271. HOW SOMEONE COULD POSSIBLY LEARN MANY INSTRUMENTS SIMULTANEOUSLY? UTILIZING THE SIMPLICIAL COUNTER-MELODY IMPROVISATION SYSTEM

 HOW SOMEONE COULD POSSIBLY LEARN MANY INSTRUMENTS SIMULTANEOUSLY?
UTILIZING THE SIMPLICIAL COUNTER-MELODY IMPROVISATION SYSTEM

By watching the Carling family one cannot by admire how each of its members play many musical instruments and all together have a wonderful early Jazz band with which they improvise and adapt many famous songs. (http://www.gunhildcarling.net/about/carling-family/ )

I once watched a video by someone speaking many (4-5 or more ) languages , about how he practices learning them simultaneously. What he was doing was quite simple. He was choosing a few  mundane tasks during his everyday life e.g. dressing after getting up in the morning from his bed, or siting to eat for lunch or dinner etc.   Then he started describing what he was doing in his mother language and he right away was repeating the same phrases in each of his many languages that he was learning. This in total was not more than 15 minutes per day, but it might involve also some searching of new words or phrases!


This case is an example of a principle where it is proved that the method of learning something is more important than the object of learning itself.

Brilliant examples as we mentioned of musicians that play many musical instruments (from 5-6 to 10-12 musical instruments) is the  Caling family. Ecah mamber of this family plays at least 5-6 musical instruments, and Gunhild Carling (https://www.gunhildcarling.net/)is playing 10-12 musical instruments.

Obviously this also proves that the method of learning many musical instruments is  radically different from the traditional in Scolls of music and Universities.
And by this we do not mainly  mean that the technique is different.

When learning a musical instruments five areas of the human subjectivity are involved

1) The sense of hearing
2) The sense of seing
3) The kineasthetics of the fingers (fingering)  and/or the mouth (embouchure)
4) The feelings and emotinal percepton of the music
5) The mental images and intellectual perception of the music (musical ontology)

So when we say radically different method we mean that the combination of the previous 5 factors is radically different

The next are 5 principles that are involved in learning many musical instruments

1) Principle of least time of  playing while learning
2) Principle of most easy method as far as the memory and spending energy in practice of fingers/mouth is concerned
3) Principle of most smart intellectually perception of the learning material  desired to learn with the maximum number of relevant cross-correlations beteen them.
4) Principle of maximum pleasure while learning (so that serotonin and dopamine arecreated in the nervous system so as t have the creation of nerve synapses that is the subconsious ability and memory and desire for more learning)
5) Principle of optimal socialization of the process of learning.

Under the above principles it is derived that for a musician that is playing many musical instruments it holds that
(see also post 275, 128)

FOR MUSIC:

1) Each instrument is NOT used so as to play all possible melodies and songs. Instead it is used and it is learned only as far as this instrument is specializing to allow playing an area and type of music that with the other musical instruments is not done so easily , efficiently and desirebly. There are though among the many insyruments at least one wich can be used the musician to play all possible melodies or songs. But most of the many instruments is  learned and played only in the area and specialization which is concidered best (e.g. a cello  might be learned to play only bass lines at the 2nd octave and a trombone overtones improvisations only in the 2nd-3rd octave)

2) At least one midi controller is used that can emulate all 3 generations of musical instruments  (see post 329, chromatic, diatonic,overtones musical instruments) and helps to learn but also to conduct the music of all other musical instruments.

3) The musician is focusing in learning a repertoire of music and songs with its musical theoretical ontology rather, than particular instruments. Thus when learning and spent some hours per day or week we learn a new song, and we learn its harmony (chord progression) melody and parallel simplicial counter melody (bass lines) etc on many instruments one after the other rather than spending these hours on particular instrument. In this way the same hours spent for the musical ontology of a song (chords, melody, countermelody, bass lines, rhythm  etc) will be used for learning more than one instruments, This reduces dramatically the memory and time spent in learning and shifts the subconcious memory to the abstract musical ontology rather than particular material particularities of the instrument which is more spiritual , and which memory and time is utilized for all instruments simulteneously. (see also post 271) 

