Learning about music

Along with learning to play ukulele, I'm trying to learn more about music in general. I'm wondering if anyone has any suggestions/recommendations/ideas on resources for learning.

At the moment, I'm doing the following:

I'm taking a free online class from Coursera, ("Introduction to Classical Music"), which so far, isn't specific to just classical music, but music in general, so that's good for me.)

I'm working on ear training and learning to read notes, using musictheory.net (also free.) I plan to venture into some of the other modules that they have later.

Any other suggestions? Any good, easy to use books? Other websites or courses?

ETA: I also am trying an app called Fret Tester which can be set for ukulele tuning, to learn the notes on the fret board. It's also useful for learning to read notes on a staff.

I'm gonna Lurk this thread. I knew nothing about music last year. Picking it up from the UU and free web stuff. I'm to baroque for much else.

You know enough to say that you're "baroque", so you might be ahead of me. LOL.

The Coursera courses can be taken for free, (wide variety of courses, not just on music), and musictheory.net is free. There are free versions of apps, too, but I can't recall if Fret Tester was free or not. (I had it for a while, but just haven't had a chance to use it before.)

Be ready for a flood of input. My two cents, learn the things that interest you at the moment. I started out with classical but have moved to blues and traditional Hawaiian finger picking.
There are so many free and paid teaching materials. One that pops out to me now is the James Hill online course. A competent player friend of mine does that course and seems to enjoy it very much.
I usually learn from videos, online resources or books.
Pekelo and The Alfred Complete Method and Mel Bay's Uke Method Grade 1 are the books I always have with me now.
Here is a link to the James Hill site, he is a well-respected player and a great uke promoter.
http://www.theukuleleway.com/

I took two coursera courses on music theory. One taught by the University of Edinbourgh the other by the Berklee
School of Music. There was some overlap but I got a lot out of both. Of the two the Berklee one was more practical.

A good book for both learning ukulele and picking up some music theory is "Ukulele From Scratch" by Bruce Emery. I think Bruce does an excellent job of teaching basic notes/chords while incorporating some very useful music theory into the lessons. Here's a link to his website...

http://www.skepticalguitarist.com/uke/uke.html

The book is only $16.50 and can be ordered through Elderly Instruments or other retailers listed on Bruce's website.
There is also a version for the Baritone Ukulele.
Bruce has another outstanding book, "Music Principles for the Skeptical Guitarist" which covers theory more in depth.

JackLuis said:

I'm gonna Lurk this thread. I knew nothing about music last year. Picking it up from the UU and free web stuff. I'm to baroque for much else.

Click to expand...

If it ain't baroque...

If you don't know already, teach yourself to read music. Curt Shellar has a good book for learning to read with the uke. A half an hour a day and you'll be reading in a few weeks and you'll just get better and better.

Reading will help you later in forming chords without using a chord chart. You'll understand scales better. You'll find notes higher up the neck.

Pekelo's books are very good in putting one in the direction of reading more than one note at a time, i.e., double-stops and chords.

I got really lucky and got a music teacher, for free. I can't say enough about the value of learning from someone face to face. If I don't get something she goes to the piano and shows me. I'm starting to get it...
Good luck, let us know how it goes!

As a music teacher, I am loving this thread. In the years of my combined education and experience, I have come to believe that how we teach music isn't always the best--or only--way to learn music.

I would start with your own ukulele playing. What are you playing and how are you learning it? Are you reading chord charts or tab? Do you only play songs that you know, or can you read music (to the point of being able to pick out the notes in the Daily 365, for example)?

As a person that reads music, I am guessing the majority of ukulele players play by the chord charts and then sing by ear, following the works, such as on the ukutabs website.

So your next challenge is to figure out what you want to learn in music.

Do you want to learn about chord progressions? If so, play a lot of music. You will find that the large majority of chords follow the same general sequence, particularly with an instrument like guitar or ukulele (piano or even organ offers a wide variety of inversions that stringed instruments cannot)

Or do you want to learn notes, rests, intervals, and chords?

Musictheory.net is a wonderful site (there are iOS apps called Tenuto (the exercises) and Theory Lessons (the lessons) if you want to contribute to Ricci's work (Ricci Adams made Musictheory.net).

Or if you are looking to play individual notes on the ukulele--there is a whole different approach to that.

So--I would suggest beginning with the end in mind--and then going from there.

