My son is a fantastic drummer and when he was young I used to use his drum books to teach my clarinet sax and flute students. The way drummers' music works is rhythms only which takes the concern for the note pitches away and it is easier to see the motifs of the music. Once you get the phonetic sounds of the groups or cells of notes, then you practice tonguing the notes. We have to do long tones and tonguing exercises anyway, so why not practice them as part of your warm-up routine. Once you get comfortable with this procedure start adding your scale exercises using these exercises by mixing up the different cell phonics and once you are making up your own exercises you are improvizing. Now when sight-reading you have the scale and rhythms memorized which helps with all those 9 points Jamie talks about. It was great to hear Jamie mention that the correct rhythms and phrasing are more important than the notes. I have been preaching this for 50 years of teaching. Great lesson Jamie thanks. Keep them coming. You rock!
I was happy to see you mention Tip#5 Transcribe. I've done lots of transcriptions, especially of horn section figures, and as you mentioned, it's the same process just in reverse. I would also add to make sure you're not only transcribing the rhythms, but also notating them correctly so they correspond to the standard notation you will actually encounter.
Great lesson as usual. Another couple of tips. Memorize one and two count rhythm patterns. You can learn these be tying every combination of a 4 sixteenth note pattern and then every combination of a 4 eighth note pattern. This is what I call one and two note patterns and comprise most rhythms you will ever encounter. Next learn to look at a measure and see where all of the down beats fall. After a while sight reading is mostly automatic.
The time warping thing is very cool, never thought of applying it to this but I was a goaltender in my youth and that would definitely happen when somone would wind up to take a shot, you'd just somehow slow down time.
I think another important tip is master the tone like singing it in your mind while reading it and this includes the rythym because if youre familiar with the tune the key signature will just follow. You might be off but your instrument will hit it if also you master the scaling.
Really enjoyed this video as it made me realise there could be other people like me who only sight read. I beat myself up daily about not playing anything by ear as I really want to do that. But, maybe I'm not so bad after all. 😊
Great guidance, Jamie! I don't know if those tips would have saved me, though, from a disaster when I subbed in a big band to fill a 2nd tenor chair. I thought I was a good sight reader, but hadn't played in a big band for 50 years or so. The leader called, "Chart 173" and counted off a 200 bpm tempo. I didn't even have the chart on the stand when they began to play. Yes, it was one of those, "one, two, three, go" situations you mentioned in the video. I made it through the rehearsal, but never was asked back - which was actually a relief. Maybe I'll give it another shot after practicing with your tips. Thanks!
For big bands sight reading, I always check out the road map before starting. Is there DS? Where does it go back to? Also, is there a DC or Coda jump? Any written solos, or any open solo sections? Who gets them? When playing: I'm looking ahead for differences from what I'd normally play, if that makes sense. It's like my brain is already auto-processing, and I just apply these differences. Accidentals, weird rhythms, and the like. On lead alto, I try to play with confidence, getting as much right as possible so the sax section can rely on my lead, especially in tough soli sections. Otherwise, it can turn into a section free for all and they stop relying on my lead. On other sax chairs, I make sure I'm following the lead regardless. This may include jumping beats and adjusting articulation, dynamics, and pitch. It's amazing that with experience our brains learn to do all this while playing charts we've never seen before.
Good points there. Maybe I’ve already mentioned this, but I play in a Boomer R&B and Rock 6 piece, usually as the only horn player. But I got asked last Fall to play in a community jazz band, and I was shocked to find out how bad I was at reading those jazz charts. I’m still taking piano lessons, so I am reading a lot of music, but I hardly ever read music for sax. With the combo, it’s all well known tunes, so we just play our parts, even if the front man calls a key change. I’ve even learned Muscore and written out some horn parts for tunes that we do that aren’t as well know in case we have another horn player. (Our combo likes the sound James Hunter Six gets out of just a tenor and bari.). Like you said, I had a big problem reading the rhythm of those jazz charts. It was hard for me, for example, to count out 7 measures of rest, then come in on the 3.5 beat of the 8th measure. Or some simple pattern of on and off beat of the same note. It would be so embarrassing to the only horn in the section bleating out a note at the wrong time. In practice, I’d be the guy going “Honk! Shit!…..honk! Shit!” Because I play tenor with guitar players who love E and A, I play in F# and B all the time. In fact, I really love playing in F# now. But I can’t read those keys. I have a hard time seeing an A and playing it as A#. It’s incorrect in the music theory sense, but I always adlib in those keys thinking there is a Bb in the scale. My best approach to those charts was to find recordings of the songs in the set list, and play along with the sheet music and listen with headphones and Amazing Slow Downer. At some point for me, the parts become more memorized, played by ear, than reading notes, and the sheet music just becomes a mnemonic of the order those phrases are coming at me, which helps with reading ahead, and falling into the pattern of the scale, as you said. On time dilution, or “fly time”, I think of flute time. I played flute primarily for many years. There are memes out there about how a bari or tuba player panics if you put the flute part in front of them with all those trills and 32nd notes. Some of those players in the community jazz band are really good at “reading those parts down” the first time they see the piece. But I’ve seen people like that who are totally lost if there is no sheet music and the front man just says “Mustang Sally, in the original key.”
