Best way to practice sight reading ?

[ML94]

hey guys

I've now really got into my jazz and all that stuff. What im obviously lacking is the skill to sight read notes. Looking at chord charts is fine but i really want to improve my reading drastically. I know this will take ALOT of practice but im prepared to put it in.

What is the best way, or in your opinion on getting better at sight reading. I might just add, sight reading in different keys ?

Is it just racking up all the dots you have and going through them or is there some secret no ones telling me

[Faithless]

Ok, so, first of all, sight reading is about knowing the notes - you cant really read well, if you don't know the notes on your axe, right?
Take this exercise and woodshed that:

http://www.joehubbardbass.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/The-Random-Note-Finder-Exercise.pdf
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0sS0hhfezQ

Then you can take tunes (melodies) and play them on one string at the time (without metronome!!!).
It will help with your familiarity with the bass no end.

easy
L

[Doddy]

I'm working off the assumption that you are playing a four string.

If you play within the first five frets,all of the notes fall between one ledger line below below the stave (E) and one
ledger line above it (C).
Start by learning the notes on the stave one string at a time starting with the E string. Then moving on by learning
one more string at a time.
Rhythmically,start simply with semibreves,minims and crotchets before moving onto to quavers,semiquavers,triplets etc.
It's really not that hard.Just spend some of your practice time every day on reading and you'll pick it up pretty quickly.
Like Faithless says,you need to know the notes on the 'board solidly first,but you should be able to do this anyway.

With regards to reading in different keys,it helps if you know how keys work to begin with and what notes are in what key.
This is where the circle of fifths will help. Start with Cmaj(no sharps/flats),then go to Gmaj (1 sharp) ,Dmaj (2 sharps) and
so on.You can also go the other way...again start with Cmaj,then go Fmaj (1 flat), Bbmaj (2 flats) and so on. If you read
exercises that go in this order you will be reading in other keys without overwhelming yourself.

Edit...don't practice 'sight reading',just practice reading.The ability to read at sight will come naturally when you
are comfortable and familiar with everything else.

Edited October 17, 2012 by Doddy

[skej21]

[quote name='Doddy' timestamp='1350504379' post='1839885']
I'm working off the assumption that you are playing a four string.

If you play within the first five frets,all of the notes fall between one ledger line below below the stave (E) and one
ledger line above it (C).
Start by learning the notes on the stave one string at a time starting with the E string. Then moving on by learning
one more string at a time.
Rhythmically,start simply with semibreves,minims and crotchets before moving onto to quavers,semiquavers,triplets etc.
It's really not that hard.Just spend some of your practice time every day on reading and you'll pick it up pretty quickly.
Like Faithless says,you need to know the notes on the 'board solidly first,but you should be able to do this anyway.

With regards to reading in different keys,it helps if you know how keys work to begin with and what notes are in what key.
This is where the circle of fifths will help. Start with Cmaj(no sharps/flats),then go to Gmaj (1 sharp) ,Dmaj (2 sharps) and
so on.You can also go the other way...again start with Cmaj,then go Fmaj (1 flat), Bbmaj (2 flats) and so on. If you read
exercises that go in this order you will be reading in other keys without overwhelming yourself.

Edit...don't practice 'sight reading',just practice reading.The ability to read at sight will come naturally when you
are comfortable and familiar with everything else.
[/quote]

Plus one.

Also, once you've learnt enough to start reading lines of music, gather a good selection of reading material. Play through a piece until you start to make errors and then leave it and flip to another piece in your selection. Keep doing this and it'll ensure you're always looking at music and reading it and not relying on your memory as much. It won't take long before you start reading through full passages and then eventually full pieces without a second thought

[ML94]

Hey guiys thanks for all that !

Thing is i know where the notes are on bass and stave. Thing is my mind knows its an Ab but my hands dont react quick enough . how on earth do i quicken that reaction ?

[chris_b]

Just do lots of it.

[ML94]

I guess that's it really.

[Doddy]

[quote name='ML94' timestamp='1350573654' post='1840756']
Hey guiys thanks for all that !

Thing is i know where the notes are on bass and stave. Thing is my mind knows its an Ab but my hands dont react quick enough . how on earth do i quicken that reaction ?
[/quote]

Practice. It's the only way.

[Faithless]

With sight-reading, you have two different things that you have to isolate and practice separately: it's pitches (notes) and rhythms.
As far as pitches go, you have that Note Finder exercise I posted earlier, and, for rhythms, you want to find lines with varies groupings of 16th notes, and practice them (pitches doesnt matter, you can play them on one note all the way through).

One more thing - in order to be able to sight-read something, you have to be able to [i]play (excecute) [/i]it.
If you want to read Charlie Parker's lines, you have to know how to play Parker first of all, get it?
So, to put it short, if you don't have the right chops, you're never gonna sight-read it.

