Hey yâall. Me and Tommo were talking about this and we think we may have closed this too soon. Weâre still figuring out this whole moderation thing, so apologies. We just want to keep things civil. I donât think calling a thread âuselessâ is a good way to go, but we understand that things get heated. No biggie.
What are you trying to figure out, if teaching has a positive or negative effect on some aspect of musical ability? Because you canât get there by looking at a small number of people who didnât have teaching, because then you have no way of measuring the effect of teaching. This is only logical.
On top of this, popular music is not a super teaching-focused culture, so of course weâre going to see lots of players who never had lessons, both great and not great. Again, this doesnât really tell us anything at all about what effect lessons would have had on those people. By contrast, when you look at musical cultures where teaching is the norm, like classical music, suddenly, surprise, almost all the GOATs had extensive teaching, even the prodigies. It was common for the biggest young talents to immediately get swept up by older former child prodigies to continue their teaching, the way Lizst and Rachmaninoff did for piano players.
This still doesnât tell us what effect teaching had on those players, because now youâre looking at the opposite problem â a culture where almost everybody has teaching, as opposed to a culture where most people donât. But if youâre just observing that there is a correlation between musical greatness and not having had lessons, the classical world offers a direct and pretty strong refutation of that correlation.
Personally, I think if you were to be able to test the effect of teaching in a controlled way, what weâd find is that it increases the hit rate. In a world without teaching, only the geniuses like Shawn and Yngwie make it to the top. Popular guitar music is roughly that world, which is why I think youâre noticing what youâre noticing. Those players werenât made better by their lack of teaching, everyone else was simply made worse.
In a world with more teaching, more people make it, and at more levels, from not so great to great. This doesnât fit the neat narrative of âteaching is necessaryâ and âteaching is not necessaryâ, but I think itâs closer to being accurate. Again, just my guess, but thatâs what I think weâd discover.
First, let me just clarify that my post was originally a direct reply to this comment on another thread;
[kgk]
This boils down to self-taught (usually bad) vs. taught by expert (usually good).
My comment was then (re)moved from the thread and one of your mods turned it into itâs own thread instead. So of course itâs going to sound vague when taken out of the context that it was nothing more than a reply to another userâs statement.
On to the teaching thing, I have to admit that my experience has been completely counter to what you describe. Most musicians Iâve met that have had formal training have actually been worse than all of the ones that learned by and for themselves (whether this has an element of not wanting to actually play but being forced by parents etc⌠that might be a part of it, but far less prevalent amongst guitarists than classical musicians of course).
This is especially the case in the classically trained musicians Iâve known growing up⌠not a single one of them could improvise on their instruments, and in fact many of them told me theyâd never even attempted to improvise, nor to compose their own music, all they could do was recite from staff and repeat it ad-verbatim. To me thatâs not really even scratching the surface of what musicianship is all about.
When it comes to guitarists a similar trend seems to emerge, whereby the ones that have been taught, and seek to learn by copying others and being heavily externally influenced often do not have the ability to improvise, or when they do, it can tend to sound like a bunch of licks/scales/pre-learnt patterns stuck together with no sense of individual voice or true spontaneity.
Probably the fact that being self-taught demands a certain high degree of self motivation and actual desire/passion for the art at hand, whereas essentially anyone can âbe taughtâ as itâs much more of a passive and submissive act that people can feel pressured into, or it just becomes a habitual thing in their minds that theyâve just âgotten used toâ has a large influence on the âend resultâ of the player after however many years of playing their instrument.
Perhaps things are different in the USA, but here in UK (Cambridge especially) we have a very strong tradition of classical musical training, and the notion of having a tutor for any sort of musical instrument, especially as a child, is very prevalent, so itâs very easy to see examples from both sides in the real-world here.
Sorry about removing the thread from the other other thread. Next time weâll include some context.
This still doesnât sound like a logical conclusion to me. If youâre citing the worldâs best rock players or songwriters as evidence for this supposed correlation with schooling, then you have to look at the worldâs best classical composers too. And thatâs when it becomes obvious that the presence or absence of teaching doesnât change the top-level picture, since arguably the best creative minds in music history, the people that wrote all the music weâre still listening to hundreds of years later, were all for most part also highly trained people.
