Songs...

I agree with your Dad. :D

It is great to play original music, but where do you draw your ideas from? I think everybody draws from music they enjoy and have been influenced by. If not, your music would be absolutely original, not sounding like anything ever played. Does it?

Didn't think so.

I dunno, I have written a few (very few) good original songs. But I have copied hundreds of absolutely GREAT songs.

No man is an island unto himself. :wink:

Wes

i learnt a lot quicker and more styles after learning covers, id always written my own music and learnt that way but after a while it got a bit stagnant...so i learnt some covers and everything was great again. i think a balance of technique and theory as well as learning songs is needed, you can learn the songs and then use the theory to see if your playing the chords notes and stuff right. everything is balance

Songs come from songs. If you want to write songs you need to know songs.

No. but they read them. Painters copied painting and drawings, traditionally.

Learning songs is very helpful if you can analyze what they did using intervals, you can see what they were thinking and use their experience to help your own writing.

I've been learning Bach lately, it feels like going to school, there is a lot that musicians of the past can teach you.

But I agree with you about understanding how to play your instrument vs. knowing songs. Nothing is worse then a guy who just learns songs and when it comes down to creativity/spontaneity can't do anything. And learning songs is only helpful when you can understand what your looking at.

It is like memorizing speeches rather then learning to speak a language.

I agree with your Dad. :D

It is great to play original music, but where do you draw your ideas from? I think everybody draws from music they enjoy and have been influenced by. If not, your music would be absolutely original, not sounding like anything ever played. Does it?

Didn't think so.

I dunno, I have written a few (very few) good original songs. But I have copied hundreds of absolutely GREAT songs.

No man is an island unto himself. :wink:

Wes

I think I get what you're trying to say.

I just don't really see how you could learn from replaying songs, I guess I'm just weird :( This question is also from a couple times where I've just sat down with people, who've known absolutely nothing about an instrument, got a piece of sheet music, explained to them what the notes were, and where they were located on the Guitar / Piano. By 30 minutes, they could play a good majority of it, for the given amount of time, but take away the sheet, and they didn't know what in the world they were doing. My sister wanted to be able to play Fur Elise on the piano, I taught her how to play it, along with a couple other songs. In the end, she could play the songs, but still couldn't play the piano.

Mainly what I'm trying to say is, I've seen a lot of people who could play songs, but didn't know how to play the instrument... ( That probably didn't do anything to clarify what I was saying... But hopefully it did. )

Learning songs is very helpful if you can analyze what they did using intervals, you can see what they were thinking and use their experience to help your own writing.

I've been learning Bach lately, it feels like going to school, there is a lot that musicians of the past can teach you.

But I agree with you about understanding how to play your instrument vs. knowing songs. Nothing is worse then a guy who just learns songs and when it comes down to creativity/spontaneity can't do anything. And learning songs is only helpful when you can understand what your looking at.

It is like memorizing speeches rather then learning to speak a language.

This is what I meant.

but in learning a song, you have to learn new chords or techniques, plus you get a good idea of how a song flows from start to finish, NEZTOK said 'I don't like being a coping machine' and in a way you are being that if you only learn what the teaching books say just as much as if you only ever copied songs, by covering songs you will automatically put you own slant on things and i think thats far better than copying exactly what the song does. in doing that you start to find what 'your style' is, and your interpretations on others songs are a great way to start your own creativity processes going. it opens up doors or which way you want to go from here

Shoo,

I understand where you are coming from and to me it makes some sense, but I also have to agree with Wes and some of the others. Just because you know some techniques doesn't mean you can use them necessarilly well in a song.

I think learning covers and understanding how those techniques are used will go along way in helping you write original music. Once you've got the techniques down and hear how some of the masters used those techniques then you can take it to another level and put your own personal touch on it.

otherwise how would you know what you don't know?

I think we all want to become good guitar players. I also believe there are many different ways to get there. I like to try a little bit of everything, learning from the experience of others. If I don't use a particular technique, it doesn't mean the technique is wrong, it just means I prefer a different one.

Denny

I think I get what you're trying to say.