Send me a message if you run into a theory issue that you need help with. With a PhD in music education, I can field most theory questions.

Incidentally, as I teach choir and I have incorporated ukulele, I am teaching from another perspective. I teach sight-singing in class (via solfege: DO RE MI, etc) and when we work with the ukulele, I teach with a lead sheet and chord letters (much like the Daily 365) because I think that is how most ukulele players interact with the instrument--and furthermore represents most of the YouTube videos students will watch to learn songs they want to play on ukulele.

Good luck with your pursuit. Music literacy in this day is a dying skill--and every person that learns how to read music helps keep that skill alive.

I recommend the Music Theory Workbook by Chris Bowman. Will teach you everything you want to know about scales , key signatures and chord forms. Fairly dry but totally hands on so for me at least it makes learning quick.

John

Those of us who have done this for many ( many ) decades have had to learn how to learn music. I have several pieces of advice and you can take them for what they're worth to you.
1) play a music-theory friendly instrument. That would be violin, mandolin, or, best, piano. Piano is easy...playing chords and that's where to start.
2) Learn to improvise. Not the best on the ukulele. Guitar is ok and would transfer nicely.
3) Learn what jazz is. That's a good one for reading about. The history of touches ukulele music in a couple places. Some of the ukulele music IS jazz, so the motion of chords across a song will make a to of sense.
4) I have a large beef with how music is generally taught. It took me a third of a lifetime to figure this out. ( again, think it out for yourself ) Traditionally, music is taught in this order: melody, harmony, rhythm.

But I think this is totally backwards.

The way we learn music as animals is rhythm first. Then harmony, and melody last! Think about this. It can help you shorten your study from half a lifetime to a couple years. I had a couple wonderful aunties who were of that age when every young girl learned piano. They could each play hundreds of songs. ( and they knew all the words )...but no flow. No joy of bouncing limbs to keep the time And it almost wasn't music.

Good luck on your journey!

Right on about rhythm first. It's no joke to say that it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing. Deaden the strings and strum along until you get the rhythm down. The wrong note at the right time is always better than the right note at the wrong time.

In many languages the word for sing and dance is the same word. It, too, took me a long time to learn that rhythm is the most essential element, and believe me I love classical music, not just jazz.

Thanks to all for the suggestions. I'll be checking them all out, and trying to figure out where to focus.

It might sound a bit odd to say that I don't know what I want to learn from this, but I guess I'm figuring at this point I don't know enough about what I don't know to say. I just know that there is a whole world out there that I'm missing out on, and whatever I learn, it can only help.

So, if I should focus on rhythm first, what suggestions do you have? (Other than using a metronome?)

I have a ukulele that a friend was kind enough to give me that I just retuned to bass tuning, (don't know how to play bass either!), thinking that trying to learn a bit of bass could help me learn some of the basics, too. Rhythm would be a big part there, I would think, and music theory would have to be a big part of that too, right? I know we've got some U-Bass people here, so maybe they have some suggestions for getting started there, too? (Or any other bass players. No need to limit it to U-Bass.)

I've been playing from tabs, and having lots of fun, but want to progress more now, and think this would be a big part of it.

Again, thanks for all the suggestions.

I've been playing from tabs, and having lots of fun, but want to progress more now

Click to expand...

I would suggest that you concentrate on reading music, the notation, it will give you just about everything you would want.

pointpergame said:

Those of us who have done this for many ( many ) decades have had to learn how to learn music. I have several pieces of advice and you can take them for what they're worth to you.
1) play a music-theory friendly instrument. That would be violin, mandolin, or, best, piano. Piano is easy...playing chords and that's where to start.
2) Learn to improvise. Not the best on the ukulele. Guitar is ok and would transfer nicely.
3) Learn what jazz is. That's a good one for reading about. The history of touches ukulele music in a couple places. Some of the ukulele music IS jazz, so the motion of chords across a song will make a to of sense.
4) I have a large beef with how music is generally taught. It took me a third of a lifetime to figure this out. ( again, think it out for yourself ) Traditionally, music is taught in this order: melody, harmony, rhythm.

But I think this is totally backwards.

The way we learn music as animals is rhythm first. Then harmony, and melody last! Think about this. It can help you shorten your study from half a lifetime to a couple years. I had a couple wonderful aunties who were of that age when every young girl learned piano. They could each play hundreds of songs. ( and they knew all the words )...but no flow. No joy of bouncing limbs to keep the time And it almost wasn't music.