All youâre really noticing here is that the very top level of music in most styles is generally populated by people with lots of natural ability. No surprise there. In cultures where teaching is prevalent, those top-level genius types will be educated. In styles like rock where people start out in their basement or bedroom, you will see less education. I donât think you can draw any sort of conclusion from this at all about whether teaching is good or bad for musical ability.
@AJD_Music and @Tom_Gilroy are actually talking about same things )
I mean, definition of âeducationâ, definition of âgood/badâ musicain⌠Good musician studied a lot and learned a lot. Regardless of sources.
A guy who is Berklee gradaute but who is not really interested in music and furhter self-development has small chances to be good. Well, he doesnât need it anyway.
A guy who donât have proper official education, but who is really nerdy about these things, probably would be better candidate. You know, that kind of guys who practice, asking stupid question to other musicains, using other peoples music and/or technique as an inspiration.
You may make these two guys change places. Result would be obvious too. âMusic-maniac-scholarâ versus ânot-so-fancy-about-itâ selftaught.
As for absence of official formal education⌠electric guitar is a relatively new instrument. There are not many schools of blackmetal, or progressive rock. At least Iâm not aware of any. But techinacal guys often come from these unorthodoxal genres. I mean, just look at these dethmetal monsters!
So, my guess is that statictically there are should be many great âuneducatedâ shredders. But itâs not about formal education being useless, itâs just that there are small chances to get any. If we consider private lessons and eperience exchange as âeducationâ then, I think, weâll see that great players are more âeducatedâ than average ones in general.
Iâve been told a few times on this forum that my writing can come across as confrontational and condescending. If at any point while reading this post you feel that is my intention, please, remember that this is an unwanted, unintentional consequence of my professional training.
Improvisation isnât a skill thatâs typically taught to classical musicians. Generally speaking, improvisation isnât even considered particularly valuable by classical musicians. Generally, people are rarely good at things they donât actually do.
Improvisation is absolutely a skill which can be taught in formal tuition. Jazz education emphasizes the importance of the skill and has produced many skilled improvisors.
Yes, to you. What skills you feel are valuable and which constitute musicianship is entirely your own subjective opinion. Incidentally, I agree that composition and improvisation are important.
My experience is that this is equally true of âself-taughtâ guitarists who donât practice improvisation. Generally, people are rarely good at things they donât actually do.
Some small improvisational ability will come from developing your ear and transcribing music. I would imagine that more âself-taughtâ musicians have to learn to use their ears earlier and transcribe music for themselves early on.
There are certainly guitarists who have attended formal lessons who have have not developed their ears and their ability to transcribe sufficiently well to be good improvisers, and have instead depended on sheet music or tabs provided by their instructors. There are also âself-taughtâ guitarists whoâve learned primarily through songbooks or online TABs with exactly the same weakness.
In any case, just having good ears is not sufficent to make one a good improviser. You actually need to practice improvising. Generally, people are rarely good at things they donât actually do.
In any case, Frank Gambale, Scott Henderson and Mike Stern are all absolutely, mind-bogglingly awesome at improvisation. Each one of them has received formal tuition.
By the way, I know youâve listed Shawn Lane as one of your favorite players. Shawn is one of my favorite players and Iâve written about him extensively here.
Shawnâs typical method of improvising over a complex chord change was to pretend the change didnât exist and just play some fast licks or patterns until the change had passed. Often, completely atonal digital sequences. Obviously, there are some counterexamples here and there, but this is absolutely typical.
Is it at all possible, that maybe with some lessons in improvisation from an experienced Jazz educator, that Shawn might maybe have learned to handle complex changes, and actually been better for it?
Anybody who develops their ears, builds a large enough vocabulary and actually practices improvisation can develop into a skilled improviser.
Whether you or I hear an âindividual voiceâ in their improvisation depends in part on how much effort they put into developing a distinctive vocabulary and an eclectic array of influences, and it depends very much depends on us, and how we hear.
There are actually people who believe Allan Holdsworth literally just played Coltrane licks on guitar. Deaf people maybe, or just people who donât get either Holdsworth or Coltrane. I donât know.
