[chrismorgan]

I’ve gained that impression from every single alternative notation system that’s come up here (a new one comes up every year or two). They have a habit of solving problems that just aren’t problems for experienced readers, while causing problems for experienced readers. (They may also solve some real problems, but when they do, they always involve compromises. Inconsistent octave positioning on the staff is a problem, even if it becomes comparatively minor for fairly experienced readers, but the solution offered for that particular issue here looks lousy to me, the compromises made being considerably worse than the original problem.)

In this instance, I look at the subtle vertical placements alone and first guessed rendering imprecision, because I’ve seen that bad and worse from some digital scores, to say nothing of older scores especially with inconsistent ledger line spacing, especially when they’ve been scanned or reprinted or are otherwise aged. I also see something that my dad would struggle to distinguish visually except under fairly strong lighting. This notation looks terribly unsuitable if you don’t have (a) a high-precision, high-resolution display, (b) good lighting, and (c) good eyesight. And it certainly won’t scale down as well, nor is it in any way suitable for hand notation.

[_moof]

> They have a habit of solving problems that just aren’t problems for experienced readers, while causing problems for experienced readers.

If I had a dollar for every "new way of doing XYZ" made by someone inexperienced who just doesn't want to learn the way we're all doing XYZ just fine...

[munificent]

It so hard for an outsider to tell the difference between:

1. It is this way for logical but obscure reasons that will become clearer later when you have deeper understanding.

2. It is this way only because of path dependence and historical baggage and it's arbitrarily annoying for a new person to learn but we don't switch because we all learned it the old hard way.

It's valuable for inexperienced people to question designs that appear bad from the outside because there are a lot of examples of 2 and experienced users of a system aren't incentivized to fix them because they've already climbed up the learning curve and don't personally benefit. But that baggage is a worthless drain for every new user.

The tax for having new users point out and sometimes fix #2 is having to deal with them sometimes erroneously "fixing" cases that are #1.

[vintermann]

Well, it's even harder for insiders. What makes you think the would-be be reformers are outsiders anyway?

Further down this thread, someone brought up their sight reading tutor program. That's a very classic "solution" to the problem.

Also very classic is that when the well meaning "insider" who approves of classical notation finds out that his tutor program didn't really help matters, he'll come up with a reform proposal of his own...

We know that reformed notation systems can increase musical literacy, because they have. Examples are the Scandinavian siffer notation, the Chinese system (which is almost identical to the Scandinavian one, even though developed independently) and the American shape note systems.

But we also know that once they do, there is inevitably a push from educators to "graduate to real notation", and the gains are typically lost within a generation...

[munificent]

Insiders can reform things too, but they tend to do so less often from a combination of:

1. Since they have already learned the old way, they are less personally incentivized to improve the path. It's in their past anyway, so it's a sunk cost. Also, they may have some (conscious or not) incentive to keep things the way they are in order to leverage their existing expertise in the current system.

2. Once you've internalized a system, it's much harder to even see it's flaws. Like navigating your living room, you just walk around the furniture completely on auto-pilot without even thinking, "Maybe I should move this chair out of the way." If you've ever done any UX research, it leaves a striking impression about how users often know and do things without consciously knowing they are doing them. Outsiders and new users to a system still see it for what it is.

The peak time to improve a system is when you understand it just well enough to see its flaws and how to fix them but not so well that you've forgotten the pain points. Any given user is in that liminal state for only a small amount of time, so it's precious and it's good to make the most of it.

[scrozier]

You bring up interesting examples. The only one I know anything about is shape note singing. I guess your point is that shape note singing can be taught much more easily to beginners, and get them to a point of being able to enjoy making music (usually with others) more quickly?

If so, point taken!

And I guess that those shape note singers who feel the pull to perform/compose more complex music can then simply learn traditional notation. Self-selection, with a satisfying "intro" notation for those who are happy at that level.