The “#5 never stop” is very critical IMO, when I was learning we dont use CDEFGABC, we use solfege(do re mi ..). It was 5 years later I was able to apply it on an instrument since we cant afford a clarinet and able join the band. This #5 tip enhance my sight reading and my instructor tells me never stop but I MUST HIT EVERY FIRST NOTE ON EACH MEASURE and the rest will just follow with practice. The solfege technique allows me to look at the measure and know how it sounds like.
Got my sight reading to a great standard when i was learning Piano, was studying at ABRSM Grade 5 level. By the time i was 16 though, work and adult life got in the way. The playing slipped into a once in a blue moon thing. Am now in my mid 30s and last week i got myself a budget Alto Sax from gear4music. Its an instrument ive always wanted to learn to play. Sight reading when playing? Long way off yet, im only getting used to playing scales again lol l. But still trying to remember fingering patterns with the palm keys and paddle keys atm. I know at one point it will click though and hopefully will progress nice and quickly, as the music theory side of things is still in the ol brain box, its just uncovering it again.
Здравствуйте, я из России, подписан на вас! Очень восхищён вашему профессионализму! Не могли бы вы, выпустить выпуск про то как брать ноты альтиссимо. Спасибо!
that was great! I want to get into transcribing into sheet music but I'm scared and don't know how to start :) do you have a recommendation on what software to use for beginners?
you need tp practice reading rhythms as much as possible - you must be able to understand them instantly. Sight reading is nearly always playing something similar to something you've played before, so it's not actually sight reading as such. Also I think it's a good idea to try to read everything and anything you can get a hold of.
Do it every day is right. I was asked to substitute on 2nd tenor last night in a swing band. I stumbled all over the place because it was sight reading, and I normally play concert band music. Guess what I’ll be working on today?
My sax teacher told me to prepare for sight reading by playing scales and arpeggios in all keys. This prepare you for most music EXCEPT for the rhythms.
My eyesight is so bad that I can't sight read. When I work with sheet music, I have to use a 7x magnifying glass and memorize the music eventually working to the point that I can put it all together in my head and make it sound somewhat like what's on the sheet. I've been thinking about finding wome sort of projector so that I can project sheet music on a wall and read it that way.
Here’s the thing I read music for my keyboard. Record the tune I want to play on that, then play along on my sax without a clue what note is what 😂😂😂😂 works for me 😂😂🎉🎉
I’m always hearing that I won’t be given a new piece and be expected to play it immediately. It happens all the time. Good refresher tips though, thanks.
My problem: Last year in my band class, it was required to try out for the more advanced band. We submitted our videos online, therefore, I had more time to practice it on my own and count it out. Long story short, she ended up putting me in the more advanced band and I’m awful at sight reading. 😅 so here I am with one week left until school starts hardly being able to sight read anything.😂 wish me luck!😳😳
My son is a fantastic drummer and when he was young I used to use his drum books to teach my clarinet sax and flute students. The way drummers' music works is rhythms only which takes the concern for the note pitches away and it is easier to see the motifs of the music. Once you get the phonetic sounds of the groups or cells of notes, then you practice tonguing the notes. We have to do long tones and tonguing exercises anyway, so why not practice them as part of your warm-up routine. Once you get comfortable with this procedure start adding your scale exercises using these exercises by mixing up the different cell phonics and once you are making up your own exercises you are improvizing. Now when sight-reading you have the scale and rhythms memorized which helps with all those 9 points Jamie talks about. It was great to hear Jamie mention that the correct rhythms and phrasing are more important than the notes. I have been preaching this for 50 years of teaching. Great lesson Jamie thanks. Keep them coming. You rock!
I use my old rhythm workbook(drum pad) from
Music 1a class in the 80’s
You can’t beat the fundamental things.
Thanks 🙏🏻
This lesson was a pure gold. Thank you a lot. Glad to see that your channel is growing! I knew it from the very first day.
