I thought it might be a cool topic to talk about... I have a system that works for me, but I am curious to hear how y'all approach the "written note", and I am especially curious if you have any methods of practicing that makes note recognition faster and more accurate. Obviously, just "doing it" is the tried and true approach, but again, I'm curious about your thoughts on this.

Thanks, dudes!

...Hi Scott...

...have a look at this...

The Title is:
Guitar Sight-Reading in two Volumes
by John Kember and Martin Beech
Schott ED 12955 ISMN M-2201-2568-3 ISBN 978-1-902455-78-5
Schott ED 12966 ISMN 979-0-2201-2615-4 ISBN 978-1-84761-024-9

There's definitely some challenges to reading on an instrument like the Stick. Now, I am not talking about just "deciphering" a score, and figuring out where to put your fingers after deciding what the notes are, although that is a part of it - no, I am talking about real-time reading of a piece of music that is new; look at the score and play it.

Is it a worthwhile endeavour? I would say yes definitely- having the ability to look at any piece of music and be able to play it instantly would be an asset at any level. At the very least, it would drastically speed up the learning process. Literacy is a good thing.

Some challenges that seem to come with this;

1) People's "reading" ability is usually far below their "playing" ability.

2) Reading has to be done daily...

3) There are a ton of different aspects to reading, especially when you are just getting started. Dynamics, articulation, rhythm, note location, etc.

4) Note decoding. If you have to do an "Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge" and "FACE" thing to figure out what note it is you are looking at...

5) It bores you.

Like anything in life, if you break the tune down into 'chunks' and learn each part until you master it, life becomes easier.

If you try to eat a whole pie at the same time, you will likely choke.
One bite at a time.
Take your time between bites and enjoy the process.

Here is my thoughts on these challenges, remember - I am nobody - just making my way through the instrument

1) Gotta read at a level that you can actually succeed at. That might mean whole notes for a while, and it might mean getting familiar with the notes in a defined location - for instance, reading on guitar, violin, and Cello etc involves positions and position shifting for good reason.
The massive advantage of the Stick (like most string instruments) is that the same note can be found in multiple locations. It's an advantage, but can be a source of confusion also I think... So many options, simplify, simplify, simplify. (Beginner piano music is a great place to start - Suzuki method is amazing) Also, I tend to have "project pieces" as well as a ton of stuff available to read through, and I can create my own exercises and whatnot via notation software. Anyways, expect to start at "twinkle, twinkle" level. Lots to learn, keep it easy.

2) I have always hated geometric diagrams and tablature without the notation. That's just me. Read notation, start now - don't wait to "graduate" from tabs, because regardless of how good you get at reading tablature, you will have to start at the beginning with notation anyway. Anyways, daily practice is crucial. Kind of like going to the gym - if you only go once a week for 3 weeks and then take 6 months off, prepare to be not able to move forward. I find that I make gains every day, big ones that explode through every aspect of my playing.

3) Pick ONE thing to get good at when you read. 1) make it to and through practice . 2) the right notes. 3) then add accurate rhythms 4) speed 5) articulations 6) dynamics. Working on all of those things at once can be overwhelming. Again, like going to the gym - first goal should be just showing up, and keeping on showing up! Then, just focus on getting the notes (take things like tempo, articulations, dynamics and even rhythm out of the equation - you can add those back in later.)

4) This is a big one, lots of people have a tough time understanding just what it is they are looking at on a score. I mean, it's a bunch of alien symbols for someone who isn't used to looking at it. Think of it like learning to read Japanese. hiragana, katagana, romanji and then kanji... Daunting at first. But, like most things, "complicated" things are usually a combination of simple things. So a first step might be to literally just learn the alphabet, really learn what the notes are on bass and treble clef. If you can recognise what note is what, whether it's on a ledger line or whatever that will save you all kinds of time and frustration when you sit down and try to do some reading. I recommend flashcards, heck there are flashcards apps out there too complete with scoring and timers to help you get faster. Got anything better to do on your coffee break? Learning a language sounds cool to me... and this is something you can do in, like 30 seconds at a time. Taking the decoding process out of the equation will make your reading experience much more positive (and gainly)

5) If it bores you, and you hate it, and it's the opposite of everything you stand for - don't do it.
But if you feel like it's something that you want to pursue, or need to develop I will say this - make it fun. edit - VERY important, I find I really need to clear my mind and get some focus sometimes. That inner dialogue, that's bad! For me, anyways...

