questions about playing with other instruments together

Poststructural Pub
1

not trad related but about music (so also about trad)

as i posted in my music community net already
there are some questions i have, but no answeres to it

Its about playing together with other instruments/musicians.
For example i want to play backgrounds for my whistling on the guitar.
I know to whistle a bit, i know to play guitar a bit.
BUT What have i to know, or consider, or learn, if i want to play them both together (not at the same time :wink: , one by one, record them and mix the recordings to one piece, later)

Maybe both has to be in the same, key, or pitch, or maybe better not? …
surely “what sounds good, is good”, but there surely are some things to consider, arent there?

What do i have to learn? Theory of harmony, composing,… i dont know.
Does one of you know?

Let me tell you one more example
I know to play “norwegian wood” on my guitar , not just the rhythm, also the melody
and right now, i am learning to play the melody on the melodica.
But the melody of the version i play on my guitar goes “a,b,a,g,f,…'”
the melody of the version i play on my melodica goes "“b,c#,b,a,g#,…”
Do they fit together? do i have to change one?

Should i play on the guitar, instead of rhythm and melody, only the rhythm, if i want to play the melody with another instrument?
Or should i just solo with the melodica,… i havent tryd anything nyet because i dont want to spent a lot of time going the wrong way …
So, does one of you have experiance in playing together with other instruments?
Do You know what theory i have to learn?

2

Wow, Andreas! But that is one BIG question.

You definitely need a little music theory to get you going. For instance, it’s useful to know that if the tune on one instrument goes a b a g f# then you can’t play the same tune a whole tone up alongside as b c# b a g#. I can’t think of a single genre of music where that would sound right. Essentially, it’s not a great idea to play the same tune alongside itself in any other way that using the same notes or an octave or two apart. But exact octaves; nothing in between.

But you won’t get a list of the rules that you need from a forum thread. It’s much too massive a subject. I’m wracking my brains to think of something that might be useful to you, in the short term. I think, if I were you, I would get a very basic music theory book, or online tutor, and learn something about guitar chords and how they fit in with melodies. Learn to be able to tell what key a melody is in, and therefore what chords are likely to fit somewhere in it.

But supplement all of that with lots of listening and using your ears to try to identify things that you’re reading about in your theory reading.

I’m sorry if this isn’t hugely helpful immediately - I’ll try and find a link that might help, but maybe a bit later.

[Edited to add] … thinking about it, it might be better for someone else to recommend a basic music theory guide, as all I would be doing is Googling for one, which anybody could do. I won’t have used any of the ones that I might find, since my music theory days are long behind me. So I wouldn’t be able to recommend one.

3

Both absolutely have to be in the same key.
This is, of course, confusing if you are dealing with “transposing” instruments like the clarinet, but the idea is still to have the absolute key of both instruments be the same. Otherwise it will not sound right.

The way you present this example, it sounds like you are playing the melodica one step higher than the guitar. The easy solution is to put a capo on the second fret of your guitar. Then you can use the same fingering on the guitar but the guitar’s pitch will be raised one step. You will be fingering “a,b,a,g,f#” (relative to the capo) but the pitches coming from the guitar will be “b,c#,b,a,g#”.
You need to use the capo even if you are only playing the chords on the guitar under the melodica. The chord positions you are playing on the guitar are (I assume) D and C in the verse, which the notes “a,b,a,g,f#” go with fine. But the melodica’s notes (b,c#,b,a,g#) go with the chords E and D in those places. If you put a capo on fret 2, the D shape sounds like an E chord, and the C shape sounds like a D chord. That’s the magic of the capo.

There are several free sites that teach beginning music theory. A passing familiarity with harmonic structure would be helpful. Some experimenting with a capo is very handy in my experience, it’s easy to get a feel for key changes when all you have to do is move the capo (one fret = one half step of change).
http://www.musictheory.net/

4

Ravel, Gaspard de la Nuit, Scarbo… twenty bars of consecutive major seconds?
Bartok, Concerto for Orchestra, Giuoco delle coppie… the muted trumpets?