4) It is by far more efficient when learning to utilize improvisation rather than tedious practice excercizes from musical sheets, for many raesons. One is that the improvisation is forgiving in "mistakes" that turnout to be innovations in melodic improvisation. Another reason is that it activates more deeply the various nervous system centers that are relevant to the 5 subjectivity areas  mentioned previously, therefore it is more thorough learning. Still another rason is that improvisation is  more pleasant than tedious excercises of practing therefore we have more serotonine-dopamine inthe nervous system, which are utilized in creating new nerve synapses valuable in the subconcious memory and desire for more learning in the future.

If someone knows one instrument better among the instruments who wants to learn, then an obviously useful  technique is to learn well  a song on the instrument that he knows best , and then transfer it and learn it on the instruments that he knows less well. In other words we use at first the musical instrument that we know best so as to learn a song and focus on learning the abstract instagible musical theoretic ontology of the song (harmony, chords, melody morphology of the melody etc) and then apply this music theoretical knowledge and subconscious feeling on learning it on an other particular instrument that we know less well.

5) Classification of all instruments to 3 gentres according to their layouts of the notes for simplified and simple method of perception: a) Diatonic b) Chromatic c) overtoves. See also post  329.

Now one could imagine a similar process in learning many instruments at the same time For example let us take

0) A percussion instrument
1) A Guitar or ukulele
2) A Celtic Harp
3) A Bowed string instrument like Greek Lyra (or fiddle)
4) A diatonic Pan-Flute
5) A single tube wind with the fingering system 6+1. E.g.  Irish whistle, flute , or reed instrument like clarinet saxophone , duduk, chalumeau  etc

Such a process might most probably be very close to how the children and members of the carling family learned each one all of the instruments they play.  The central idea is of course that the versatility of playing many musical instruments is based on the ability to internalize and perceive mentally and emotionally the musical sound  and improvise rather than the ability of concentrating separately to technical skill of geometric patterns of playing for each particular instrument And one of the simplest ways to perceive musically harmonically , melodically and chromatically,  all the universe of the 12-notes is the chromatic tonality (as in post 263) (see post 258 that improvisation is at least at 2/3rds an internal feelings and intellect meditation process rather independent from the musical instrument played! The 2/3ds are of course the mental perception of the musical sound and the feelings-emotional  perception of the musical sound, and not the geometric instruments pattern of the musical playing! And one of the simplest ways to perceive musically all the universe of the 12-notes is the chromatic tonality (as in post 263) ). Thinking that  he must learn 5 (or more ) instruments simultaneously may appear discouraging, but thinking that he just have to play and improvise on a sequence of nice musical sound of  very joyful songs with 5 instruments is  by far more attractive and desirable idea.

Here in the next video, the guitar teacher explains why it is simpler for the human nervous system to concentrate on the mental and emotional perception of the musical sound rather than on  the geometric patterns of playing the particular instrument.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iacQvKMSx6A


We recall from the ntroduction of this online book that  a detailed approach of the relevant nervous centers in playing music are the next 5 nervous system centers that are involved when playing music

MENTAL 
1) THE MENTAL IMAGES OFTHE ONTOLOGY OF MUSIC (NOTES, SCALES, INTERVALS, CHORDS, ETC)
PHYSICAL
2) THE SOUNDS OF THE EAR IN THE SENSE OF LISTENING
3) THE IMAGES OF THE EYE IN THE SENSE OF SEING (E.G. OBSERVING THE FINGERS ON THE MUSICALINSTRUMENT OR THE MOVES OF DANCER). Some musical instrument do not have optical images e.g. he harmonica playing. 
4) THE KINESTHETIC CENTER OF THE ACTIONS OF THE FINGERS ON THE INSTRUMENT AND THE BREATH IN THE CASE OF WIND INSTRUMENTS
EMOTIONAL:
5) THE FEELINGS CREATED BY THE LISTENED MUSICAL SOUND IN REALTION ALSO TO MEMORIES AND LISTENING HABITS.


