Episode 268
The Importance of Scales and Triads in Music Education
The principal focus of our discussion with Sean Wilson centers on the critical importance of establishing a solid foundational knowledge in music, irrespective of the genre one wishes to pursue. We delve into the notion that a comprehensive understanding of scales and triads is essential for musicians seeking to advance their skills, particularly when transitioning to more complex genres such as jazz or classical. My approach to teaching emphasizes the necessity of addressing gaps in knowledge, which often hinder progress. Furthermore, we explore the development of a beginner course designed to accommodate those who may feel overwhelmed by traditional methods of instruction, allowing them to revisit fundamental concepts. This episode underscores our commitment to fostering a nurturing educational environment where all musicians, regardless of their starting point, can thrive and enhance their musical vocabulary.
The conversation centers on the significant role that foundational knowledge plays in the mastery of music. The speakers articulate that regardless of the genre one aspires to pursue—be it gospel, jazz, or classical—an understanding of basic musical elements such as scales and triads is paramount. Speaker A emphasizes the necessity of possessing a solid musical vocabulary, which allows students to interpret and replicate what they hear from various musicians. This foundational knowledge becomes instrumental in bridging the gaps between different musical styles, facilitating a comprehensive learning experience. Throughout the discourse, the idea of 'roadmaps' is introduced, highlighting the structured approach the speaker employs to teach music. By creating a systematic pathway for learners, they can effectively grasp complex concepts and apply them in practice, thereby enhancing their overall musical abilities. The discussion also touches on the speaker's dedication to ensuring that students can achieve their personal musical goals, even if that means they eventually seek knowledge beyond the speaker's program.
Takeaways:
- As one progresses in musical proficiency, it becomes essential to engage with various music genres.
- Establishing a strong foundational knowledge of scales and triads is imperative for musical development.
- The music program I offer provides structured roadmaps, guiding students through essential steps to enhance their skills.
- It is crucial for musicians to revisit fundamental concepts, as many may lack a solid foundational understanding of music theory.
- The approach taken in my teaching emphasizes solving common gaps in musical knowledge to facilitate holistic growth.
- Students are encouraged to explore the course material at their own pace, ensuring they achieve their individual musical goals.
Links referenced in this episode:
www.seanwilsonpiano.com
www.theDNAproject.ca
Transcript
Okay.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:It's only as you start moving higher that you really need to concern yourself with the various genres.
Speaker A:You understand what I'm saying?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:So it doesn't matter if you were trying to play gospel, jazz, classical.
Speaker A:You have to know a scale, basics.
Speaker A:You have to know triads.
Speaker A:You understand?
Speaker A:So, so for my music program, somebody could come in there and get that, get the we.
Speaker A:I.
Speaker A:I call them roadmaps, for instance.
Speaker A:So on my, on my website, a roadmap is basically telling you, here are the steps you need to be able to play here.
Speaker A:This is a foundation.
Speaker A:So no matter what subject you're playing, if you're trying to play by ear and you're trying to hear what you play, you're going to have to have this foundation.
Speaker B:Right, right.
Speaker A:And so, and, and, and the, the neat thing is I prove that it works because I'm up here transcribing jazz musicians, right?
Speaker A:So I'm not just transcribing gospel guys.
Speaker A:I got classical stuff up there.
Speaker A:I got jazz to show you that I could do.
Speaker A:If I chose, I could move to another subject.
Speaker A:But, you know, I'm gonna stick with gospel because that's the, you know, partly that's my interest.
Speaker A:That's what I want to do.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:But, but my point is that, you know, you could use the foundation.
Speaker A:And then if somebody comes and gets everything they need to get from my site, and then they say, okay, I've gotten enough, now I need to go somewhere else.
Speaker A:Perfectly fine with that, because my business program is that I'm just trying to improve you to where you need to get to.
Speaker A:So once you've reached your goals, you don't just have to continue in the state just to make me happy.
Speaker A:The whole point is that we're solving the problem, and that problem is making sure that you don't have any missing gaps, making sure you have a really great vocabulary so that whatever you want to hear and whatever you hear online, whatever you hear another musician doing, I want you to be able to play that thing, you know?
Speaker A:And so that comes with some training and some theories.
Speaker A:No matter what field you want to.
Speaker C:Go into and your programs start from total beginners or do people need to have a bit of an understanding?
Speaker A:It used to until December.
Speaker A:So what I found was that I had a beginner, what's called a beginner course.
Speaker A:But what I was finding that even my beginner course was too advanced for some people.
Speaker A:And, and again, I just, you know, these are things I'm finding out as I, as I Kind of move along, and I'm like, oh, I guess.
Speaker A:I guess people don't.
Speaker A:I need to go drop down even lower.
Speaker A:So even though there are a lot of people wanting me to continue advanced stuff and intermediate, what you got to understand is like a funnel.
Speaker A:I can catch a bunch of people at the bottom.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker C:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:But a lot of people think they're advanced.
Speaker A:They're really not.
Speaker A:There's only a little small number.