If instead, somebody doesnât develop their ears, doesnât have a sufficiently large vocabulary for the context and doesnât actually practice improvisation, then no, theyâre very unlikely to be a good improviser, whether they have received formal tuition or not. You know, because people are rarely good at things they donât actually do.
Leaving improvisation aside, I donât think being a player being âself-taughtâ is a badge of honour, nor do I care if somebody has trained at a famous school or has been taught by some famous player or instructor. I just want to hear them play (or maybe not, as might be the case).
Also, if being âself-taughtâ is so important and this is so obvious to âself-taughtâ musicians , why do so many âself-taughtâ musicians teach? Are they all just trying to exploit the âuntalentedâ for their money, or do some of them believe that teaching can actually be beneficial?
As Iâve said, I think the division between âself-taughtâ and âformally trainedâ is absolutely a false exclusive.
I took lessons for the first 5 years of my playing. I then taught myself for several years. Then I returned to my previous teacher for a few more years, who acted more as a coach while I continued to teach myself, mostly giving insights or suggestions along the way. For the last decade, Iâve continued to study, learn and develop without a teacher.
Am I âformally trainedâ because I took lessons for the first few years? If so, would I count as âself-taughtâ had I taken fewer lessons? Exactly how many lessons would disqualify me from being âself-taughtâ? What if instead of paying somebody for the privilege of their time, I had been luck enough to have a local mentor, maybe an uncle or family friend who taught me freely? If my father had been a better guitarist and had been able to show me more than open position chords, would he have been my teacher or would I have âgrown up in a musical familyâ?
Maybe Iâm not formally trained. Iâve been longer without a teacher than with one, and I honestly believe Iâve taught myself more than anybody else has. Do I need to give some specific breakdown of what I learned in lessons, what I learned for myself to determine the answer?
No, because the answer is that it doesnât matter.
What matters is what we have learned and how well we have learned it. Everybody learns from others and everybody learns for themselves. Great musicians learn a lot and learn it all extremely well.
So no, I totally fail to see how any of this is âcommon senseâ.
Victor Wooten would say (and Iâll paraphrase since I donât have a literal quote to copy and paste) -
â I canât teach you anything, each musician must teach himself. I can only show you things. â
George Benson would say, and Iâm paraphrasing again-
â Iâve had lots of great teachers, I didnât actually meet all of them but they showed me the way through their records. â
SRV would say -
â records by BB King, Albert King, the blues greats- those were my school books. â
Personally Iâd say some people might have come up through formal schooling, and some people might have learned their craft on the streets. But ultimately, we all build on the work of those who came before us and teach ourselves. Nobody develops in a vacuum but at the same time no one can do the hard work for you.
Some great points being made. Iâm not going to say Iâve changed my mind, and the irony of promoting self-learning whilst being an educator isnât lost on me haha (I run a charitable organisation providing resources and teaching skills in music/composition/video game development/graphic design/film etcâŚ).
I just think that there is something very special that takes place when someone takes things into their own hands and develops internally rather than being moulded by those external to him.
I agree that improvisation is not taught or highly regarded in classical musician circles, but isnât that reinforcing the point of the detriment that can accompany formal tuition? That you develop upon a pre-determined linear path and rarely will you see the playerâs own natural voice or style develop, even though the greats of the classical world like Bach, Mozart, Paganini etc⌠all obviously improvised, and the whole section of a âcadenzaâ is the term used for an improvisational section in a piece of classical music. So it should not be as seemingly alien to classical musicians as it appears to be today.
Anyway Iâm glad we got some insightful comments on the topic. Speaking of Victor Wooten, I like to think his 4 stages of âknowingâ are very pertinent, and that âunconscious knowingâ is the stage that all musicians should aspire to, and something that cannot really be taught, in so much as that it must be developed within one self.
Cheers guys!
Iâve no problem with that.
I donât really see what that would be, honestly. Iâm not trying to be difficult either.
I think itâs more a consequence of being motivated and willing to take responsibility for your own progression. The âself-taughtâ players who succeed certainly have those traits, but many quit out of frustration with how little progress they make. Players who deliberately seek out knowledgeable people and do their best to learn everything they can from them often have these traits too.