Following that path, I'm still not sure that the original article here provides anything useful. It's simply an alternative to traditional notation. It doesn't seem easier to learn to me. I could be wrong, but I doubt that I'm an order of magnitude wrong. In fact, if this new notation were proposed as an alternative to shape note singers, it would seem to undo the very reason for shape note singing in the first place: easy entry point to music making.

[gabereiser]

I think you forgot

3. It is hard because of me?

Music isn't for everyone and reading sheet music is not for all musicians. I know plenty of guitarists who only can read tabs. I know a few serious musicians that can't read sheet music (they have to take it home to study).

Anyone that has had proper music instruction though was taught how to read sheet music in their clef. Pianists learn both.

We must also understand our own limitations and accept that there are some things in this world that we, in our current state, can't understand without either further experience or further instruction or unlearning a prejudice we have.

[scrozier]

As a very experienced "tech guy" and a very experienced musician, I notice this happens a lot on HN. Maybe because there's a very math-y, notation-rich aspect to music that appeals to technology types. I am absolutely all for everybody getting to music whichever way works for them, but there has been a lot of effort spent by technologists trying to "fix" music or make it better, when a little humble learning would have paid big rewards.

I wonder in what fields I do this same thing....

[wolverine876]

Isn't that the reactionary response to all innovation, such as in tech? 'That's not the way we do it.'

[mkr-hn]

There's a gradient between "there's a reason we do things this way and you should understand it before you try to change it" and "don't roll your own notation."

[evilotto]

https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Chesterton%27s_Fence

[_moof]

It rhymes with it, sure. The key difference is that the phenomenon I'm talking about comes from people who haven't taken the time to understand the problem, or they come up with "solutions" that have already been tried and found not to work. The reactionary, conversely, is simply afraid: of change, that they won't be able to learn the new thing, of not being important because they aren't the one who came up with it, of losing status gained from being an expert in the old thing, etc.

[vintermann]

There are solutions that have been tried and found to work very well. The American shape note system made 3 and 4 part harmony singing something the whole congregation could take part in, rather than just an elite choir. Lars Roverud's digit notation system (and the system to teach it) did a similar thing for singing in Scandinavia. They fell out of favour not because they didn't work, but because professional musicians and teachers saw it as a crutch instead of a system in its own right, and kept pushing for graduating to "real" notation.

[scrozier]

Shape note notation doesn't, and doesn't try to, replace traditional notation, which is what Clairnote is trying to do.

[wolverine876]

> The key difference is that the phenomenon I'm talking about comes from people who haven't taken the time to understand the problem, or they come up with "solutions" that have already been tried and found not to work.

IME, that is a common 'reactionary' response. Often the problem has changed.

[mkr-hn]

Notation has changed, adapted, expanded, contracted, and even spun off for different and new aspects of the problem.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_notation#Variations_on...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_notation#Other_systems...

There are some grognards out there who hate even this, and they're way too influential in traditional music education, but notation hasn't been static and unchanging all these centuries. A lot of that resistance is from people who believe their idealized notion of their culture is superior and resist any exposure to new ideas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kr3quGh7pJA

[jonnycomputer]

Brew vs macports in a nutshell.

[Elidrake24]

What's great is I'm not even sure which one you're disparaging; they both "just work" and stay out of my way.

[jnovek]

How does one learn to actually read music, then?

I have been learning to play the keyboard for about a year and I find the layout of the keys to make a lot of sense for figuring out things like scales and chords. When I was in high school I never really learned to sight-read a staff, it was always a struggle for me and probably what turned me off to playing an instrument for so long.

If simplified notations are essentially a crutch for newbies, how does one “git gud”?

[bambax]

I'm working on a webapp to help learn sight reading; the v1 is almost ready; I will do a show hn soon (hopefully next week).

People often associate sight reading with keyboard playing, but they're different things. Reading the staff, as it is traditionally taught in conservatories, means associating the position of a note on the staff with the name of the note (in a given clef). And that's it.

