learnlicks.com

[edski]

http://www.learnlicks.com/

A friend of mine set up this very cool, free educational video site for musicians - from beginners to seasoned pros. It is a searchable collection of videos highlighting guitar, bass and drum licks (with more instruments coming soon) with focus on instruction. Its all free - and contributers are welcome (free registration is required). If you have a webcam or video camera and want to share what you know, this is the place to do it. Enjoy!

note: Flash plug-in is required to watch the videos and contribute your own videos.

Edited January 4, 2007 by edski

[Chuck Nessa]

Death of music.

[Spontooneous]

Where's Learnnottoplaylicks.com?

[Rooster_Ties]

Where's Learnnottoplaylicks.com?

[Alexander Hawkins]

Death of music.

At least it'll be easier for all those repertory musicians to get their college degrees now. -_-

[JSngry]

Death of music.

Or just the inevitable end of a centuries long cycle?

[Alexander Hawkins]

Death of music.

Or just the inevitable end of a centuries long cycle?

In what sense?

[JSngry]

Of seeing music as being something that's made by using a set of codified "tools", including theory, notation, and written compositions meant to be re-played. All of these things are geared at least as much towards standardized replication of one kind/thing or another as they are to spontaneous creation of the spirit.

Which is not to say that they haven't been without use. Obviously they have. But eventually, the tools too often have become an end to themselves. And things like those mentioned in the opening post are the inevitable result. After all, what are they if not just another set of "tools" meant to facilitate replication?

"End" of a cycle might not be the best way to put it. "Inevitable next step" in that cycle might be better. Goes to do more with mindset than anything else.

But I will say this - when "real musicians" stop making "real music", it might be time to see what the "non-musicians" can come/are coming up with. Because the spirit of "real music" doesn't give a damn who it channels through. It doesn't look at resumes and pedigrees. It just goes where it wants to go. And it won't ever die.

[JSngry]

I suppose it's also worth pondering how the various means of "performance preservation", from notation to recording have altered/evolved the need/motivation for "replication". To be blunt about it, if we have recordings of Charlie Parker, what is the "need" for playing bebop in 2006? Sure, there's any number of cases to be made, but I think they essentially all come down to "preservation" instead of "real time informational transfer" a lot more than they would if there had been no recordings.

Which is almost comically ironic, becuase what you're then trying to "preserve" is something that most of us now (or soon will) only know in "preserved" form! We have the original in as best a form as can be had.

And let's go back to, say, Bach & notation. If history is to be believed, improvisation was highly valued in Bach's time. But what's survived? The notation, the idea and means of replication. You can buy that shit damn near anywhere, right? Bach in a book, Bach on a record, Bock on an iPod. hey, if you want it, you got it. And if you want to learn how to play it, what do you do? You buy the notation, which is in itself a replication, and learn to replicate it further. Or you learn to program it. Either way...

What is learnlicks.com? A repository of replications made available for further replication. Other than it not being Bach or Bird or somebody like that, I say it's the cycle continuing. Look elsewhere for "real music", no matter where else the "elsewhere" might end up being.

Edited January 5, 2007 by JSngry

[JSngry]

otoh. something like learnlicks.com could be viewed as just an extension of the "community of musicians", a place where players get together and trade/explore ideas in an unfettered environment. Kind of like a cyber-Minton's. Why not? That's the way most of the world is now - connected and global.

What it "is" will be entirely dependent on who's "there" and what they do with it. In that regard, no change at all.

[CJ Shearn]

a "jazz fill" inspired by Neil Peart. http://learnlicks.com/watchVideo.cfm?lickID=195 uh, Neil Peart and jazz? the guy can't swing in the traditional way to save his life! great rock drummer and technician, yes, great jazz drummer? no.

[Alexander Hawkins]

I suppose it's also worth pondering how the various means of "performance preservation", from notation to recording have altered/evolved the need/motivation for "replication". To be blunt about it, if we have recordings of Charlie Parker, what is the "need" for playing bebop in 2006? Sure, there's any number of cases to be made, but I think they essentially all come down to "preservation" instead of "real time informational transfer" a lot more than they would if there had been no recordings.

Which is almost comically ironic, becuase what you're then trying to "preserve" is something that most of us now (or soon will) only know in "preserved" form! We have the original in as best a form as can be had.

And let's go back to, say, Bach & notation. If history is to be believed, improvisation was highly valued in Bach's time. But what's survived? The notation, the idea and means of replication. You can buy that shit damn near anywhere, right? Bach in a book, Bach on a record, Bock on an iPod. hey, if you want it, you got it. And if you want to learn how to play it, what do you do? You buy the notation, which is in itself a replication, and learn to replicate it further. Or you learn to program it. Either way...

What is learnlicks.com? A repository of replications made available for further replication. Other than it not being Bach or Bird or somebody like that, I say it's the cycle continuing. Look elsewhere for "real music", no matter where else the "elsewhere" might end up being.

Completely agree with this sentiment. I guess I was puzzled by your initial (more cryptic!) response because I naively choose to focus on the musicans IMHO who don't succumb to this type of repertory nonsense.