Speaker A:Most people still don't.
Speaker A:Can't do two, five ones in every keys and.
Speaker A:You know what I'm saying, And hit certain scales in every keys and hit the melodic minor key.
Speaker A:Boy, you shouldn't even be talking about advanced if you can't even do that.
Speaker A:So what I did, I said, let's increase that bottom and we can get more people in at the know who may not know a lot.
Speaker A:And so now we have a course that is.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:It's a business.
Speaker A:Well, in order to get a successful business, you know, I had to study business as well, you know, but, yeah, so, you know, we get people in at that.
Speaker A:On that bottom, we teach them.
Speaker A:Now I'm teaching now.
Speaker A:My beginner course is going to say, okay, here's a D on the piano.
Speaker A:Here's a.
Speaker A:Here's a B flat.
Speaker A:Yeah, but here's a neat thing about that course, though.
Speaker A:See, you may think, I don't need that.
Speaker A:But here's the thing.
Speaker A:A lot of people didn't start off right.
Speaker A:They.
Speaker A:They started off.
Speaker A:See, most musicians who started off playing the piano, they just kind of pick things up from wherever.
Speaker A:Yes, everybody could.
Speaker A:Everybody needs to go back from the beginning.
Speaker A:And even if you think you know it, did you really know?
Speaker A:Did you actually memorize what a major.
Speaker A:A perfect fourth sounds like?
Speaker B:Right, right.
Speaker A:Do you know how to, you know.
Speaker A:Oh, say, can you see.
Speaker A:Can you tell me what each of those intervals are?
Speaker A:Because you may think that you advanced, but if you.
Speaker A:You got to go back and fill them.
Speaker B:Them holes, you know, so.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:So the.
Speaker A:So the.
Speaker A:The.
Speaker A:The very beginner chorus is gonna.
Speaker A:I think it's really good.
Speaker A:It's gonna help some.
Speaker A:It's gonna help every musician.
Speaker A:So I'm kind of glad I went in there and not just focused on the.
Speaker A:The top.
Speaker A:Top musicians, because we have media files and stuff that do that all day.
Speaker A:Most people need to go back in there, fix those beginning stuff.
Speaker B:And I can speak personally to the beginner stuff because I was a little intimidated with courses in the past because I felt that if you didn't have somewhat Of a foundation to start.
Speaker B:You might end up feeling overwhelmed.
Speaker B:So I had a little bit of knowledge, but going back like you said, and filling those holes made me feel more comfortable.
Speaker B:It's like you were saying earlier.
Speaker B:So I'm really, really appreciative that you did take the time to go back to the beginners, because now you've got a student for life.
Speaker B:And I'll definitely appreciate that, man.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Because it's.
Speaker A:It's difficult as a business decision.
Speaker A:It is difficult because most people are all wanting those.
Speaker A:Show me Travis.
Speaker A:Show me Corey.
Speaker A:Show me Quinnell.
Speaker A:Show me.
Speaker A:You know, I'm saying, show me this guy.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And, you know, I feel like if I.
Speaker A:It's funny because now people know that I have that I can play that stuff.
Speaker A:You know what I'm saying?
Speaker B:If I.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:So I can show you all that.
Speaker A:But here I am.
Speaker A:They stand up to the website and they realize that the focus isn't really all of that.
Speaker A:True.
Speaker A:It's down.
Speaker A:It's down in those road.
Speaker A:It's in the roadmaps where you learn all the basics.
Speaker A:Now, we still have a section on my website called songs.
Speaker A:So if you go on the song section, it's broken down by level, so you can see beginner songs, you can see intermediate songs, you can see advanced, and you can get some of that.
Speaker A:You can get some cool stuff with that.
Speaker A:And actually, each song that I do on YouTube, I go on my website and I just.
Speaker A:We break that thing down even more on a website.
Speaker A:I tell them theory.
Speaker A:I tell them, here's why you need it, so they can get all that advanced stuff, too, on the website.
Speaker A:It's just that in terms of my road maps, which is the real vocabulary part, that's really.
Speaker A:Right now, it's our beginner section, our novice section, our competent section.
Speaker A:And I'm just going to be building those up for a while because I'm still developing.
Speaker A:You know, I said this on my video.
Speaker A:Y' all check out the new video I just come out with.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker A:It's gonna be a.
Speaker A:It's gonna be real.
Speaker A:It's gonna be an advanced video.
Speaker A:But I tell people, listen, I don't feel like I have all the answers.
Speaker A:Like, even though I.
Speaker A:Even though, you know, I feel like I'm discovering, you know, so.
Speaker A:So my whole thing is about discovery.
Speaker A:So my YouTube channel, I position it as me being a dis.
Speaker A:Somebody who's discovering music and not as I figured the whole thing out.
Speaker A:So then what I do is I.
Speaker A:I Listen to the song and we discover it together.
Speaker A:Let's discover it together.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:But.
Speaker A:Because like I told you guys before, I'm looking at that.
Speaker A:The forward.