Reading is one of many tools that I employ to move forward in my playing - I was very, very frustrated with my lack of progress on the Stick, and reading was a simple yet extremely effective solution to that issue. Everybody is different, right? What works for me might not work for you. But hopefully some of this (just my viewpoint) will help someone out.

A great reading resource with some killer tunes (in my opinion) I go through the whole thing daily.

Just picked it up paperback for $5.99 at Amazon prime. Thanks!

I think he's talking about sight reading specifically though which is a somewhat different beast.
sight reading is a "cold read" - playing a written piece without prior exposure.

man, I really haven't had to do any of that for like 30 years - so this is broken experience. I actually quite enjoyed it...that sort of feeling of being on the razor's edge,esp as I used to do it on guitar and there were always these fingering decisions one would make and you'd be down a path...I decided to go up the neck instead of grabbing it on different strings with a different fingering - I sure hope that doesn't screw me in 2 measures.
sort of like on a mountainbike when you decide to go to one side of a rut and the rut gets bigger and you are committed to the left side lines and you sure hope it doesn't collapse


Gosh, some things that helped me back in the day, well theory actually helped quite a bit b/c I found you could make best guesses as to what could be coming and, at least, improve my odds.
It's sort of like rollerblading or urban assault biking -- you try to leave yourself at least 2 paths at any moment and you learn to survey the situation - not just one sure move, put get ready for the top options.

it's especially helpful if its a strong style or the piece was written on or at least heavily arranged TO the instrument you are playing it on. That can be nice because there is even more biases to common theme to act as guideposts.
Transcriptions, like those Rick Foster JS Bach transcriptions for guitar, man, that guy didn't make a whole lot of concessions for the instrument so that "a guitar palyer would never" didn't really apply that strongly to those (and I understand old-man bach had that rep with chorale music..where he did the structure and the vocalists would have to deal with the breathing)

relative reading I always found helpful. I remember when I first started reading way up on the ledger lines, I though I was sort of cheating and pulling a fast one by reading the intervals (oh, that's up a Maj3rd, that's a 6th) instead of the absolute note reading...like during the reading itself I maybe couldn't tell you what the note name was, but was just reading deltas...offsets...intervals
then my instructor was "um, yeah, that's sort of the point, it's a totally valid strategy". That's when I found out about movable clefs

what else. Oh, well, I just started from the tactile habit, no never really looked at what I was doing performance time (no markers) - I'm not saying that's a superior method, but it was helpful for that work

also, at the time, I really got used to reading ahead. so my eyes would be a couple of measures ahead of what I was playing -- the more I could extend that, the more room I'd give myself.

I had quite a few of those sight reading sheets - they are one-time pads, on and done. If you played the sheet you couldn't use it again (o if you had a whole bunch I suppose you could but I'm always shocked by how amazing musical memory is...like if you recycled how you'd go..oh wait, I remember this. I suppose in terms of knowing your musical elements in general motifs, chord changes, what-have-you your memory can cross associate and even though its a different piece you kind of go "oh, this this is THAT thing this kind of music does")

There is the oh crap - cheat where when the music gets plunked down in front of you and you look at the key sig and then before count you frantically look for the gotcha - the weird thing is I always found it to be more raw pattern recognition - I wouldn't so much be doing an analysis, but just look for those blotches of dots that my back-brain would perk up and go "oh there's a hell of a lot of them or...hmm, that's not a shape we see too often...esp next to that other cluster of dots"
I guess technically not sight reading - so that might be a real cheat, but sort of a mitigating strategy anyway


I had a great time with it, I've been broken for about 3 decades, but I really enjoyed that part - it was sot of a sport (I actually find some really great philosophical perspectives and creative expression in sport - if you let it happen and are open to it)

I suspect what I just wrote is "well duh, noob" to the accomplished guys around here and that's totally fair. I'll own that

so I just meant to relate my experience with it - not advice. If you are getting advice from me on anything besides basic cooking, scuba diving or hangover care then woe betide you

Well, I start every single day with a cup of coffee and reading one page of Dotzauer (thanks for the tip Josh) for the left hand. It’s kind of a warm up thing. Then I go thru my Bach material but I just read until I memorize it.


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