[Bilbo]

I know this is not a universally agreed approach but I recommend you read lots of stuff once, play it and, even if you get it wrong, discard the piece and read another one and another and another. Don't give yourself the chance to 'learn' what you are reading, just read it.

[Doddy]

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1350672752' post='1842230']
I know this is not a universally agreed approach but I recommend you read lots of stuff once, play it and, even if you get it wrong, discard the piece and read another one and another and another. Don't give yourself the chance to 'learn' what you are reading, just read it.
[/quote]

I think you need to get to a certain point before you should do this. I think it's better to read something,and if you get it wrong,
stop and fix it. If there is keep messing up a specific rhythm(for example) that you mess up,if you don't fix it the chances are you will make
that mistake again on another piece of music. It doesn't matter how many mistakes you make in the practice room,that's what it's
for...the only time you have to get it right first time is on the bandstand.

[skej21]

Agreed. But when you're learning to read as a child, you hardly ever read through the same thing more than a couple of times and its the same with dots. Once you've learnt to read common musical phrases (rhythms etc) and it becomes similar to reading words rather than the individual letters (dots), then move into the practicing technique Bilbo and I mentioned. If you make an error, fix it and then change piece.

[Lord Sausage]

[quote name='Doddy' timestamp='1350673534' post='1842247']
I think you need to get to a certain point before you should do this. I think it's better to read something,and if you get it wrong,
stop and fix it. If there is keep messing up a specific rhythm(for example) that you mess up,if you don't fix it the chances are you will make
that mistake again on another piece of music. It doesn't matter how many mistakes you make in the practice room,that's what it's
for...the only time you have to get it right first time is on the bandstand.
[/quote]
Word!

[Bilbo]

My point is that learning to read is one thing (i.e. what each phrase means). Learning to sight read is about developing that other skill until it is automatic and requires no effort. That needs repetition. Stopping to fix every error is learning 'reading' not practicing 'sight reading.

[Doddy]

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1350744407' post='1842969']
Stopping to fix every error is learning 'reading' not practicing 'sight reading.
[/quote]
It is,but I can honestly say that I've never practiced 'sight reading' once. The ability came from reading and
fixing mistakes so that next time I see a particular note or rhythm,I can play it. I've never made a difference
between 'reading' and 'sight reading'.

[LawrenceH]

[quote name='Doddy' timestamp='1350750141' post='1843072']
It is,but I can honestly say that I've never practiced 'sight reading' once. The ability came from reading and
fixing mistakes so that next time I see a particular note or rhythm,I can play it. I've never made a difference
between 'reading' and 'sight reading'.
[/quote]

I agree with this totally - for most people (non-dyslexics) reading words, we get faster by by learning to recognise whole sets of words and phrases rather than spelling out each letter. In psychology this is called 'chunking'.

[skej21]

I think the point has been missed here. The idea is that you start spot sight reading after the aforementioned 'chunking' has been done. The reason we are so good at reading words is that we are subject to them everywhere. Signs, letters, web pages, texts, newspapers etc etc etc. we are so used to being presented with unseen, 'fresh' material that we HAVE to be able to just read it. The problem with reading dots is that we don't have this. We spend far too long dissecting the few bits of practice dots we encounter after the initial 'chunking' has expanded our reading vocabulary that we never develop at a comparative speed. It takes a much longer period of time to develop our reading to similar 'recognition on sight' standard.

I think the point Bilbo and I were making is that exposure to lots of new material after 'chunking' may be a more natural (and familiar) way to quickly develop reading skills.

Edited October 20, 2012 by skej21

[Doddy]

[quote name='skej21' timestamp='1350769112' post='1843396']
I think the point Bilbo and I were making is that exposure to lots of new material after 'chunking' may be a more natural (and familiar) way to quickly develop reading skills. [/quote]

Like I said,I've never practiced 'sight reading'. When I make a mistake,I'll stop and look at it,not plough through then move on
to another piece-I'll run the section until it's right. When I then move on to a new piece,I can then recognise if that particular
rhythm or note appears again and can play it. I don't make a difference between reading and sight reading-you practice reading
and correct mistakes,then the more you practice the fewer mistakes you make and before you know it,you're sight reading.

[LawrenceH]

[quote name='skej21' timestamp='1350769112' post='1843396']
I think the point has been missed here. The idea is that you start spot sight reading after the aforementioned 'chunking' has been done...
I think the point Bilbo and I were making is that exposure to lots of new material after 'chunking' may be a more natural (and familiar) way to quickly develop reading skills.
[/quote]

I understood the point, but myself meant that 'chunking', as far as I understand, is not something you learn, master and finish - it is a continual process that gets ever-more refined as you integrate more complex groups (or you plateau and don't get any better at reading). I imagine different strategies for this suit different people. Practicing at tempo and not going back is a different thing but in a way easier, in that you can happily continually fumble the same types of thing unless you go back and work out what's going on. I must say though, I've never read on bass! Had my fill on piano

[ML94]

is it necessary to carry on reading if you completely mess up a bar. I like to get everything perfect, so you I would remember a certain pattern or phrase. I've seen that many people say carry on just to replicate a reading scenario, 'the band doesn't wait'.

