Archive for the ‘Learning By Ear’ Category

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Another Murphy Method Revelation

Wednesday, November 24th, 2010

This post comes from a Murphy Method student in Arizona, Dave Eisenhuth.

I am sure your have a library full of e-mails from frustrated students at different levels of instruction, however I wanted to share this with you. As my instructor you may appreciate it.  I do not know if it was divine intervention, the Murphy Mojo or something else, but I thought I would share.

Last week, I waited with baited breath as the next journey in the Murphy Method was about to begin.  I had burned through Beginning Banjo Vol. 1 so I went ahead and ordered Vol 2, Misfits, and Vamping dvd’s and the Christmas DVD from Casey.  They arrived and I jumped right in.  After following your banjo track I decided that Sunday was to be dedicated to Misfits and Vamping.  I awoke early on Sunday morning and after mass, I came home, greeted the morning, and jumped right in.  After my usual warm up exercises going through all the songs from Vol. 1 I hit the Misfits and had a very good session of learning.  Feeling confident (where the fun began) I tore open the Vamping DVD and began, what would become a very frustrating day and evening.

After about 4 hrs and a break for lunch, I began to realize that #1 my fingers were not cooperating with my brain and not only was I having trouble with the chords, but also listening and hearing the chord changes.  That brings us to around 7:00 pm Sunday night and a constant spiral into bad playing.  Now I could not even play anything without major mistakes.  I should have packed the banjo away and left it for another day, however being a stubborn mule of a man I pressed on.  The constant thought in my head was, I am a college graduate with an advance degree, I am an insurance and financial business owner by trade, this can not be that difficult.  Well the Banjo Gods did not agree and the systematic failure in my playing continued. Around 8:30pm I had finally had enough and after many expletives and adjectives I  half jokingly told my wife I was going to take the truck out for a drive and  return the Banjo to the Gods since apparently a Yankee born and raised in Tucson, AZ  is not meant to play the banjo.

I packed the banjo in the truck with the full intention to either bury it in the desert or to see how well a banjo could fly as it was tossed out of a truck at 70 miles an hour.

We live north of Tucson near the base of the Catalina Mountains and I decided to head off and clear my head and say goodbye to my banjo with a quick and painless assassination of my newly found foe.  It was a full moon and the saguaros and mountains were literally stunning.  My wife had recently purchased me XM satellite radio and I just happened to come across a station called Bluegrass Junction. I figured I could not play, but at least I could enjoy the music as I drifted along the highway.

What happened next, I still cannot wrap my head around, and since I am not a drinker, nor a partaker of the herbal cigarettes (at least since college), but over the next 1/2 hour I began to hear all the licks in the songs that were being played and the vamping and the chord changes. Thinking that I had or was about to lose my mind I pulled over at a small turn out and realized I had been driving for about an hour and was well on my way into the mountains.  As I sat there for the next 25 minutes, it was if the songs themselves were trying to teach me something and the clarity of the licks, chord changes and vamping were amazing.

Then the epiphany happened. In 40 degree weather under a full moon I broke out a camp chair and camp light I had in the truck and took out my banjo and tried to follow along.  Amazingly I was able to vamp and my fingers were working making the chords, I could make the chord changes with the song and at least could recognize some of the licks begin played on the radio, although I could not play the lead, I could at least hear the chord changes and vamp along somewhat with a limp.

At this point, I again was happy and my banjo was safe from destruction.  I was so happy sitting there under the stars playing with the radio blasting,  I guess I did not realize that standing behind me was and Arizona Highway Patrolman.  After a near heart attack he simply stated that he had been driving southbound and noticed someone at a turn out with a camp light playing a banjo.  An oddity in Arizona to say the least.  I explained the entire day that lead up to this and we both had a good laugh and as it turns out he was a bluegrass fan and had dabbled in the guitar.  I told him of your teaching method and he said he would check it out.

I guess the moral to all this is in my mind is, Don’t over practice to the point of exhaustion, Never give up, and most importantly your teaching method, although not always apparent immediately is actually re-programming you brain and ear to hear things the average player may not.

In the week since my ability has increased substantially from that night and my only complaint now is that when I listen to the songs it is hard to enjoy them because I am listening for chord changes, vamping and licks.  Instead of just enjoying the song.  For now I will take that trade off.

As to your method, based on that experience, is truly groundbreaking, or I am losing my mind LOL.  Either way I want to Thank You, Casey, Red and the rest of the Murphy Method Misfits and Monkeys for your teachings and instructions and looking forward in continuing my Banjo journey with you lessons and camps

Happy Thanksgiving to you all

A Very Happy and Devoted Student of the Murphy Method!