This means, for instance, that the octave is a different problem (I was going to say that it doesn't matter, which isn't exactly true, but close). A C3 is a C4 is a C5 is a C. Same with accidentals. A sharp G is a flat G is a G.

There are many problems associated with learning to read staff on sight. The main and obvious one is that it's tedious and offers no immediate reward. But another is that we are trying to learn too many things at once.

My app is trying to make learning to read notes engaging, competitive and (maybe?) addictive. I don't know if it'll have any success, but during the weeks I've been working on it, it was very effective at improving my own performance.

[InitialLastName]

For all of its strengths as an instrument, piano has some drawbacks for learning to read traditional staff, as there isn't an (obvious-to-the-uninitiated) differentiation between notes or across octaves (you just sit in front of a wide line of keys). I think I learned to read first on a recorder, where you can develop a more intuitive link between fingerings and notes (especially as the first note you learn is the B dead in the center of the treble staff).

I'd suggest a few paths to learning the note positioning:

- If you're already comfortable with note locations on the keyboard, don't be afraid of the line/space mnemonics. If they get you to where you're making ID's faster in the parts of the staff where your hands normally live, it can make life much easier, and you can easily extend from there. There are really only ~26 note/staff associations to learn that will cover the majority of the music you'll see day to day (with octave shifts) and knowing a few will make the rest come more easily.

- Similarly (and I think this is the way piano is taught to beginners, but it's been a long time) you can make a lot of progress by starting your thumbs on middle C, which is dead between the staves and operating from there to play simple music. As you play and read more music, you'll find yourself starting to recognize the locations of more notes across the staff, until they all come to you intuitively.

[scrozier]

The distinction between reading music and sight reading aside (others have addressed it), learning to read music is honestly just rote practice. In the grand scheme of things, it's really not that hard. To play simple songs (all within one octave, say) from music on a staff on an instrument, you really only have to learn twelve associations of positions on the staff to a key on the keyboard or a fingering or an embouchure and a fingering, etc. It's far easier than learning a language or a programming language or the rules of hockey. From there, it's just extending those associations higher and lower, and learning other aspects of music notation, like note durations. It's just standard repetitive learning. No magic or particular talent is involved.

[analog31]

Start with realistic expectations. It will take longer for you, than for someone who's 9 years old. Find sources of large amounts of written material that is nonetheless fairly simplistic, but at the same time not children's songs. There's a lot of sheet music at IMSLP.

An example is the Mikrokosmos collection by Bartok, written as a method book for kids, but is nonetheless serious music.

Don't focus exclusively on reading. When you've worn out a piece from the standpoint of reading, continue practicing it to build technique and musicianship. All of those things develop together. Good luck!

[reikonomusha]

Learning to sight-read is different than just reading. Sight-reading takes an enormous amount of daily dedication and practice for years to get to even an intermediate level.

[JasonFruit]

I don't recall it being that difficult to achieve. Probably the difference is in early teaching and expectations: if you learn to read music as an aid to remembering pieces that are perfected over a long time, sight-reading would be slow to develop, but if you learn it as a way to be able to play new music frequently, it will come more quickly. Probably like the difference between learning a foreign language by studying grammar and working translation exercises as opposed to on-the-fly immersion — you develop different strengths.

[jnovek]

This is a great perspective that I hadn’t considered before.

My previous experience, years ago in high school, was absolutely the former. I think it makes tons of sense to try playing a wide variety of pieces at my skill level.

[ghostpepper]

I am just beginning to learn piano and when I told my teacher that I was memorizing the pieces I was supposed to be reading, he told me to simply play each piece once, mistakes and all, and continue on to the next - specifically to practice playing a piece on first sight.

[scrozier]

I think the distinction is one of degree, not of kind. "Sight reading" is just reading music and applying it to an instrument or voice, in real time. It's a natural outgrowth of learning to read music. I'm a very good sight reader, and it didn't take me anything like years of daily practice. (Which was a good thing, because I have no practice discipline.)

[john61]

> How does one learn to actually read music, then?