I just don't really see how you could learn from replaying songs, I guess I'm just weird This question is also from a couple times where I've just sat down with people, who've known absolutely nothing about an instrument, got a piece of sheet music, explained to them what the notes were, and where they were located on the Guitar / Piano. By 30 minutes, they could play a good majority of it, for the given amount of time, but take away the sheet, and they didn't know what in the world they were doing. My sister wanted to be able to play Fur Elise on the piano, I taught her how to play it, along with a couple other songs. In the end, she could play the songs, but still couldn't play the piano.

Mainly what I'm trying to say is, I've seen a lot of people who could play songs, but didn't know how to play the instrument... ( That probably didn't do anything to clarify what I was saying... But hopefully it did. )

This applies in reverse as well. There are great guitar players who are masters of the instrument, yet they cannot write a good song. We have talked about this in other posts in the past. Yngwie Malmsteen is a fantastic guitarist, but how many hit songs has he ever written? How 'bout Steve Vai??

The whole point of playing any instrument is to play songs. You can be a fantastic technician on guitar and be horribly boring to listen to. On the other hand, many great songwriters play very simple music. John Lennon and Paul MacCartney did not read music (at least at first) and wrote hundreds of GREAT songs. John Fogerty of CCR was an excellent guitarist, but not in the league of someone like Steve Vai, yet he wrote dozens of fantastic songs that still get airplay today.

But any good songwriter is influenced by music before them. George Harrison said in an interview that where the Beatles learned their great songwriting skills was from playing covers in Germany 8-12 hours per day, 7 days a week for 2 years. Sailors came in from all over the world and asked them to play all sorts of unusual music. The Beatles took the knowledge from learning these many various styles of music and applied it to their own songwriting. And everybody knows the Beatles were incredibly versatile in their songwriting.

That came from learning covers.

You can do whatever you want, that is the great thing about guitar. But if you just play your own music without influence from others you will probably find yourself sounding very one dimensional.

Edit- I've got to add this to the discussion... I have played in front of people hundreds of times over the years, I've never heard anybody shout out, "Hey, play the chromatic scale!"

Nuff said.

Maybe not Wes but I'm coming to your next show and yelling out " Play that funky chromatic scale white boy"

and your interpretations on others songs are a great way to start your own creativity processes going. it opens up doors or which way you want to go from here

And there is where the true value lies. There are some composers out there who are afraid that by listening to or playing other people's music, they will lose their own musical identity, but they've got it wrong. I would disagree with the sentiment that one who can play songs well but does not compose does not know how to play the instrument. There are so many songs out there that have universal themes, and the way a musician performs a song can be completely different from the way another musician performs it. Playing a song is so much more than playing notes. As you say, Shoo, anyone can play notes. But playing notes isn't playing music. A Musician draws on his own experience, feeling, passion, etc. to make those notes inspire emotion.

Besides, what if everyone felt that playing other people's compositions didn't have value? Then when a composer died, his music would die with him. How sad would that be? No Beethoven. No Mozart. For those before recording we would have nothing. For those who have recordings, we'd only have that one version. How boring!

My Grandfather in law is probably the best musician I know. He plays any instrument under the sun. And if you ask him to play a song, dollars to doughnuts he knows it and will play it for you. Has he written original songs? If he has, he hasn't played them for me. But the guy can arrange music (he knows his theory) for songs already written and has some killer arrangements of old standards.

In any case, to each his/her own. If you don't see the value in playing music written by other people, then that's your call. But personally, I think you are short changing yourself, and denying yourself the opportunity to fuse your emotion and passion with some of the wonderful music that has been written. Sometimes there is no need to invent the wheel.

Quite honestly, it seems arrogant to think that only your music is worth playing. But, in the end, the joy and expression of making music is what matters most. Do you enjoy playing your music, and your music alone? Then that's what's important. If playing music written by others brings you no joy, then don't do it!

Doug

not everyone is cut out to create songs though, some people are happy with simply playing an instrument for enjoyment value, so even though you may not set out to learn 'covers' if you enjoy playing guitar and you enjoy a certain song from a band, why not learn it? in the end its about having fun and getting better, if you can find happiness in theory and technical things then youll know that thats what you should do, nothing hurts and a mixture of things is always good but if its making you happy then why change it? not everybody has to be a master of an instrument.

if its bringing a smile to your face then your doing it right :)