[Alexander Hawkins]

otoh. something like learnlicks.com could be viewed as just an extension of the "community of musicians", a place where players get together and trade/explore ideas in an unfettered environment. Kind of like a cyber-Minton's. Why not? That's the way most of the world is now - connected and global.

Perhaps...but I guess the important thing about an interactive, 'real' environment such as the jam session is that one learns the context etc. for learned techniques, whereas in (cyber-)isolation/the isolation of the music college, there's the increased danger of painting by numbers.

[JSngry]

otoh. something like learnlicks.com could be viewed as just an extension of the "community of musicians", a place where players get together and trade/explore ideas in an unfettered environment. Kind of like a cyber-Minton's. Why not? That's the way most of the world is now - connected and global.

Perhaps...but I guess the important thing about an interactive, 'real' environment such as the jam session is that one learns the context etc. for learned techniques, whereas in (cyber-)isolation/the isolation of the music college, there's the increased danger of painting by numbers.

I'd not count on cyber-isolation staying "isolated" into perpetuity, even though I (and possibly you) may not live long enough to see it become all it can be. Between virtual reality & teleconferencing technologies and the evolutions/progresses/whatevers/etcs. they're bound to make, who knows what can happen?

And as for music college, well, GIGO, and all that. Harsh, perhaps, but ultimately true.

[Alexander Hawkins]

You're going to have to help me out with GIGO, I afraid...

[Alexander Hawkins]

Hang on...isn't google great (he says, late to the party). Garbage in, garbage out, right?

Also agree on your point about isolation. Interaction is, after all, already occurring in fields such as smart improvising programmes (thinking of George Lewis' stuff, etc.)

[JSngry]

I guess I was puzzled by your initial (more cryptic!) response...

Didn't mean it to be cryptic. Sorry.

But just think about it - notation, theory, composition, those are all "tools" geared towards steering the creative impulse into a certain "means of expression". Doesn't mean it's "bad" or anything. but why do you need theory except as a reference point as to how things are "supposed" to sound? Why do you need notation except as a means to ensure that a certain idea gets reproduced past the moment of inspiration? Why do you need composition except as a means to create an structure of order and then preserve it? (And why preserve it? Plenty of answers to that one, some benign, some not).

Again, those are all useful tools. But tools they nevertheless are. And tools are used to build. And where there's building, eventually there's zoning. And when there's zoning, the nature/impulse of the building process can't help but change, especially as the years pass and things get old and crowded. You're not building for the sake/joy of building anymore, you're looking to build something that will pass spec. And damn do those tools come in handy for that! So handy that you can buy hammers and shit at freakin' grocery stores and 7-11s now.

It's taken centuries for us to get to this point, but here we are. It's inevitable, and it's nothing to get freaked about, I don't think. As one cycle ends, another begins, and the overlap will probably be a lengthy one, and may never completely disappear. But it's probably time to consider the notion that the old buildings are going to crumble and fall, and that maybe people aren't going to want or need buildings anymore. Or if they do, not the same type buidings with the same functions as the old ones. Sense of place is by no means a fixed quantity, doncha' know, and what are buildings except firm declarations of fixed space?

That's probably cryptic too, and again, sorry 'bout that. But think about it anyways, ok?

[JSngry]

Garbage in, garbage out, right?

[Alexander Hawkins]

I guess I was puzzled by your initial (more cryptic!) response...

Didn't mean it to be cryptic. Sorry.

But just think about it - notation, theory, composition, those are all "tools" geared towards steering the creative impulse into a certain "means of expression". Doesn't mean it's "bad" or anything. but why do you need theory except as a reference point as to how things are "supposed" to sound? Why do you need notation except as a means to ensure that a certain idea gets reproduced past the moment of inspiration? Why do you need composition except as a means to create an structure of order and then preserve it? (And why preserve it? Plenty of answers to that one, some benign, some not).

Again, those are all useful tools. But tools they nevertheless are. And tools are used to build. And where there's building, eventually there's zoning. And when there's zoning, the nature/impulse of the building process can't help but change, especially as the years pass and things get old and crowded. You're not building for the sake/joy of building anymore, you're looking to build something that will pass spec. And damn do those tools come in handy for that! So handy that you can buy hammers and shit at freakin' grocery stores and 7-11s now.

It's taken centuries for us to get to this point, but here we are. It's inevitable, and it's nothing to get freaked about, I don't think. As one cycle ends, another begins, and the overlap will probably be a lengthy one, and may never completely disappear. But it's probably time to consider the notion that the old buildings are going to crumble and fall, and that maybe people aren't going to want or need buildings anymore. Or if they do, not the same type buidings with the same functions as the old ones. Sense of place is by no means a fixed quantity, doncha' know, and what are buildings except firm declarations of fixed space?

That's probably cryptic too, and again, sorry 'bout that. But think about it anyways, ok?

Didn't mean cryptic to sound critical...however, it <i>was<i> tantalising!

Again, agree with much of what you've said here!

Edited January 5, 2007 by Red