The same way millions of musicions before you. By reading music, training, time and patience.

[jnovek]

Please don’t take this personally, but this isn’t very helpful advice.

I’ve learned how to do many things in my life, and I’ve come to appreciate that it’s very easy to practice the wrong thing and never make any progress.

Another way to phrase my question might be, “What and how should I practice to develop my music reading skills?”

[yesenadam]

Pianist here, regularly won sight-reading competitions in my youth etc. GP's answer seemed a good answer to me. Your first sentence seemed rude, disrespectful.

What kind of music do you want to be able to read? Presumably the music you like and want to play. So read that. You will always be reading new stuff you don't know, not the same thing over and over, so I'm not sure how never making any progress is a possibility. Sight reading/playing difficult music is not easy, sounds like you want a quick way of learning the skill, which doesn't exist.

    A fellow went to a Zen master and said, “If I work very hard, how soon can I be enlightened?”
    The Zen master looked him up and down and said, “Ten years.”
    The fellow said, “No, listen, I mean if I really work at it, how long—”
    The Zen master cut him off. “I’m sorry. I misjudged. Twenty years.”
    ”Wait!” Said the young man, “You don’t understand! I’m—”
    “Thirty years,” said the Zen master.

[jnovek]

> Your first sentence seemed rude, disrespectful.

Really? I genuinely trying to communicate that I was criticizing their opinion and not them personally. Did it come off as sarcastic? In any case, I apologize.

You are being awfully presumptuous. I am doing this because I enjoy it. I don’t have a destination or a timeline. I am not asking for a “quick fix”.

I’m asking how to focus studies in music because I struggled for many years with music when I was in school. I did practice quite a bit and always lagged behind.

Your response reminds me why I don’t ask people on the internet for help.

[djhn]

I don't think your question was rude at all.

I feel similarly. I've performed the Chopin/Liszt etudes and Bach's sinfonias as a kid (which I guess translate to intermediate classical piano skill) but would struggle to sight read even the two-part inventions at 1/2 or even 1/4 speed.

I'd be quite keen to use some method to upgrade my sight reading to where I find learning new music rewarding, as long as it's known to produce results.

Currently I can learn a Chopin Nocturne or Mazurka much faster by ear (listening to it to learn the rhythm/melody/harmony) to recreate it roughly and watching someone play it to get the more exact voicing (with the sheet music as a reference mostly).

[yesenadam]

Ok, again you are rude, not a surprise this time. I spent time giving you a more useful answer and got multiple rude comments in return.

[MandieD]

I can only give advice for “one note at a time” instruments like the flute or trumpet: practice sight reading children’s songs you know (and therefore can tell if you’ve made a huge mistake) - sight reading, not memorizing! As you get more proficient at reading those, slowly choose harder things - melody lines from a familiar church hymnal are ideal for this. If you make mistakes, finish the phrase, then repeat it, but here, you should be going for quantity, not quality.

Treat this as a separate part of your practice.

I would imagine it’s similar for piano or guitar.

[vintermann]

It really isn't. You highlight something important: musicians don't usually learn to convert notation to music in their heads. Instead, they learn to associate notation with how to make the sound, e.g. finger positions.

I remember in ear training class in high school all the brass kids playing imaginary valves with their fingers when trying to sight-sing.

It's harder for singers, and quadratically harder for instruments where you have more positions and play more notes at once.

[InitialLastName]

It seems like there's a three-way connection that forms in a musician's head between the note on the page, the sound the note makes, and the muscle memory for playing the note. Each connection is strengthened by different types of practice, and supported by each other, but often with the way we teach music the kinetic is a proxy between the aural and the visual; this is especially true of people who learn mechanical instruments.

One way to boost the aural/visual connection (when you already have strong aural/kinetic and visual/kinetic connections) is to pick up instruments that are very different from the ones you already know; I would think this is the goal of music education programs requiring basic proficiency with piano and singing, regardless of the student's main instrument. Once you have to learn a new set of muscle memory associations to go from the same note on the page to the same note in your ear, it starts to break down the strength of the muscle memory associations.

