Mike Dyson performing a jam on his track “Dorian Nights”
I can’t read music.
I can read guitar tablature, but that’s not really the same.
In college, I did take an introduction to piano course, and there I did learn how to sight-read, but I don’t remember. It also takes effort to translate that knowledge to the guitar, which I believe to be a much more difficult instrument.
If I could start over again, I would have learned to read music and learned the piano as my primary instrument because, in my adult life, I can see the value in having that knowledge as a musician.
Stevie Ray Vaughan could not read music either.
I think to a certain degree, when you don’t know how to read, you sort of develop this crude system which eventually develops into your own style.
As a guitar player, to me, style is the most important part and the greatest thing you can actually achieve as a guitar player.
How much do you not sound like someone else?
You want to be the Stevie Ray Vaughan, David Gilmour, Buddy Guy, Eric Clapton, Jeff Becks of the world. The guitar players that everyone instantly recognizes without any doubt.
The crazy thing about all five of those iconic guitar players is not one of them could read music.
Eric Clapton even stated in his book that he was “nervous at an Aretha Franklin session because everyone else had sheet music on stands and he couldn’t read any of it.”
Crazy thing is, I just did research on this and found that out.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t learn to read music because there are plenty of musicians that can read music. Eric Johnson is an iconic guitar player that can read music, but even he states that he can only “sight-read a little.”
As I continue to Google players that I perceive to be technically superior guitar players, like country musician Vince Gill, he too states that he “learns by ear.”
There is something to be said about that.
When you learn other people’s material, whether it’s cover songs or sight-reading, some of your uniqueness gets lost in the process. You are absorbing and duplicating the creations of others, not being inspired by their creations and making your own, and therein lies the problem.
This is the main reason I write my own material. I learned over the years it is easier to write your own material than to learn someone else’s.
And you will never have the expectation or set of problems that come with performing a cover song. People always expect it to sound exactly how it is.
When you perform your own song, most of the time people are happy with however you decide to play it—that is, of course, if you are the type of musician like the ones listed above.
Improvisation is the sauce and people expect it when you deliver them the proverbial BBQ.
That being said, the video above is a jam I made over an instrumental track I created. I like to call it “Dorian Nights” because it uses the Dorian mode scale.
I just had to watch a YouTube video to actually learn what that means because, of course, I don’t know.
Sounds good. I like it.
Most of all, it sounds exactly like me, and as a guitar player, that’s all I could ever hope to achieve.
Thanks for watching, and I look forward to sharing more soon.
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