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A Comparison of Learning Styles
By Tim Musser
Over the past several years I've been exposed to two basically different styles of teaching an instrument. My involvement in piano lessons and lessons on the bass guitar have provided me with an interesting viewpoint of these two styles. Many times the distinction between the two is not made and the pupil is forced into the teacher's preferred style. The two methods of instruction I am referring to is teaching music by the reading of notes vs. the teaching of music by ear.
I was in second grade or so when my mother suggested I take piano lessons. Like most other kids that age I balked a little at the idea but finally gave into mom's urgings. For about 8 years I went to piano lessons every Thursday night. During this time, whenever people would come up and ask me how my piano lessons are going, I would respond positively. However, deep down inside I knew differently. See, my piano teacher taught strictly by reading notes ~ a method I thought was just the normal way of learning the piano. Since beginning guitar lessons, though, I learned a lot about myself and about my learning style. I realized that I flourish when I can play by ear and 'wing it' but when it comes to reading notes, it really is a struggle for me. That would explain the frustration I had when I was forced to sit down and practice my piano lesson for 30 minutes every day.
I can recall many heartless hours at the piano continually trying to focus and concentrate on the notes on the page. I didn't really have the desire to learn that stuff because it wasn't music to me. I truly believe that today I would be a lot more proficient at the piano if I would have been able to play by ear for those eight years. The faster pace of learning would be due to the motivation of actually making music vs. practicing exercises and songs from a book. Now, don't get me wrong, different exercises are very essential to learning an instrument well. However, in my case, for example, I'm more motivated now to do exercises because I have experienced the final end result and reward of doing them. In other words, I know that doing these exercises will make me a better bass player and not just something to satisfy my instructor.
Anyway, when I get up front with my bass guitar in the worship band that I play in, I love to wing it and not be forced to play a set of notes off a page. I don't find myself doing that on the piano much at all. I play piano with another musical group and basically I just get a piece of music, memorize it, and perform it. I think if you want to make music in the truest sense of the word, it needs to be an expression of yourself, something that comes from inside, based on you or experiences or thoughts that are yours. More often than not, the best music is also more spontaneous. Granted, there are some incredible pieces of music written out there and they can be very fun to learn and perform. But I found personally that the most fulfillment comes from when I can give a piece of myself to the listener rather than play a set of notes written by someone else. I find I can portray the feel of the music a lot better if it's mine because I don't always know what the author was thinking when he or she wrote their music.
There are a couple of other examples I have to show a little more how playing by ear is more conducive to my learning style. First, I can remember how I dreaded every Thursday night when I had to go for piano lessons. It seemed like I really wasn't getting anywhere. Knowing that I'm a perfectionist, it was hard for me to try and play all the songs and exercises for them and to do it perfectly. There was a lot more stress involved. On the other hand, when it comes to Wednesday night and it's time for bass lessons, I really have a hunger to learn more and to better myself at playing the bass. In my case, there's more fulfillment and motivation now because the focus has shifted off of doing it to please other people towards doing it for myself and, in my case, ultimately for the glory of God.
Secondly, I feel a greater sense of anxiety when I perform on the piano in front of people as opposed to performing on the bass. It doesn't seem like it should be that way because I've taken about 8 years of piano lessons as opposed to about a year of lessons on the bass. Again, I believe a tribute to personality and learning styles.
Finally, an experience I had a couple weeks back. The worship band I'm in was practicing for a worship service we were to lead. We came to the one song and our lead guitarist gave me the sheet of lyrics with the notes written on it and asked me to transpose it up into another key. I took a little time and tried my best. I wrote the notes on the paper that I thought would be the right ones for the new key. I copied over onto my paper and then gave him back his copy. We started to play and right away I could tell something was wrong. The song came to a grinding halt and we tried to figure out what was wrong. We discovered that half the notes I wrote in were wrong. So instead of trying to write in the right notes we started again and 'winged it'. The song went beautifully! At that point I was in the process of learning that I do better by ear, but from then on, I knew it!
In closing I would just like to mention how thankful I am that my instructor realized my need to play by ear and not be burdened with reading notes. I realize that every learner is different and my case is different from anyone else's. However, I feel the strong need for each instructor to recognize the strengths and weaknesses of their students and teach to their strengths. It's amazing how much I am learning on the bass vs. the piano and the speed of which I'm learning. I still do very much like to play the piano but there is a much greater sense of fulfillment in playing bass for me. I feel better at making music on the bass. After all, that's the point of taking music lessons. Right?
My Experience With a Bad Guitar
By Joy Houck
About a year and a half ago I decided that I wanted to play the guitar,but I didn't want to buy a brand new instrument. Instead I talked to a man in my church who offered to lend me his old guitar for a few months. It was nearly twenty years old and the strings probably hadn't been changed for that long, so I bought new strings thinking it would improve its harsh tone. Unfortunately it really didn't help. At my first lesson, my teacher pointed out how high the strings were from the fingerboard, and then let me play one of his guitars. It was amazing how much easier it was for me to hold the strings down, and how much fuller it sounded than the one I had brought in. I ended up buying a guitar from my teacher at my second lesson and have never regretted splurging because it made learning to play less difficult and much easier on my fingertips.