Good luck on your journey!

Click to expand...

I agree with rhythm first but harmony next no! Melody is more important. There are many musical cultures round the world where harmony is simply not a part of their musical language but melody occurs in every musical culture. Western music is unusual in having developed a sophisticated system of harmony. Even so there are musical genres where harmony is not a major part.

I play in a folk band and we play for dancing. The music we play is essentially melody driven. True we add harmonies in the form of accompanying chords but it's perfectly possible to play without adding harmony and yet still play danceable music. Morris dancing at one time was typically danced to a pipe and tabor or to a single fiddler. Rapper sword of North East England also typically danced to a single fiddle. I've played a recorder for people to dance to and it works. No, you don't need harmony to play music. All you need is rhythm and as long as you can play a melody rhythmically you can make danceable music.

However, our Western musical culture is harmony based so we do need to understand the basics of harmony and how chords are constructed and their interrelationships.

oregonuke said:

A good book for both learning ukulele and picking up some music theory is "Ukulele From Scratch" by Bruce Emery. I think Bruce does an excellent job of teaching basic notes/chords while incorporating some very useful music theory into the lessons. Here's a link to his website...

http://www.skepticalguitarist.com/uke/uke.html

Click to expand...

This is the book my ukulele teacher uses as his course text and I highly recommend it. I've already gifted copies to several new uke players. Side note: Bruce recently released his Blues Ukulele book which I'm enjoying very much.

Curt Sheller's website is learningukulele.com and has lots of great lessons in the music theory category. There are lessons for free and additional material for paid subscribers.

oregonuke said:

A good book for both learning ukulele and picking up some music theory is "Ukulele From Scratch" by Bruce Emery. I think Bruce does an excellent job of teaching basic notes/chords while incorporating some very useful music theory into the lessons. Here's a link to his website...

http://www.skepticalguitarist.com/uke/uke.html

The book is only $16.50 and can be ordered through Elderly Instruments or other retailers listed on Bruce's website.
There is also a version for the Baritone Ukulele.
Bruce has another outstanding book, "Music Principles for the Skeptical Guitarist" which covers theory more in depth.

Click to expand...

This was one of the first books I got that really clicked with me on the instrument. I am a music teacher and Bruce has a wonderful approach to gently including music theory in the book where it is not overwhelming and serves the music. He is also great to converse through email and was super helpful to me. His teachers edition I use a lot with my students.

Also, choirguy has some great comments that I fully agree with as a fellow choir director and music teacher.

Perhaps by learning to read one might then be able to sing along as one plays the melody, and also at the same time work on the correct timing.

Getting the right pitch will train the ear. Herb Ohta Sr.--- the great jazz player--- says get the melody down pat before anything else. Then, learn the chords.

So, for a beginner learning to read and then getting a copy of Jim Beloff's The Daily Ukulele might be a very nice way to go.

Play the melody and sing along with it. Then, try to sing the melody while accompanying oneself with the chords, working with a metronome or a very accurate tapping foot to get the timing right. Start slowly and build up speed.

As one progresses the next very important step is to learn chord voicings. One C chord does not equal another necessarily. Get Roy Sakuma's chord book and learn three or four positions for the chords used in the songs you choose. It will become apparent that some chord positions bring out the melody better. If you know how to read and can play the melody you will know why. Usually you will want to play versions of the chord that have the melody note on the first or second string.

Lots of very interesting input. I appreciate all the responses. I hope that people will continue to contribute their ideas.

I don't have a clear goal for this journey, but figure if I start off, I'll eventually stumble on a path I want to take. If I wait until I have a clear goal, I might never get started. So far, I'm just working on learning to read notes, and doing some ear training, using musictheory.net. It's a fun game at the moment - how many did I get, and was I able to do it a little faster than last time? So far, it's just a separate skill I'm working on, so I still have to figure out how it relates to ukulele. Odd but true that I don't yet have a way to relate it to ukulele, but maybe that's just because I'm not proficient enough at it to do anything with it yet.

Is there an app or website that is similiar to musictheory.net but has you read a note and place it on a ukulele fretboard?

Meanwhile, I've got lots to look into, and learn from. Thank you all.

ETA: I just realized that you can use a ukulele fretboard on musictheory.net. It still doesn't tie it to reading notes on a staff, but it's a step in that direction, at least.