[Faithless]

it's necessary to continue after a mistake only if you're on the bandstand, but if you're shedding at home, you want to stop, and break it down - maybe coming up with an exercise that'd focus on the particular issue.
I'm not saying you can't just burn through the piece, no matter wheter you made any mistakes or not, but this is the 'performance' part, where you don't really learn anything, and 'science' part is where you play something, find something you can't execute, stop, and correct it.

[philparker]

One trick to improving sight reading is: take a very simple melody line, on a bass clef, with no rhythmic difficulties and a slow tempo, and all in one hand position, then 'study' the line starting with the time signature and the key to each and every note right to the end. Once you are content that you understand it and are able to play it - play it slowly and deliberately from start to finish without a metronome and assess yourself. If you played it flawlessly, you are ready to move on, if not try something simpler, but don't practice it or play it more than twice.

The development comes as you reduce the time to study the line; increase the rhythmic difficulty; increase the tempo; play in different keys; increase the number of hand positions etc.

This development will come hand in hand for some people learning to play an instrument from scratch over a long period of time. However, for many people, their playing ability will have already exceeded their music reading ability and their sight-reading ability. If you want to isolate sight-reading as an area for improving it will take time, effort and study, but there are books available where authors have assessed these needs and have selected pieces structurally in order of difficulty to improve all the things I mentioned at the start.

A quick look on-line, I have seen just one book [url="http://www.musicroom.com/se/id_no/018656/details.html"]http://www.musicroom.com/se/id_no/018656/details.html[/url] but I don't know this personally to recommend, but I've used a similar book for a different instrument and found it invaluable to improve my sight-reading and also very well structured.

[fatback]

OK, but what about fingering and positions? Do you readers normally analyse first?

Dunno why i'm asking really. I think I've got whatever the musical equivalent of dyslexia is, and should stop torturing myself and stick with chord charts.

Is there anything less pleasant than trying to read those dots?

Edited October 23, 2012 by fatback

[philparker]

[quote]OK, but what about fingering and positions? Do you readers normally analyse first?[/quote]

Firstly, it depends on how much time you have - and the more time the better even if you are a good sight-reader. However, yes, you analyse it as much as you can. If you have the time to run over the whole score you will immediately pick out the bars where the higher notes are and deal with them. With a sufficient knowledge of the fretboard you will work out each side of the higher notes to work out the better hand position for the range of notes around that (those) high note(s). Next you will look at the 'phrasing' and the number of bars you want to retain in each position by evaluating and segregating the lower and intermediate positions.

When you are able to read at speed you have to glance up to 4 bars ahead to take all this in whilst instantly returning to the specific note and next note in question.

If you want to learn a piece from scratch and don't need to play instantly and/or it is above your ability - the more time you spend analysing it by reading it without playing it will be time very well spent. Even in between practice sessions I will sit down with the music and spend even more time analysing it - and yes, I realise all the mistakes I have made and how I can improve it. It will be covered in pencil marks by the time I have finished with it!!

Bass guitar is also unique with playing backing/harmony/sequence to chord structures - and that is an art in itself that shouldn't be disparaged in musical study. I really enjoy the creative potential to this and I think it also requires an impressive knowledge of chord structure/harmony and theory to execute as a form of 'sight-reading' by itself!

[quote]Is there anything less pleasant than trying to read those dots?[/quote]

If you want an adrenaline rush whilst playing music and you can 'just' about keep up at the max of your limit then try sight-reading to support other musicians live in front of an audience!!...or just challenge yourself with ordinary sight-reading and you'll still get a buzz when it works!

For most mortals - sight reading will be about 3 or 4 levels lower than playing level (not taking into account many hours poring over a piece to learn).

[pete.young]

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1350672752' post='1842230']
I know this is not a universally agreed approach but I recommend you read lots of stuff once, play it and, even if you get it wrong, discard the piece and read another one and another and another. Don't give yourself the chance to 'learn' what you are reading, just read it.
[/quote]

This is exactly the way that I was taught to sight-read, in the classical piano world.

The other insight I found usefule was that it's not about the notes, it's about understanding the intervals between notes on the stave and how they relate to intervals on whatever instrument you're playing. It should require much less mental effort to look at two notes a line and a space apart and see that as a 4th, than to translate both positions onto the stave into notes and then work out the relative positions on the fretboard.