Learning the same song on many instruments, would mean that 3) images and 4) action of the fingers will change from instrument to instrument, but the triad
1) Mental musical ontology 2) Sounds of the ear ontology 5) Feelings remain the almost the same! 

So a daily or weekly process could be nowadays as follows:

1) Chose in youtube a nice and happy song that you would like to listen and play. Better be happy rather than sad , as such a learning should raise our bodily frequency and should be laso a learning of how to be happy within the good joy (not the bad joy). E.g. it might be an early jazz song like those that the  carling family are playing and enjoying. If we do not want to start with a known song in youtube, he may start by playing and recording in Audacity a rhythm by a percussion instrument, and then use this as a base.

2) Derive an mp3 file from the youtube-video, and analyze it with the free software Audacity (or a similar) to verify by its chords that it is a chromatic tonality music song (see post 263 ) 

3) Try singing its melody (improvisationally) or whistle  (improvisationally) its melody. THIS IS PROBABLY THE MOST IMPORTANT STEP IN LEARNING ALL THE INSTRUMENTS SIMULTANEOUSLY.

3.1) COMPOSITE PRACTICE OF IMPROVISATION AND INSTRUMENT PLAYING.

This ability can be activated as follows: At first listen for some weeks to nice songs preferably Jazz songs and familiarize with their melodies harmonies and techniques. Start with early jazz which is simpler and utilizes the triads of chords 1-4-5 or 1-2-5 etc.
The preliminary stage of education of the subconscious determines also the speed of creations of emotions and feelings when improvising. It is important that the speed of actual musical improvisation is not faster than the speed of creation and shaping of the emotions and feelings. In different persons it is different speed.

3.2) Besides trying to whistle the melody , it can be tried to whistle a simplicial coutermelody of the melody (see post 289)

Listen them with one only earphone, leaving the other ear open and sing or whistle parallel to the melodies of the song, inspired or stimulated on the occasion of the written and listened song. The whistling improvisation may nevertheless deviate not only from the listened melodies but also from the listened chords and harmony, if the feelings require so. This is an important factor of the improvisation as melodic or harmonic "errors" in whistling a melody most often turn out to be improvements of the melody based on our own memories of nice melodies and inclinations in the feelings. General rules that two parallel melodies fit harmonically together as described in post  128, require only that the number of intervals of 3rd, 4th 5th and 8th are more than 50% compared to intervals of 2nds. In addition alternating with this whistling or singing we may  play on a  desired instrument similar melodies. Depending on the acquired skill on the instrument, the improvisation may be poorer or same rich as the whistling. Furthemore instead of only listening to the song, if opened in a software like  Audacity where its chords can be found and displayed below the waveform, we see also the underlying chords and we learn to associate the whistling or instrument playing of the melodies with the underlying chord progression. We keep doing it not only so as to get pleasure but also to improve improvisation and playing skill on the prefered instruments.

The speed of conducting the improvisation may be increased if while we improvise we pretend that there is a mandarin (fruit) flying a few centimeters above the top of our head and we look and listen and conduct the improvisation from that point in air or aether rather than from our hands or mouth.

3.3) We may also record the whistling in the computer, while we listen in one only earphone and in one ear, the parallel song from the mobile or another computer. This may create an entereily new song and new melody and even different chord progression inspired and stimulated by the initial parallel song.  That is why a more likable way of the whistling melody should not be considred as a "mistake" but as a more likable melody of a new song, inspired from the initial.

4) Start with the best known instrument or easiest instrument that here we  will assume that it is the guitar or ukulele. Play its chords rhythmically and improvise melodically whistling or singing simultaneously. We may also try to whistle a simplicial counter-melody as the song is playing in the computer (See post 289 about the simplicial counter-melody) 

5) Go one with the second best known or easy to play instrument that here we will assume that it is the Celtic harp. Make sure that the Celtic harp (which is a diatonic instrument ) is tuned at the right central diatonic scale of the song Usually Bb, or F , or G , or C etc Play the chord and improvise the melody with the right hand . Alternate chords and melody with the right hand. The melodic improvisation could be very close to the whistling improvisation. Use the left hand for an isocratic  bass line based on simple 2-voices harmony  (usually an interval of 3rd). It could even be the power-5 chord ofthe scale. Or it could be just one note per pentachord or tetrachord at the bass area.