Posted in banjo, Learning By Ear | 3 Comments »

Student Testimonial

Monday, November 8th, 2010

Casey Henry

One of our long-time mail order students, Bill Breen, received a question from a fellow member of Banjo Hangout asking whether he had used The Murphy Method to learn to play. In response Bill wrote a nice long email about how and why the method worked for him. He said that we could share it here, so, even though it’s a little like preaching to the choir, here is his excellent testimonial:

Yes, indeed, Murphy Henry IS my banjo hero. She was able to teach me to play banjo using her “Murphy Method” when all other methods and books I tried failed me. I know there have been a number of threads on the BHO wherein some members claim her method doesn’t teach by ear. I am living proof that she DOES teach by ear. I am grateful to her for that, because I can sit down and come up with a break for a song without resorting to “tabbing it out.”

Her method initially involves learning songs by rote, but then one progresses to recognizing “licks” from songs previously taught by her from HEARING them. Once the student recognizes the sounds, they can apply their previously learned licks to new tunes.

Back when I was learning from her, her lessons were only available on audio cassette tapes. This, too, is further evidence that one is learning by ear. Yes, she did tell me on the tapes, ‘put this finger on this string at this fret and pluck it with this finger of the right hand.’ A student HAS to begin learning that way. As they learn, they also hear, remember the sound, and apply it in future lessons. Like building a brick wall, it’s accomplished with building blocks: a foundation first. :^)

Sorry for being so long winded. But I felt it important to answer your question while responding to what I believe are some inaccurate criticisms of her teaching method. Now that her lessons are on DVD, the learning process is now even easier. :^D

I know different teaching methods work better for different people: some folks learn better with tab. I could not, so her way of teaching was absolutely PERFECT for me. As a result, I am comfortable playing in jams, performing breaks to songs I’ve never played before. That, to me, is what enjoying music is all about.

Yep, Murphy Henry is my banjo hero!

Thanks, Bill, for the glowing recommendation. We always love to hear student success stories. Happy picking!

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Posted in By Casey, General, Learning By Ear | 2 Comments »

New tunes, okay. How about your old tunes?

Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010

Red Henry

When you’re learning to play, or even after you’ve been playing for a long time, there’s a natural tendency to play your newest tunes. After all, they’re new and much more exciting than your OLD ones. But you can get bored if you only play the tunes you learned most recently, and your musical skills can suffer.

When you’re practicing, or even when you’re picking with other folks, remember to play your old tunes too. This does several good things. Among them: (1) You keep your fingers playing a wider variety of licks and melodies. (2) Your friends will enjoy the variety when you dig up a tune from the past. (3) You have the pleasure of re-discovering a great tune or song you’d almost forgotten.

But one of the best things about picking your old tunes, is that it keeps your brain working. If you play just half a dozen or so songs all the time, it’s easy to get into a musical rut and stay there for years. Instead, consciously go back and find tunes and songs you used to play. Keep learning new tunes too. Go through our Slow Jam DVDs and remember some songs you used to like. Your brain will like it, and your picking friends will thank you for it!

Red

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Posted in By Red, General, jamming, Learning By Ear, Practice | 1 Comment »

Enthusiasm

Wednesday, October 27th, 2010

Casey Henry

I started a student about three months ago, an older fellow who had been playing from tab for several years. He knew the basics but when I asked him to play me a tune (I needed to see what he already knew so I would know where to start) it turned out that he couldn’t play a single tune without the tab in front of him. My heart aches when I see a case like this and I wish he had found me sooner. He just wanted to be able to play but was shackled to the page.

We started out with “Banjo in the Hollow,” taking it in very tiny pieces, since he had never tried learning by ear before. I explained that when he went home from his lesson, and went to sleep that night, when he woke up the next day what he had learned wouldn’t be in his brain anymore. And that that was normal! That’s what’s supposed to happen. I told him to go back to the cassette and learn it again. The same thing would happen the next day, I continued, but when he went to re-learn it (for the third time now) it would come more quickly. Eventually, by the fourth or fifth day it would stick and would be in his brain for good.

When he came back the next week he had learned the part of the song that I’d given him perfectly! And he said that, indeed, it had happened exactly like I said it would. He forgot everything two or three times, and then it started to stick. “Banjo in the Hollow” took four or five lessons, and then we went straight to “Foggy Mountain Breakdown.” That’s quite a jump, but he had already learned tab versions of “Cripple Creek” and “Boil Them Cabbage Down” and the other tunes I generally do in between. Since it’s a hundred times harder to re-learn something, I decided to go with completely new material, even if it was a bit harder technically. We’ve taken a couple months on FMB, but darn if he hasn’t got it down!