[scrozier]

However, if you can sight sing, it makes playing music on a wind instrument much easier, as you have a target in your head for what the note should sound like as you play it. Sight singing is a very good skill for instrumentalists.

[egypturnash]

I am by no means even a decent amateur guitarist but "practice with songs you know" definitely lines up with what I was being asked to do when I was taking guitar lessons as a kid.

[duped]

Honest answer is to find a tutor and take private lessons. Books and videos can't show you how to correct bad technique and habits, and it's hard to follow the right pedagogy without someone to guide you.

[alar44]

Literally practice. Don't look at your hands. It takes years and years, there is no quick way to learn piano.

[analog31]

I'm an amateur double bassist, and a fluent sight-reader. To be fair, I gravitate towards situations where reading is an asset, since it gives me a leg up on the "competition" including pro's who haven't maintained their reading chops. Plus I benefit from the networking opportunities afforded by those situations.

For me, here are the problems that I see with any new notation system:

1. "Standard" notation (SN) has created a symbiosis between composers and players. If you don't compose in SN, nobody will play your stuff. If you don't read SN, you won't be able to play anybody's stuff, and will probably not even get a chance to develop your reading skills to a performance level. The ultimate stage of learning to read is sight-reading in an ensemble with other players.

2. Learning a new notation gets exponentially harder as you get older. I started learning to read when I was about 10. It's like my spinal column has created a special circuit directly from my eyes to my hands, through my ears. A lot of time when I'm sight-reading, I'm actually thinking about other things.

3. All of the repertoire is in SN, virtually none of it is in computer readable form, and much of it is out of print. I play in a large jazz ensemble. We still maintain our entire music library, entirely on paper. For this reason, SN has much more inertia than one would expect from other "notations" such as programming languages.

For these reasons, the shortcomings of SN and benefits of new notation, are practically irrelevant. Now, "standard" notation is not carved in stone. For instance, jazz bass parts are notated differently than classical clarinet parts. I get a lot of chord symbols and am expected to play an improvised bass line.

[phkahler]

I'm not sure it's possible to say it's worse. You suffer from having learned the traditional notation, so some of this is going to look weird regardless. I'm not good at reading music and agree with some of the issues it has, but looking at this does seem like a different set of issues to me as well. I think the only fair comparison could be done by someone with a lot of experience using both.

I think it's fair to say the staff has to be spread out more for this notation since is doesn't compress 12 notes into 7 places like traditional notation.

OTOH be glad you're not reading guitar tablature ;-)

[chrismorgan]

Certainly I’m biased, but on the vertical alignment thing I think I can be objective: relying on sub-millimetre positioning is a bad idea.

[vintermann]

It certainly is, but there are similar obvious bad ideas in regular notation.

If you've typeset music manually, or written out nice parts by hand, you know that you need to take stem direction into account when spacing note heads. Notes with opposite stem direction will seem closer, or further apart, than they actually are. Optical illusions aren't a great feature of a notation system.

Five lines is also a bad optical choice, because it's actually very difficult to count 5 or higher parallel lines at a glance. I remember my piano teacher, who was a very strong sight reader, played a Bach fugue for me. However, the score had been annotated with a line showing the figure part ("dux", "comes" etc.) and as it happened that line was spaced exactly like a staff line. He'd played three measures before going, "wait, that doesn't sound right" and realizing he'd been playing on a six-line staff!

[vintermann]

> They have a habit of solving problems that just aren’t problems for experienced readers, while causing problems for experienced readers.

Well, of course. They have invested a lot in the system as it is. But I've noticed even very basic changes that should not cause problems for already strong readers (e.g. a slightly thicker middle line) have zero chance at adoption, whereas changes that are not justified by didacticts (e.g. many composers inventing some quirky new way of expressing something) are.

I share your judgement that this system is poor, and that there are many poor notation systems proposed all the time, though.