6) Proceed with the next easier instrument that here we will assume it is the  bowed instrument ( 3-strings metric or fretted lyra, see post 264) . Make sure that it is tuned at the right scale (Bb or F etc) and play the triad chords on it improvising melodically   a rather random arpeggio with the bow staying longer in particular ote that are the centers of the melody (simplicial submelody). Try to emulate your improvisational whistling with the bowed melodic improvisation.

7) Go on with the next easiest instrument that we will assume here it is the pan-flute. Chose a pan-flute tuned at this scale (e.g. Bb or F etc) and improvise melodically. Try to emulate your whistling improvisation with the pan-flute.

8) Finally proceed with the single tube wind, which could be an Irish whistle or a quena, or a chalumeau,or a duduk-like wind or a clarinet , saxophone etc. Make sure it is one in the same scale (Bb, F etc) . Try to emulate your whistling improvisation with the pan-flute.

9) Maybe one particular day he did not have time to repeat this process of improvisation for all 5 types of instruments but say only for 2, or 3. Still a next time it will be all 5 types! If he feels comfortable and satisfied with the result, he records the improvisational playing separately each one upon the previous in Audacity to produce a sound file. Elaborate a bit and on the recording and maybe correct some volume, timing or even pitch imperfections. The idea is to be excellent in creativity , learning and enjoyment rather  in formal perfection. Then  publish it in youtube or facebook in a group of well meaning favourable friends, if you feel so, or simple keep it in your databases.

10) The above process 3)- 9) can a ply by not starting with a known song in youtube, but by free improvisation directly from our emotional subconscious, and may use all 5 types of instruments or only some  of them, still all the instruments for the same piece of music. 
If we do not want to start with a known song in youtube, he may start by playing and recording in Audacity a rhythm by a percussion instrument, and then use this as a base.
 The way that an improvisation not based on a played song can be composed is with various methods:

AS IS THE CASE WITH ORGANIZATION STRUCTURES OF VARIOUS ORDERS OF DEPTH LIKE MUSIC AND ITS ORGANIZATION, THE IMPROVISATION CAN BE AT

 THE LOWEST LEVEL: 1) MELODIC ONLY (start with winds, or harp ar guitar , ukulele, with this order see e.g. post 266, 224)

AT A LOW LEVEL : 2) 2-VOICES OR PAIRS OF SIMULTANEOUS NOTES IMPROVISATION , (mainly harp but also guitar, ukulele, E.g. see posts 260 ,82)

AT A MIDDLE LEVEL: 3) CHORDS AND MELODY IMPROVISATION (Harp, or guitar , ukulele, e.g.see post 9 . Of course the closest to happy early Jazz songs is to use triads of major chords and in particular 1-4-5 of the Bb or F major scale, and then extend them possibly with chromatic tonality . See post 263 ).

AND AT A HIGH LEVEL : 4) MORPHOLOGICAL REPETITIONS PATTERNS OF PARTS OF THE PIECE  IMPROVISATION (on any instrument e.g. see post 203, 201)

I believe the most successful order is to start with the chords, and in particular a triad of major chords and in particular 1-4-5 of the Bb or F major scale, and then extend them possibly with chromatic tonality as in  post 263 with minor, diminished and augmented chords but not more than 1/3 of the total time and only if the whistling improvisation suggests it. The next simple idea in improvisational harmony is an harmonic linear progression of major/minor chords by intervals of  4ths. Then improvise fully by singing or whistling melodies on them and pass this whistling gradually to the rest of the instruments. 

The improvisation of each instrument with the chosen order, starting from the rhythm of the percussion instrument, is recorded (e.g. in Audacity) , and the next instruments are played at first live with a background from the speakers or earphones (like karaoke) from the previously recorded instruments, and then are recorded also with the rest of the recorded instruments. The final result as an .mp3 or .wav file is it is liable and satisfying is published a group friends or simply kept in nono-publishing data bases.

