Site Reading

[2infamouz]

I'm not sure if this is the correct category to post this in, but what are some effective ways to get better at / practice site reading besides obviously just trying it over n over lol. I can play by ear pretty well and almost any melody I hear I can play it back on the piano, but I cannot read music to save my life...I have a decent understanding of playing technique, scales, chords, and most of the basic stuff but I just cannot get good at reading music ...Any suggestions?

 

[mwandishi]

Practice, a lot of sheet music. I mean there are tips and what not like focusing on the intervals, but ultimately u just have to keep doing it. I had book by howard shanet, but it still came down to memorizing it (I prob read like a four grader). I sure there are some books that have specific techniques and there are acronyms.
Treble Clef lines--Every Good Boy Does Fine (EGBDF), Bass Clef-lines-Good Boys Do Fine Always (GBDFA). Treble space-FACE, Bassclef space--All Cows Eat Grass.
The notes b/w, above, below the clefs u just have to get use to (no C3,C2, etc in sheet music).
These are just my elementary suggestions, I'm sure BC or some others have something better. my 2 cents

 

[bandcoach]

Unfortunately the only way to get good at this is to start with simple melodies (folk songs, nursery rhymes, etc) and build your skills by practising every day.

It is important that regardless of what you work on to develop your sight reading skills that you know what it should sound like before you start

An important thing to remember is that you are trying to do two or three things when sight reading:

1. interpret rhythm
2. interpret and play notes moving smoothly from note to note
3. interpret and play chords moving smoothly from chord to chord

Some important precursors to study are

Scales

• both hands same direction up and down
• hands move in opposing directions - left down right up and reversed for second half of the scale
• hands move in opposing directions - left up right down and reversed for second half of the scale

Arpeggios
major, minor and dominant 7th chords to begin. Add augmented and diminished triads and then the other 7ths (minor 7th, major 7th, diminished 7th, etc)

Both of these (scales and arpeggios), should be read first, with tempos as slow as 30 bpm (1 note every 2 seconds if playing quarter notes/crotchets) and moving as fast as 240bpm (4 notes every second)

After doing some basic skill building with scales and arpeggios, reading melodies should improve simply because your mind recognises the notes and what position/fingering will work best to play segments of the melody.

This advice works for any instrument, as the problems and challenges are the same regardless of medium. The instruments that offer the most challenges, however, are the strings, as there are many possible positions for some notes that the instrument can play

 

[IB_P]

You won't read notes, because you don't have time, you read patterns and positions on the stave, so with piano, my advice is this.

Find middle C. Jump a white key both up and down and hold the next one. This is the bottom line of the treble clef and top line of the bass clef respectively. Now jump 3 white keys up and down and hold the 4th, you now have the middle line of the treble and bass clef. Jump another 3 and hold the 4th, you now have the top line of the treble clef and bottom line of the bass clef. Anything outside of these areas is accommodated by ledger lines and va markers etc.

Place your hands on the keyboard in a way that allows you to accommodate the change in direction of the notes on the stave with the direction you need to go on the keyboard. Just play the notes by noticing the spaces and positions on the stave, forget about consciously knowing what note it is if you don't intuitively know it. Start with simple pieces and progress from there.