As he was packing up his banjo after his lesson last week he told me that he hasn’t been able to put his banjo down. He said it sounded silly to say, and maybe I couldn’t tell, but he just plays all the time! I told him that it wasn’t silly, it was awesome! And I absolutely could tell, that that was the reason he’s doing so well at FMB. It does my heart good to see someone so excited about what they’re learning! I can’t wait until he has another couple songs under his belt so I can get him together with some other students for a little jam. Just think how excited he’ll be then!

Posted in banjo, By Casey, Learning By Ear, lessons | 5 Comments »

Listen My Children And You Shall Hear….

Thursday, October 7th, 2010

Murphy Henry

The poem “Paul Revere’s Ride” has always been one of my favorites (we had to memorize the whole thing in seventh grade) and after I finished writing this blog, I thought the first line would make a perfect title.

I know Red has blogged recently about the four beats of E minor versus the six beats of E major in “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” and how satisfying it was to have all the members of that pick-up band making the same choice in the same moment (six beats of E major). Been there, done that (the first time with Red on guitar) and it is truly an awesome feeling. I almost fell off the stage!

Well, at the gig we played Saturday, with a different pick-up band (Red, me, Steve Spence on bass, and Scott Brannon on guitar), I was pleased to see Steve and Scott (both veteran musicians) do the exact opposite. Perhaps this bears a modicum of explanation.

This party, which we’ve played for years, was just down the road about a mile or two at the home of my banjo student Robbie. It was a perfect playing situation: indoors, seated, no P.A. (There was also great food!) Robbie, a senior in high school, is a talented musician who has been taking lessons off and on for maybe a year, less a few months that we lost for some reason or other. He’s recently come back and we’ve been working hard on vamping The Big Four (Banjo in the Hollow, Cripple Creek, Cumberland Gap, and Foggy Mountain Breakdown) so that he could play them at the party.

And play them he did (straight through several times, no vamping) while we backed him up and he did a fine job, despite the fact that he kept stopping and loudly proclaiming, “I can’t do this!” Well, I had my banjo out and every time he’d quit, I’d step in and keep the tune going, and eventually he’d clamber back on board. It is a testimony to his musicianship that he was able to get back in at the right spot every time.

Anyhow, when Robbie started playing “Foggy Mountain Breakdown,” Steve and Scott, being well versed in all things Flatt and Scruggs, were playing the six beats of E major, just like the Foggy Mountain Boys. But, you know, it just didn’t sound right probably because I was vamping four beats of E minor and Robbie was playing much slower than Earl. So, bless their hearts, they were listening to what was going on and without me saying a word they eventually changed what they were playing to match what I was doing. And then things sounded right—we were together. Nobody was hammering those six beats of E major just because “Earl done it that way.” When you’re playing music together, as one of today’s modern country songs says, you’ve gotta  “roll with it” and make adjustments when necessary because the operative word is together.

Or as Susan Morrison said, when she and Zac were practicing for their nursing home gig and she missed an entrance, leaving them both vamping, “So, I should have listened?” My reply? “That would be a great big yes!”

As we keep telling you, it’s not enough to do your little part, you have to listen, my children, and you will hear…what everybody else is doing and then you’ll be able to make your playing fit in better with theirs. Now back to the poem…

He said to his friends, If the British march

By land or sea from the town tonight

Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch

Of the old North Church as a signal light.

One if by land, two if by sea

And I on the opposite shore will be

Ready to ride and spread the alarm

To every Middlesex village and farm

For the country folk to be up and to arm.

Done without Google! I could go on but I will spare you!

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Posted in banjo, By Murphy, jamming, Learning By Ear | 2 Comments »

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My…

Tuesday, September 14th, 2010

Red Henry

You know, there are some things in early bluegrass recordings that are impossible to beat. One of our favorites is on Flatt and Scruggs’s early version of Foggy Mountain Breakdown, where the whole band (except for Earl) is playing the “wrong” chord.

Let’s review the chords in FMB: you start out with eight beats of G, and then you go to an E chord for a certain number of beats. Nowadays, most folks change to an E-minor chord for four beats, to match what the banjo is playing. That’s how Murphy teaches it, because it’s what almost everybody plays now. But on that old Flatt & Scruggs record, the band plays SIX beats of E-MAJOR! It’s a wild and woolly sound. It’s incredible. It’s a hair-raising moment. It’s lions and tigers and bears…

Murphy and I have played FMB with that 6-beat E-major chord for over 30 years. The first time we played FMB that way was at Diamond Jim’s, a bar in Gainesville Florida. When we heard how the E-major sounded, we both about fell off the stage. Oh, my.