If he is lucky he might find some friends and try a group improvisation where he is playing in sequence some of the instruments he is learning or practising.

We remind here why in learning simultaneously many instruments it is by far better the improvisation method than reading a musical score.

THE ADVANTAGES OF IMPROVISING A MELODY VERSUS PLAYING A MELODY

PLAYING THE MELODY

DISADVANTAGES: 1) No sufficient space to interpolate  your own feelings parallel to the melody
                                   2) Rigid stereotypic repetition  , that the slightest deviation will cause the                                                feeling of an "error" or "bad sound". This will create fear and will "slauter" the "wings" to add your own "signature" to the melody. It will stop  also and suppress the ability to compose your own melodies.

ADVANTAGES: 1) You do not have to involve much of your emotions and creativity , after learning it it seems easier to repeat it each time and if the melody is played correctly it is expected by the audience to to appreciate it.


IMPROVISING THE MELODY:

ADVANTAGES:1) Plenty of free  space to interpolate  your own feelings parallel to the melody
                                   2) No rigid stereotypic repetition , each time played it is somehow different . The randomness of the decorative notes of the improvisation allows for searching the appropriate melodic center that corresponds to the intended emotion or for gradual correcting till the melodic center of the original melody is found  (in the scale stepwise glissando as default movements) This will create an euphoria of abundance of creativity and will multiply the ability to compose your own melodies in later times.

DISADVANTAGES: 1) It requires listening to your own mood (or the mood of the  audience) when improvising the  melody, and there is always the risk that the current version of the improvisation of the melody is not good enough compared maybe to previous improvisations or that the audience will not appreciate it enough as you appreciate it when your are improvising it.



IN OVER ALL IT IS OBVIOUS THAT IMPROVISING A MELODY IS BY FAR MORE ADVANTAGEOUS THAN JUST PLAYING THE MELODY.

Here is a summary of an improvisation method by the simplicial counter-melody of a song as in post 289.

A practice that would implement the above in  easier way is 

1) Download the song as an mp3 file , then open it in Audacity, and utilize its function of finding the chords.  

2) We look at the chord progression and try to identify the main  diatonic scale , from which it may deviate chtomatically. 

3) Then we choose the appropriate instrument that may diatonic at this scale or even chromatic. It may be a wind instrument like harmonica, flute, clariphone sax etc or it may be a bowed instrument like violin , metric-lyra celo-lyra (see post 264) or other stings instruments like cuatro, guitar, bouzouki, mandolin, mandola, etc. 

4) At first we whistle the simplicial counter-melody while the song is  playing.

5) Then we repeat the whistling simplicial counter-melody with the chosen instrument

6) If we are multi-intrument player, we rotate the instruments from the easiest to the more demanding (e.g. harmonica, then celtic harp, then chinese panflute, then marked scale cuatro, then fretted-lyra , then straight flute,  then clariphone or sax etc)  playing similar simplicial counter-melodies for this song. If we do that we try to identify ourself  the with the simplicial counter-melody and consider that we actually we laer a simplicial counter-melody for thsi song rtaher than that we learn  the particular instrument that we play).

SIMPLISTIC IDEAS THAT ENCOURAGE IN IMPROVISATION IN MELODIES AND HARMONY.

(See also post 263 . 270 and  83. A SCALE OF CHORDS ORIENTED IMPROVISATION METHOD VERSUS SCALE OF NOTES OR CHORDS OF A SCALE.)


In order to improvise one has to be daring and under the flow of a kind of joy.

The educational system of classical music which is based on reading scores is not appropriate for creating improvisation abilities.

1)  THE BIOWARE WITH  SUBCONSCIOUS SINGING ABILITIES IS THE BEST "INSTRUMENT" AND STARTING ABILITY. he most important and also simple idea in melodic improvisation, is that the improvisation must be created at first or at least as well (but usually better than what in an musical instrument) in singing or whistling which will dominate the instrument playing even if later no singing or whistling is heard.
The living bioware is always a better musical instruments than a rigid hardware musical instrument or even digital musical instrument.