(Sorry, Andreas, not much use to you but Ben needs this!)

:stuck_out_tongue:

5

Well, Ravel was deliberately awkward, wasn’t he? :imp:

… and as for Bartok …

6

Heehee!

7

well the answeres ARE usefull
more or less they say what i tought

  • i need music theory
  • the instruments (keys) have to fit (there are exceptions but thats another story)

yes i am learning music theory already but am not far yet, i am a slow learner and my questions or whishes are a bit advanced i gues :frowning:

anyway, should i just follow my musictheory study or is there a specific topic i should look for first?

8

Just listened to Scarbo. This one. Beautiful stuff.

I see what you mean about that passage. Is that really 20 bars long? Bloody short bars!

I would dispute that it’s really a melody played in consecutive major seconds. To me, it’s more like an effect, used as a bridge passage, and which is born out of an accompaniment motif. I may have missed something, but it doesn’t seem to constitute a theme or a melody per se.

I’m too tired to go listen to the Bartok. Mind, I always am. :wink:

9

http://conquest.imslp.info/files/imglnks/usimg/e/e0/IMSLP03178-Ravel-Gaspard.Durand.pdf

(2.56MB download, pp31–2)

I would dispute that it’s really a melody played in consecutive major seconds. To me, it’s more like an effect, used as a bridge passage, and which is born out of an accompaniment motif. I may have missed something, but it doesn’t seem to constitute a theme or a melody per se.

Doesn’t really matter what it is, Ben… just a bit of fun (and you’d struggle to dispute the Bartok)! :slight_smile:

Now, if only I could say something useful to Andreas when I teach this stuff. But afraid you’ve broached a subject of cosmic proportions and there’s no quick or easy answer to any of it. For major/minor ‘classical’ style harmonisation you might start by learning about chords I, IV, V (the old ‘three chord trick’) before adding II, VI etc. But for trad (with its more frequently modal basis) you might need completely different chord sets, and good, idiomatic trad guitar’s likely to be using all kinds of ‘non-standard’ shapes, which may in turn (but don’t have to) involve alternative tunings and/or drone effects, even where the chords might otherwise fit a more ‘classical’ model.

So how long is a piece of string?

:boggle:

10

I would like to do this too but I’m not about to learn the technology to hear a whole band of mutepointes. Besides, my friends refer to this as “playing with myself.”

11

http://www.musictheory.net/


This is a free website. For you to train in Music Theory.
And even ear training.

12

Just discovered two diminished fourths (Cx to F#) and a minor third (G# to B) lurking in there, but what’s three ‘rogue’ intervals among 120? The third’s the last of the passage, so doesn’t count, but wonder why he broke the pattern for the fourths? (Presumably not for fingering, because it doesn’t seem any harder maintaining the seconds!)

But Scarbo’s not supposed to be ‘beautiful’!

:astonished:

13

Music Theory is like engineering in a way. You can get all the theory you want but none of it does you much good without application. But in engineering you get a lot of theory before you do anything practical. In music, you do a lot of practical work to get ready for the theoretical:
Generally the path of study is to first play music a lot before you even start to study the theory. 12 year old kids play many instruments together in school bands without any theory and eventually some of them absorb enough of the theoretical ideas that they have a good start when they try to learn music theory.

So the real answer to many of your questions is “try it, and your ears will be your teacher”.
For example:

You are asking if you can play an A note on the guitar and have it sound like a B note on the melodica?
The easy answer is “try it”! Do they sound the same? There’s the answer.
In many cases it would take a lot of study to get to the same conclusion as one minute trying it out yourself.

14

Tough. I think it is. :smiley:

15



Hello Andreas,

I am also learning more about music and this music theory site is exceelent :smiley:

16

Bartok string quartets - beyond words, just listen…


of course they might not be ‘your cup of tea’

17

I just find Bartok really heavy. Like a too solid meal that sits like a rock in the stomach.

18

Well, yes, they are my cup of tea in fact. I would agree, beyond words.

Feadoggie

19

Ok. Fair play, I’ll try 'em next time I get a chance.