Only if you consider it a detriment. By and large, they donât. I donât agree with them, but theyâre entitled to that viewpoint.
Incidentally, one of the best improvisers I know is a classically trained concert pianist who also studied jazz formally.
If itâs a topic which is emphasized in tuition, a teacher can absolutely help guide a student towards developing their own style. Again, itâs just not something which is emphasized, or considered valuable, in those circles.
As for the cadenza, there was a gradual shift in the classical tradition, where composers began insisting that the performers played a composed cadenza. The general position now seems to be that if the performer is the composer, they can improvise or not at their discretion.
In classical music, the composer is like the writer of a film, the conductor is like the director and the musicians are like the actors. Theyâre all creative artists within their specific roles.
Also, as somebody who is not a classical musician, but listens classical music extensively, there are absolutely classical musicians with their own distinctive styles. Theyâre playing the same notes, but their interpretations and their expressions of the music differ drastically.
Every actor who plays Hamlet reads the same lines.
As for the 4 stages of knowing, do you mean the following progression?
- Unconscious Incompetence
- Conscious Incompetence
- Conscious Competence
- Unconscious Competence
If so, the primary purpose of teaching is to get you from stage 1 to stage 3 as quickly as possible, and those progressions certainly can be aided by teaching.
Iâve posted this in another thread, but I train and compete in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. My coachâs instructor came to give a seminar last year, and gave the following analogy.
âTo make a diamond, you need coal, pressure and time. You put in the time. Your training partners give you the pressure. I make sure youâre coal, and not shit.â
Iâd go further than that. A great teacher motivates you to put in the time. They create the environment where your always under the right amount of pressure. They make sure youâre coal, but they also teach you how to be coal. They teach you to recognize when you are coal and when you are not. After that, a great teacher teaches you how to do everything they did for you for yourself.
Iâm glad we reopened, I enjoyed the latest discussions thank you all 
@AJD_Music - sorry I should have indeed provided more context to your post when I moved it here. Good experience to learn from so I can improve my moderator âmovesâ for the future 
If I may throw my opinion in the mix, while I love a great improviser, I donât think improvisation is a skill that should be demanded of all musicians. I have tremendous respect for classical musicians that can âonlyâ read music but still provide moving performances and personal interpretations of someone elseâs music.
Even if the notes played are the same, the personalities of different artists can come through strongly in my opinion.
Letâs take a concrete example from the world of classical guitar. The following (outstanding!) performances of Recuerdos de La Alhambra all sound different to me, and I donât think it can be said that any of these lacks personality or artistic value:
EDIT: ops, @Tom_Gilroy I hadnât seen this while I was typing, it appears you anticipated me
Great to hear specific examples of what I was describing.
I think Debussyâs Clair de Lune is aso a good example.
Here is the composerâs rendition, from a piano roll. Despite what the comment section might lead you to believe, this is very much what Debussy intended and is not played faster for limitations with the recording equipment. Under 4 minutes, many modern listener donât enjoy the piece played this quickly. I love it.
Here is a rendition by Pascal Roge, nearly 6 minutes. This is pretty typical of modern interpretations.
Some modern versions even extend to 7 minutes plus. Honestly, at that stage the piece sounds boring and trite to me.
Another rendition by Walter Gieseking. Almost 5 minutes, a transitional or more impressionist interpretation and by far my favourite. This resonates within the very fibers of my being.
Actually, I think the best example which demonstrates the incredible variety in interpretation of a classical piece is Rachmaninovâs Piano Concerto cycle, since you can hear both how the pianist brings their own interpretations, but also the differences in direction by the different conductors. The ony problem is that even the shortest recordings of the movements Iâd want to mention are all much longer.
no way, I had been playing for nearly 40 years off and on and entirely on my own. Then I started the course by Skordis Prokopis, and in 3 months my playing is significantly better. You have to learn technique properly from someone who really knows the stuff.
I believe itâs largely based on environment. Perfect storm concept.
If you have the right environment to keep your drive for practice and learning up, you will improve way faster than someone who has an environment that consistently punishes that excessive focus.
No one reaches the top without help. For every large wave there is an ocean supporting it.