Not many other people play Foggy Mountain Breakdown that way. However, Christopher and I found a couple of people who do, when we were playing for a party in Baltimore last Saturday night. I was playing mandolin. Chris was playing guitar. Our band for the evening was a couple of outstanding area musicians, Mike Mumford on banjo and Ira Gitlin on bass. And guess what? When Mike kicked off FMB and hit that first E chord, EVERYBODY went to the E-major chord. For six beats. Automatically. It was a wild and woolly sound. It was incredible.

Listen back to that old Flatt & Scruggs record a few times, and then try it yourself. It’s great. Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

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Posted in By Red, jamming, Learning By Ear | 3 Comments »

Picking

Tuesday, September 7th, 2010

Red Henry

Yesterday afternoon we had a real good picking session. The participants were what made it work. Besides Murphy, Chris, and myself, we had a teenage banjo player, a forest ranger, a deaf banjo player, a singer converted from hip-hop, and an out-of-work bass player. A well-matched group, huh?

Okay. I guess you are wondering who these people were and why they fit together so well musically. Well, the teenage banjo player was Murphy’s student Logan, a good student and up-and-coming player whom she’s blogged about before. And the party was for Logan’s 18th birthday. The forest ranger was local guitar picker and singer Gerald C., who happens to be Logan’s scoutmaster. The deaf banjo player was our Cousin David, about whom you’ve heard before. (Just kidding about the “deaf” part.) The convert from hip-hip was our friend Chris L., a new Stanley Brothers/Flatt & Scruggs/Reno & Smiley freak who used to be in a rock band with our Chris. (The band was called, appropriately enough, The Bends.) And the bass player was Murphy’s long-time student Bob V., a fine picker and witty person.

So why did we fit together so well? Well, aside from Murphy’s formidable skill at leading a jam session (as amply demonstrated on our Slow Jam and More Slow Jam DVDs), it was because everybody knew a lot of the same material or could pick up on it well. You do find jam sessions where the players all have their own favorite songs but can’t really play anyone else’s. In this case, everybody picked up on what everyone else was doing, and it worked out fine.

Sometimes you find the strangest combinations of folks in jam sessions… and the music still works!

Red

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Posted in banjo, By Red, guitar, jamming, Learning By Ear, Practice | No Comments »

Record yourself!

Friday, August 13th, 2010

Red Henry

That’s right. Record yourself. That is one of the best ways to hear exactly what your playing sounds like, and to find out what you need to work on.

In years past, recording yourself was very easy and cheap to do, with the inexpensive cassette recorders that a lot of folks had. Modern technology makes recording almost as easy (but not cheap) by using video cameras or small high-tech audio recorders. Even most digital cameras can take a movie–with sound– of your playing. But whatever your favorite device is, just record yourself playing a couple of tunes. Then play them back and see what you sound like.

When you hear your music played back, it might not sound quite as good as you thought it was going to. (My band-leading, banjo-playing brother-in-law Mike says that for him, recording music– and listening to it afterward– is as pleasant as having teeth pulled. But that’s just his opinion.) Now, I’m not saying this trying to discourage anybody from playing. If in the playback, you don’t sound like Earl, or Ralph, or J.D., or Murphy, that’s not a reason to give up playing, or even recording. The point is that you can really hear what your playing sounds like. You can hear all your notes, and your timing, and your rhythm. And if you are playing steadily enough on the tape to play along with yourself during the playback, that’s excellent! You’ve come a long way, and are ready to play with other people, whether you feel like it or not!

Sometimes when you hear yourself for the first time, you might be discouraged. But this doesn’t mean that your playing normally sounds the way it does on the tape. Any time the tape is rolling (or any other recording is going on), you’re going to have it on your mind, either consciously or unconsciously. And it might affect your playing. But the more practice you get recording, the better you’ll play each time you record, and when it comes time to listen back to the tune, the better you’ll sound. Recording and listening is great practice, and can sure help a person’s playing!

Record yourself!

Red.

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Posted in By Red, Learning By Ear, Practice | 2 Comments »

Earned the License! (Flying and Picking #12)

Friday, June 25th, 2010

Red Henry

Red Henry

Folks, I’m going to break away from those excellent postings from Kaufman Kamp to tell you about something else good that happened this week. As many of you know I’ve been learning to fly, and on Wednesday I got my license! It’s been a huge 7-month-long project, studying and flying all I could, but it finally happened. I took the flying examination (called a “check ride”), and passed with– yes, I’ll say it– flying colors.

