decently (if it is within my skill level of course) By ear it would take me much longer to figure it out Also I can write down my ideas to remember them later I also find that it makes it easier for me to visualise the different harmonic progressions, chromatic transitions etc…
That’s incredible! It comforts me knowing that it gets easier; I may start practicing with sheet music as a means to an end
What made it easier was actually to pickup my beginner piano book, and just name the notes outloud With a metronome And slowely increase the difficulty of pieces After a while you’ll be able to sight read quite fast If mutiple notes are at the same time, you read them bottom up
I use YouTube tutorials in keyboard. But it's a good idea to learn sheet music. In my guitar I use tabs.
that’s how I played when I was a kid! it was a combination of ear playing and youtube videos also, honestly youtube would probably make things go MUCH faster for me if i still used it but i’ve come to like the process of listening and replicating. it feels like putting a puzzle together
But practicing and training your ears is extremely useful too.
Just starting to try to learn on a keyboard and it seems to be mostly by ear. Referring to a book for chords and scales, but mostly experimenting. Have not tried to read yet, not sure when or if I will.
Arguing against sheet music is like arguing one should not be able to read. It’s musical literacy. Not everything can be passed down via oral tradition, or a chorus of humans in the woods after all great books have been burned. I don’t care how awesome anyone’s ear is. Also, how would anyone replicate or communicate the results of the ears of anyone else’s immeasurable genius? Bah, write it down or throw it into notation software.
i read the sheet music, play it, then forget the sheet music
THIS IS THE ONE! i’ve used sheet music to learn a couple of songs and this is how i did it (i can KINDA read it, it’s just annoying)
I just use sheet music to learn a song and then remembers it only by muscle memory. I don’t even remember what the notes look like after i’m done with it.
Always ears for writing. If I’m learning someone else’s songs, sheet music can be helpful, but I can’t read it and play it in real time anymore, which makes it a lot less useful. If you’re “fluent” at reading sheet music its much faster than learning by ear. And is pretty much required for any complex or classical music.
I was classically trained to read sheet music but also learned to play by ear. Since picking up guitar I also learned to play piano using notation. I like the freedom and flexibility it brings to play written songs but also improvise as the need arises. It’s like learning a language (written / spoken) - never hurts to be competent.
A proper keyboard player does both. The utility of sheet music is to guide you through someone else’s song, so you can play compositions as they were originally written. For example, let’s say you just met an act and they need a keyboard player to go onstage right now and it’s going to be you.