🙏🏻
I was happy to see you mention Tip#5 Transcribe. I've done lots of transcriptions, especially of horn section figures, and as you mentioned, it's the same process just in reverse. I would also add to make sure you're not only transcribing the rhythms, but also notating them correctly so they correspond to the standard notation you will actually encounter.
Cool, thanks!
Excellent tips. I frequently need to remind myself to read ahead because that helps so much
Glad it was helpful!
Excellent 1, still irks me I screw up, but I just keep going. Trying to get it right so someday I can play with others. Now if I could memorize...
I reaaaallly love the fly mind suggestion! Thank you!
You are so welcome!
Great lesson as usual. Another couple of tips. Memorize one and two count rhythm patterns. You can learn these be tying every combination of a 4 sixteenth note pattern and then every combination of a 4 eighth note pattern. This is what I call one and two note patterns and comprise most rhythms you will ever encounter. Next learn to look at a measure and see where all of the down beats fall. After a while sight reading is mostly automatic.
Thanks for the comment
The time warping thing is very cool, never thought of applying it to this but I was a goaltender in my youth and that would definitely happen when somone would wind up to take a shot, you'd just somehow slow down time.
🙏🏻
I think another important tip is master the tone like singing it in your mind while reading it and this includes the rythym because if youre familiar with the tune the key signature will just follow. You might be off but your instrument will hit it if also you master the scaling.
Thanks for the comment
I’m in two big bands that do 99% sight reading. Your tips are fantastic! Thank you, thank you!!!
That is awesome!
Really enjoyed this video as it made me realise there could be other people like me who only sight read. I beat myself up daily about not playing anything by ear as I really want to do that. But, maybe I'm not so bad after all. 😊
Great. Glad it helped🙏🏻
Excellent advice - it's taken me a while to arrive at the same ideas! Thanks Jamie.
Glad it was helpful!
Great instruction Mr Anderson! Thank you so much!
You are very welcome
Thanks Jamie! I play mostly by ear and am very slow at reading, especially rhythms, but these are great tips.
Thanks
Great guidance, Jamie! I don't know if those tips would have saved me, though, from a disaster when I subbed in a big band to fill a 2nd tenor chair. I thought I was a good sight reader, but hadn't played in a big band for 50 years or so. The leader called, "Chart 173" and counted off a 200 bpm tempo. I didn't even have the chart on the stand when they began to play. Yes, it was one of those, "one, two, three, go" situations you mentioned in the video. I made it through the rehearsal, but never was asked back - which was actually a relief. Maybe I'll give it another shot after practicing with your tips. Thanks!
Ouch! Yeh keep at it
That is really useful, thanks Jamie. I play in a intermediate woodwind band, already use some of those tips, but learned new ones I can incorporate.
Glad to help
For big bands sight reading, I always check out the road map before starting. Is there DS? Where does it go back to? Also, is there a DC or Coda jump? Any written solos, or any open solo sections? Who gets them?
When playing: I'm looking ahead for differences from what I'd normally play, if that makes sense. It's like my brain is already auto-processing, and I just apply these differences. Accidentals, weird rhythms, and the like.
On lead alto, I try to play with confidence, getting as much right as possible so the sax section can rely on my lead, especially in tough soli sections. Otherwise, it can turn into a section free for all and they stop relying on my lead.
On other sax chairs, I make sure I'm following the lead regardless. This may include jumping beats and adjusting articulation, dynamics, and pitch.
It's amazing that with experience our brains learn to do all this while playing charts we've never seen before.
Great comment!
Good points there.
Maybe I’ve already mentioned this, but I play in a Boomer R&B and Rock 6 piece, usually as the only horn player. But I got asked last Fall to play in a community jazz band, and I was shocked to find out how bad I was at reading those jazz charts. I’m still taking piano lessons, so I am reading a lot of music, but I hardly ever read music for sax. With the combo, it’s all well known tunes, so we just play our parts, even if the front man calls a key change. I’ve even learned Muscore and written out some horn parts for tunes that we do that aren’t as well know in case we have another horn player. (Our combo likes the sound James Hunter Six gets out of just a tenor and bari.).
Like you said, I had a big problem reading the rhythm of those jazz charts. It was hard for me, for example, to count out 7 measures of rest, then come in on the 3.5 beat of the 8th measure. Or some simple pattern of on and off beat of the same note. It would be so embarrassing to the only horn in the section bleating out a note at the wrong time. In practice, I’d be the guy going “Honk! Shit!…..honk! Shit!”