This flight exam was in the same old rusty Cessna 172 you see in that photo above, registration number N51056. I’ve flown about 121 hours so far, mostly in that same airplane, and the plane and I have come to know each other pretty well. Now I’ll start flying a couple of times a week just for fun, in this airplane and others, and enjoy the flights even more, because now there’s no pressure about making the grade. Although I expect to keep learning forever, now I’m an independent pilot.

And what (to ask it again), does this have to do with playing music? A lot. The more I fly, the more connection I see with music. You’ll have some goals when you learn to play, such as playing your first tune all the way through without stopping or losing your place; being able to play your tunes while your teacher plays rhythm for you on a guitar; someday being able to play along with the group in a jam session, and maybe even performing at parties, small concerts, at church, or for folks at nursing homes. But along the way, you really hit a landmark when you can play your tunes standing up, at a reasonable speed, in a jam session. That’s what Murphy sometimes calls “becoming an independent banjo player” (or mandolin player, or fiddle, or guitar, or whatever). Although you still have lots you can learn, you might say that that’s when you’ve earned your license. And it’s good.

Red

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Posted in By Red, jamming, Learning By Ear | 8 Comments »

Kaufman Kamp – Week 1

Wednesday, June 16th, 2010
Casey Henry

Casey Henry

I write you from the campus of Maryville College in Maryville, Tenn., where I am teaching fiddle and guitar at Kaufman Kamp. I have the very beginning class for both instruments (simultaneously!) and, despite my reservations about teaching two instruments at once, it is working out rather well. This is our class:

Fiddle/Guitar 101: Roxanne, Casey, Jack, Deb, Louvenia

Fiddle/Guitar 101: Roxanne, Casey, Jack, Deb, Louvenia. I didn't realize until seeing this picture that I'm taller than all my students. Thanks to the multi-talented Donna Dixon for being our photographer.

We picked up one more student this afternoon, after the picture was taken (sorry Jim!). We started out the first morning of class learning a G scale. Now, traditionally on fiddle most people start out with the A scale. But my reasoning was that, since this is primarily a bluegrass camp, and the default key for bluegrass is G, that my fiddles should at least be able to chop along in the most common key right away. In trying to figure out how to manage two instruments in the same class I hit upon the idea of doing “Frère Jacques” as the first tune. Everyone knows the melody already and it only has ONE chord. So my sole guitar student could just grab a G chord and hang on.

It went so well that in the afternoon we learned some two-finger chop chords and alternated between playing lead and playing rhythm. Two of my students showed up at the next morning’s slow jam, at which we played everything in the key of G, so I felt good about teaching them G first.

The next day I started with a challenge. While my single guitar player and I had a guitar-specific workshop, the three fiddles tried to pick out “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” by themselves, by ear. They did SO GREAT!!! I had told them the starting note and that all the notes they needed were in the G scale we had learned. They not only got “Twinkle,” they then added the shuffle bow stroke to it! They had started in on “Amazing Grace” when we guitars came back. I was incredibly impressed. All three of the women play other instruments (bass, hammer dulcimer) so they are already familiar with this music, and they’re used to using their ears to figure out what to play. Those very important facts contributed to them picking out “Twinkle” so quickly.

In the rest of Tuesday morning’s class we learned the A scale (for fiddles it’s a whole different scale, for the guitar we just put on a capo and played the G scale) and then “Boil Them Cabbage Down” with the shuffle bow stroke and pick stroke. They did so well I showed them how to do an easy double stop by playing the open E string along with the A string (the string all the melody notes are on).

After lunch we picked up a second guitar student, who jumped ship from the beginner group. I was worried he’d have a hard time since he’d missed what we did in the first three classes, but he gamely jumped right in (luckily he could already play his scale, and that helped immensely).

We took on our biggest challenge so far: “Cripple Creek”. It was the longest tune we’d done, and the most complicated. But by taking it three or four (or sometimes two) notes at a time, by the end of class we sure enough had it down. I was careful to explain to them that since we’re learning by ear, when they went to sleep tonight the tune would seep out of their head and wouldn’t be there in the morning. That’s part of the process. But we’d do extensive review, so by the end of today’s classes, “Cripple Creek” would be back. Oh, sure, it will go away again tonight when they sleep, but you know what, Thursday we’ll review it, too, so by the end of camp it will be stuck in there good and tight.

So, I’m off to lead this morning’s slow jam. Today’s key is A, so we’ll play everything in A, which opens the field to play “Cripple Creek” and “Old Joe Clark.” Also, since it’s two frets higher, my singing will sound less like a sick bullfrog and more like a healthy bullfrog (just kidding!). But I am looking forward to the C day, since that’s actually my key!

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Posted in By Casey, Camps, Learning By Ear | 4 Comments »

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