Musical Matters

I had my last piano lesson this week. And what a ride it's been! Before leaving, my music instructor allowed me to snap a picture of her. Say hello to Mrs. Stem.

While I won't be continuing with private piano lessons, I will still be learning and practicing at home. I've really come so far in just 8 weeks--I'm seeing a lot of potential in myself. Am I being too optimistic? Am I fooling myself into thinking I've come so far, when really I've only memorized little tid bits? Either way, I think it would be foolish of me not to continue in some form. So I'll be continuing in the work book I have at home. But the overall reason I haven't signed up for another semester of piano lessons is because I've signed up for voice lessons instead!

Two weeks into piano, I found myself asking Mrs. Stem for vocal tips. "Am I damaging my voice by singing this way," or "how do I increase my range?" And pretty soon, we were talking about voice lessons. I asked Sam about it, and with his full encouragement, I signed up! Every Monday after piano lessons, a 30 minute voice lesson followed. 

And I must say, while I have been eager to learn piano, I am only that much more eager in voice. I've never had voice lessons before, but the older I get and the more I sing, the more unsure I am if I'm "doing it right." Sometimes, I don't know if it's just a matter of tone of voice--simply put, that's just how I sound--or if it's about the technicalities of singing. And just what are they?

Not quite sure...but I'm learning.

I'm realizing that I've always sung (is that the right verbiage, "sung?") with a chest voice. Of course, choir calls for the "operatic" voice, but otherwise, it's all chest. And all these years that I've been singing in my chest voice, I haven't been singing with my head voice.

While that statement seems redundant, the implication is that I haven't been practicing with my head voice at all. So not only do I not really know how, but I have no control over it either. I am all over the place! Sure, I can hit some high notes, but that doesn't mean anything if I can't control them. And boy oh boy has it shown in every single lesson!

I'm also finding out that I'm so unnecessarily tense, resulting in a lot of strain on my voice. When I'm alone in the house, I could be singing freely (with a head-voice), not thinking anything about it, but if I were to notice a fly watching me, or should a squirrel outside the window pay me any attention, I immediately get tense and try reverting back into my chest voice. I know, I don't understand myself either. How do I overcome that? That's a question for anyone to answer. I'm open to all suggestions.

Voice lessons for the fall semester will begin August 13th. Booyah.

In the meantime, while I continue to practice piano and work through my frustrations at home, there are some questions I have that go unanswered. And for a while now, I've had this one specific question that I can't seem to shake. The question is: Why do the bass and treble clefs read differently? Or rather, couldn't we make them read the same? There are five lines in each clef, and four spaces. The treble reads E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F. The bass reads G, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A. Wouldn't it be a lot easier if they were the same? .

Every time I get stumped with something, I write it out on paper--it usually helps me to see things more clearly. So that's just what I did. And just when I thought I convinced myself that my theory couldn't work, I suddenly found a way that it could!

These are my scribblings that led to a new idea...

So, the notes on sheet music read like this: 

But all you musicians out there, get ready for the next big thing! What I am proposing could revolutionize the music industry! The new scale:

So instead of having Middle C by itself, it is joined by "Middle A." Result? Both clefs now read the same way.

So, while the original scale has worked for many, many years, wouldn't this be a whole lot easier to READ. I didn't change the notes (because that would go against math, science, and music!). My proposal wouldn't even change the way music is written. It would only change the way music is read.

You may be wondering what the reason is for all this. Beethoven didn't seem to have any issues with it. None of the Greats did. In fact, none of the not-so-greats had any qualms about it either.
So am I the first one to have proposed an idea like this? It seems such an easy solution. An easy solution to what? you say. Any easy solution to the strain on my brain; so instead of having to learn two different clefs, they would read the same.

But while I've invested much time and effort into wondering why things are the way they are, and even gone so far as to propose a new method to change it, I seem to be okay with the answer, "that's just the way it is." However, if there is another reason out there, if there is a fable of why the originator of the bass and treble clef wrote the sheet music to look the way it does, choosing one way over the other, I'd love to hear about it. Perhaps it was a matter of space of paper vs ease of reading. Perhaps the originator was such a genius, he didn't even think about it!

In the meantime, I'll just learn the bass clef too, and soon this whole thing will be no big deal.