 The central idea is of course that the versatility of improvising on  many musical instruments is based on the ability to internalize and perceive mentally and emotionally the musical sound  and improvise rather than the ability of concentrating separately to technical skill of geometric patterns of playing for each particular instrument And one of the simplest ways to perceive musically harmonically , melodically and chromatically,  all the universe of the 12-notes is the chromatic tonality (as in post 263) (see post 258 that improvisation is at least at 2/3rds an internal feelings and intellect meditation process rather independent from the musical instrument played! The 2/3ds are of course the mental perception of the musical sound and the feelings-emotional  perception of the musical sound, and not the geometric instruments pattern of the musical playing! And one of the simplest ways to perceive musically all the universe of the 12-notes is the chromatic tonality (as in post 263) ).

2) CONVERGENT SEQUENCES OF NOTES TO MELODIC CENTERS: It helps a lot for the improvisation of melodies to have the idea of STEPWISE GLISSANDO in the sense of scanning all notes in pitch linear order sequence of the scale that the instrument is tuned, so as to find the one that you will stay longer (melodic center as note of the simplicial sub-melody) or even correct to the melodic center if the melody is somehow already known. Instruments like piano, Celtic harp, or diatonic pan-flute are very helpful in this. The guitar or other string instruments with fingerboard (fiddle) or fretboard with the usual tunings are not much helpful in this but they are helpful in chromatic stepwise glissando. Exception is  the 3-strings fretboards with tuning open major chord (e.g, Panduri, Bouzouki, Lyra see posts 252, 254 , 264) that there is the same easiness: The 2nd and 3rd voice of the melody can be played in the 3 strings and the melody of 1-2 octaves most often can be played in  one only of the 3 strings! While in classical music's melodies the central entity is the melodic theme  in improvisational music melodies the central concepts seem to be "convergent sequence of notes to a melodic center or note o t he simplicial sub-melody"  Of Course the melodic center or note of the simplicial melody is a note sounding much more time that the neighboring notes. 

3)THREE  TYPES OF VARIATIONS: TRANSLATION, INVERSION EXPANSION. A 2nd simple idea in melody improvisation is that of the 3 types of variation: 1) translation b) inversion 3) contraction/expansion. The translation is to repeat the same melodic theme lower or higher in the scale. once or many times. This may involve deforming the exact intervals of the theme, but it creates a sense of repetition and at the same time of changes. The inversion is to make the ascending melodic theme descending but same pattern theme and vice versa. Again this may involve distorting the theme. The inversion makes the sad happy and vice-versa. Finally the expansion/contraction is the idea that chromatic intervals (2nds of 1 or 2 semitones) will create a kind of chromatic dissonance and tension, the melodic intervals (3rds major or minor) will create a sense of melodic feeling, and larger harmonic intervals of 4th, 5th of 8th a feeling of harmony. The simple idea is to wave sadness and joy or serenity and anxiety by waving from short size intervals to larger type of intervals and vice-versa. The guitar or other string instruments with fingerboard (fiddle) or fretboard  are helpful in this idea . 

4) HARMONIC CYCLES For the harmony and in improvising at the level of chord progressions, the corresponding idea is a linear order of chords (major/minor) in sequential harmonic relation ,in other words that their roots are consecutive notes in the cycle by intervals of 4th. Given a melody in a diatonic scale  or in chromatic tonality of a diatonic scale,  when improvising almost randomly with chords, there is also a similar idea of stepwise glissando by chords either in diatonic pitch linear order of the roots or in the harmonic progression of their roots by 4ths ,which latter is quite faster than the diatonic stepwise glissando, especially when we are searching for the major chord (or minor chord) among the 3 in a diatonic scale that fits the current state of the melody. Once the right root or middle of the chord is found we  tweak to major or minor (sometimes diminished or augmented) till it fits well to the melody. 

Other simple ideas to compose chord progressions involve the harmonic triad of major chords in a diatonic scale 1-4-5 and also the chords of a diatonic scale as enhanced by chromatic tonality (see post 263)   Other simple ideas involve  triads of harmonic pairs of chords in various relations like chromatic , melodic harmonic.