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Take a peek into a high school jazz band rehearsal or grab a seat at a college jazz combo concert. Better yet, walk into your local jam session or take a close look at the jazz trio playing the next time youre at a wedding. What do you see? In each case youll find the Real Book player. The Real Book player is the musician that learns tunes out of a fake book, practices in front of a fake book, and performs using a fake book. Like a ball and chain, the book is always there. No book = no music. For years I used to be a real book player. I looked at lead sheets to memorize tunes, I practiced improvisation by staring for hours at written out chord progressions, and I relied on the book like a life preserver at gig after gig. From my perspective, this all seemed to work out just fine, however after a few years a problem slowly began to emerge. I was performing standards from a book all the time, but I wasnt actually learning any of these tunes that I was playing night after night. Even worse, I wasnt improving at all as an improviser. Week after week I was basically rehashing the same old material in the same exact way without having any musical progress to show for it. The problem was not that I wasnt trying to improve as an improviser, its that I was trying to use a fake book to achieve this goal. I see many musicians unwittingly heading in this same direction glued to the book and wondering why theyre having trouble memorizing tunes or difficulty creating solos. Dont let this happen to you. Keep in mind that the book isnt bad in and of itself (after all its just paper!), however knowing the side effects of reading out of a fake book and learning how to use it effectively is essential for every player looking to improve as an improviser and learn more tunes.
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In fact you dont even have to listen to that tune to be able to perform it. You can essentially skip all of that practice time that would otherwise be spent on listening, ear training, and transcribing and go directly to performing hundreds of tunes in front of an audience. So why try to memorize melodies, hear chord progressions, or spend time transcribing from the record? Why do more work when you can have it easy?
Nothing is more desirable than to be released from an affliction, but nothing is more frightening than to be divested of a crutch.
~James Baldwin
The more you use the book, the more youll become dependent on it. This harmless and convenient crutch that you bring along to your rehearsals and gigs will suddenly become an unbreakable habit. You cant perform without it, you cant practice without it, in fact your entire ability as an improviser becomes tied to this book. In the past, if you took the book away from me I would have an anxiety attack. How was I going to know the melody or chord progression without that piece of paper? How was I going to perform tunes from memory in front of an audience? This is the main reason why I continued to lean on this crutch in the practice room and on the bandstand. The book was covering up some big holes in my musical skill set. ! .!
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Take a close look at your own playing for a moment. Are you going to be the player that is leaning on a crutch during every performance or are you going to be an improviser thats going to know these tunes on a personal level and play with feeling?
By taking this shortcut now, youre cheating yourself in the long run.
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While it may be convenient to simply read hundreds of tunes, you are depriving yourself of one of the most important tools you have as a musician, your ears. As long as you use the book, youre leaving your ears undeveloped. As long as you paint by numbers, you wont truly learn how to paint.
II) You dont really Know the tune When you rely on a fake book, you never get to the point where you know the tunes that youre playing. This is fine if you just want to fumble through solos, but getting to the level of great improvising requires that you know a tune inside and out. Not just memorizing a melody and sequence of chord symbols, but ingraining these sounds in your ear, knowing these progressions in your mind, and working them out on your instrument. You have to know the tune on a personal level. Without this connection to your ear, body, or musical feeling, your improvising is going to be flat and mechanical. The extent to which you know a tune not only affects your ability to improvise, it also affects the impact youll have on the listener. Imagine for a moment that youre watching a movie in which every actor is reading lines from a script. Each performer is looking down at a stack of paper and not really interacting with the other actors, rather using all of their focus just to get each line out at the right time. Now compare that to an actor that has not only memorized the script, but has actually become the character transcending technique and the scene to use each line to deliver emotion with powerful impact. Which movie would you rather see? I think the choice is obvious. The choice is equally obvious when it comes to listening to a musician play from a fake book vs. a musician that is playing a tune that they have memorized and a tune that means something to them. By relying on a fake book to perform, youre essentially sight reading a tune every time that you play it youre that actor reading from a script, giving a performance that you dont believe in. III) Limiting the music When you can only play the tunes in that fake book on your music stand, youre not only putting yourself in a box musically, youre limiting the music itself. But, what exactly does that mean? Thousands of musicians have the Real Book and most of these musicians are using it to perform in front of audiences. As a result, every player that is using a ! 0!
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book is limited to the same finite number of tunes contained in that book. Go to any jam session in any city and youll hear the same three dozen tunes performed in roughly the same way. Jazz becomes this thing that sounds the same everywhere you go. It becomes a predictable background music that never really reaches an emotional or creative high point. Because there is a mentality that being a jazz musician is rolling up to a gig with a stack of fake books and sight reading tunes at random, many musicians feel that it is ok to get by without actually learning tunes and putting something personal or original into the music. This mindset actually limits and hurts the music. Instead of music that is created in the moment, it becomes this predictable exercise that is no different from any other group any where in the world. Quite simply, by reading tunes out of a book, youre taking away the possibility of possibility.
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II) Knowing a tune intellectually and aurally fosters creativity Creativity is dependent upon a certain level of proficiency and freedom. If youre still struggling with instrumental fundamentals and the basics of music theory, its going to be hard to be creative and spontaneous. Likewise, when you look at a page and process that information you arent free to focus on creating, youre simply reproducing notes from a page and inserting corresponding scales and licks. Getting away from the book will free you up musically. When you have a tune in your ear and you know it in your mind youll be able to focus on creative aspects of playing, not just the technical aspects. You can concentrate on sending a musical message to the audience and creating music in the moment instead of just getting by. III) Listening and interacting when you perform One common theme that you see with players or groups that use books to perform is that everyone ends up staring at the book. Every player is in their own world and focusing on their own part. Theyre all playing at the same time, yet no one is playing together. As a result there is little to no musical communication within the group. Not exactly an inspiring performance. By freeing yourself from the book, youll be able to start listening to the other players around you. Moments will happen in the music that were not planned, and the audience will notice this. Youll open yourself up to the magic that happens when two or more players improvise together in the moment.
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Youre not going to get rid of the fake book overnight, however if you start taking some steps now youll be able to start performing repertoire that you know by heart. Make Ear Training part of your daily routine. The more that you take in information with your ears, the easier it will be to learn tunes from the record and hear Focus on repertoire and key tunes in your daily practice. If you dont devote any of your practice time to learning tunes, youre not just going to magically learn tunes. The reason most players use a book is that they dont know a lot of tunes. Make sure you are learning or working on at least one tune each week. It may not seem like a lot, but it will add up quickly in the space of a few months youll be able to play an entire set or two from memory. Start by making it a goal to perform one (or more) tunes from memory every time you perform or go to a jam session. Reading out of a book is easier and safer, but take a chance its the only way youll improve. Remember that the book is like a pair of training wheels for your improvising, it allows you to perform a number of tunes quickly without mastering some essential skills that you need as an improviser. If you never take these training wheels off, youll never develop the skills you need to become a successful improviser. Getting away from the book is not going to be easy at first. Youll have to come to terms with the fact that you only might know one or two or a dozen tunes instead of the hundreds you can read out of the book. However, the skills that youll develop in learning by ear will transform your musicianship. More importantly, youll find that you ability to improvise will greatly improve from this process. Remember you are the source of your musicality you are your own instrument. The music should be coming from within yourself, not from an external source. If you have any doubts about this, you only have to look at the greatest improvisers as they are playing standardsDo you see a book anywhere in sight?!
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