Because I play tenor with guitar players who love E and A, I play in F# and B all the time. In fact, I really love playing in F# now. But I can’t read those keys. I have a hard time seeing an A and playing it as A#. It’s incorrect in the music theory sense, but I always adlib in those keys thinking there is a Bb in the scale.
My best approach to those charts was to find recordings of the songs in the set list, and play along with the sheet music and listen with headphones and Amazing Slow Downer. At some point for me, the parts become more memorized, played by ear, than reading notes, and the sheet music just becomes a mnemonic of the order those phrases are coming at me, which helps with reading ahead, and falling into the pattern of the scale, as you said.
On time dilution, or “fly time”, I think of flute time. I played flute primarily for many years. There are memes out there about how a bari or tuba player panics if you put the flute part in front of them with all those trills and 32nd notes.
Some of those players in the community jazz band are really good at “reading those parts down” the first time they see the piece. But I’ve seen people like that who are totally lost if there is no sheet music and the front man just says “Mustang Sally, in the original key.”
Thanks for sharing!
Finally! Thank you, thank you, thank you, Jamie!! :-)
You're so welcome!
The “#5 never stop” is very critical IMO, when I was learning we dont use CDEFGABC, we use solfege(do re mi ..). It was 5 years later I was able to apply it on an instrument since we cant afford a clarinet and able join the band. This #5 tip enhance my sight reading and my instructor tells me never stop but I MUST HIT EVERY FIRST NOTE ON EACH MEASURE and the rest will just follow with practice. The solfege technique allows me to look at the measure and know how it sounds like.
Great comment, thanks! 🙏🏻
Instantly up your sax game with this free masterclass👉🏻 www.getyoursaxtogether.com/masterclass👈🏻
Got my sight reading to a great standard when i was learning Piano, was studying at ABRSM Grade 5 level. By the time i was 16 though, work and adult life got in the way. The playing slipped into a once in a blue moon thing.
Am now in my mid 30s and last week i got myself a budget Alto Sax from gear4music. Its an instrument ive always wanted to learn to play.
Sight reading when playing? Long way off yet, im only getting used to playing scales again lol l. But still trying to remember fingering patterns with the palm keys and paddle keys atm. I know at one point it will click though and hopefully will progress nice and quickly, as the music theory side of things is still in the ol brain box, its just uncovering it again.
Keep at it. Congrats on the new sax
Здравствуйте, я из России, подписан на вас! Очень восхищён вашему профессионализму! Не могли бы вы, выпустить выпуск про то как брать ноты альтиссимо. Спасибо!
Already done. Three actually. Just search UA-cam.
that was great! I want to get into transcribing into sheet music but I'm scared and don't know how to start :) do you have a recommendation on what software to use for beginners?
A lot of people are using Musescore now.
Learning the important scales is a big help but what usually kicks me of my tracks is the accidentals. :D
🙏🏻
Mexico 🇲🇽 presente
Gracias 😊
🙏🏻
you need tp practice reading rhythms as much as possible - you must be able to understand them instantly. Sight reading is nearly always playing something similar to something you've played before, so it's not actually sight reading as such. Also I think it's a good idea to try to read everything and anything you can get a hold of.
Thanks
Thank you
You're welcome
Do it every day is right.
I was asked to substitute on 2nd tenor last night in a swing band. I stumbled all over the place because it was sight reading, and I normally play concert band music. Guess what I’ll be working on today?
👍
My sax teacher told me to prepare for sight reading by playing scales and arpeggios in all keys. This prepare you for most music EXCEPT for the rhythms.
🙏🏻
My eyesight is so bad that I can't sight read. When I work with sheet music, I have to use a 7x magnifying glass and memorize the music eventually working to the point that I can put it all together in my head and make it sound somewhat like what's on the sheet. I've been thinking about finding wome sort of projector so that I can project sheet music on a wall and read it that way.
Great idea.
Here’s the thing I read music for my keyboard. Record the tune I want to play on that, then play along on my sax without a clue what note is what 😂😂😂😂 works for me 😂😂🎉🎉
👍
I’m always hearing that I won’t be given a new piece and be expected to play it immediately. It happens all the time. Good refresher tips though, thanks.
You're welcome
Who indeed can know the mind of a fly!
😂
My problem:
Last year in my band class, it was required to try out for the more advanced band. We submitted our videos online, therefore, I had more time to practice it on my own and count it out. Long story short, she ended up putting me in the more advanced band and I’m awful at sight reading. 😅 so here I am with one week left until school starts hardly being able to sight read anything.😂 wish me luck!😳😳
You got this!