Speaker A:I'm looking at the whole picture.
Speaker B:Higher level.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:So what happens is I can now reject things based on that, you know, because it's like having a core belief system.
Speaker A:You know what you can reject and, you know, what you can accept, right?
Speaker A:So everybody that I study, I'm like, okay, this is how it fits into the bigger picture.
Speaker A:So this is why that makes me a better teacher now.
Speaker A:Because I'm like, okay, I can reject this.
Speaker A:I got people sending me videos, man.
Speaker A:Check this dude out, man.
Speaker A:You need to break him down.
Speaker A:I go and listen to the video and I'm like, this.
Speaker A:No, this isn't.
Speaker A:This isn't.
Speaker A:This isn't it, man.
Speaker A:Like, he's not doing anything.
Speaker A:You know, they just looking at the crowd like, yeah, man, look at the crowd.
Speaker A:He's just sliding some notes.
Speaker A:He ain't doing nothing, man.
Speaker A:Like, so I gotta.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:So I gotta.
Speaker A:Yeah, but I gotta.
Speaker A:So I have to really educate people in terms of.
Speaker A:Now this.
Speaker A:What this person did is truly crazy.
Speaker A:Let me tell y' all why, you know, right?
Speaker A:But in other cases, somebody do something crazy and it sounds crazy, but it's just a triad.
Speaker A:It's just like a C triad, but it's.
Speaker A:But it's the placement, see?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:See, as a musician, what you do is you.
Speaker A:It's where you play stuff that makes you sound really incredible.
Speaker A:It's not.
Speaker A:It's not the fancy chord, see?
Speaker A:Corey Henry.
Speaker A:Let me tell you what Corey Henry does.
Speaker A:He takes these simple triads, right?
Speaker A:And he puts them where you would never expect, see?
Speaker A:And so people are like, what in the world is he doing?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And then I listen to it.
Speaker A:I'm like, oh, he's just doing a triad.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:You see, So a lot of stuff isn't just fancy chords.
Speaker A:It's your placement.
Speaker A:And that's why going back to that beginning helps you so much, because you can.
Speaker A:You can put some of your simple chords in some.
Speaker A:In some crazy place, and people will still look at you like you killing.
Speaker A:Because you know where to put this stuff, you know?
Speaker A:So with the triads, you would try, man.
Speaker C:I'm.
Speaker C:I'm wondering, as someone who's been teaching intermediate, I mean, you thought it was beginner, but intermediate to advance for a long time.
Speaker C:And then after years, went back to teaching basics.
Speaker C:What.
Speaker C:How was that experience?
Speaker C:Did you learn anything really?
Speaker C:Revisiting basics, like that.
Speaker A:Well, I think the.
Speaker A:I think the whole point is that, you know, one of the reasons why I made a business decision to name the site after myself, because it's really wanted to be personal to how I see music.
Speaker A:Simply because.
Speaker A:Simply because there's so many theories out there that I feel like I've actually maybe taken a, you know, just taking a kind of a different approach.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:And so here's one thing I learned with.
Speaker A:With about business that I really.
Speaker A:That really helped me, and I've actually told some people and they've used it, you know, with some success, and that is that you could only be good at what you are doing.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:What you are explaining.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:So I may not be good in somebody else's theory, but I'm good in explaining what I am doing.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:So basically what I'm doing is I'm.
Speaker A:I'm good at explaining my process.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And if my process is working for you, then I know I don't need to care about how the theory is done in other places because other people are saying, hey, it's working.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:I'm playing, I'm learning.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so, you know, I'm finding that, you know, for me, you know, I.
Speaker A:I really, it's, you know, I built the site and by the way, I didn't use anyone else to build the site.
Speaker A:I hand.
Speaker A:I hand do my entire site.
Speaker B:Oh, wow.
Speaker B:Ask you that too.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker A:We don't.
Speaker A:I didn't outsource that.
Speaker A:I.
Speaker A:I literally edit all my videos.
Speaker A:I don't take it to another editor.
Speaker A:I do all my YouTube videos.
Speaker A:I do my entire thing.
Speaker A:So my expenses are zero.
Speaker A:Obviously, you're gonna.
Speaker A:You're gonna pay for your hosting.
Speaker A:You know what I'm saying?
Speaker A:You're gonna pay for your hosting.
Speaker B:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:And now I'll say this.
Speaker A:We have almost 600 members, so that's a lot.
Speaker A:So, you know, I do have people I'm hiring in terms of, like, I have a community manager who goes and checks things for me.
Speaker A:I have people in the chat box, you know, so I'm paying people.
Speaker A:So, you know, we have.
Speaker A:We have people that gotta pay for stuff like that, but in terms of just, you know, organizing the site, building it up to where it is, that was.
Speaker A:That was me having to learn all that stuff on my own and just kind of doing it little by little.
Speaker B:That's impressive.
Speaker B:Do you find time to do anything else?
Speaker B:Like, are you performing?
Speaker B:Are you writing?
Speaker A:Do you get nothing now?
Speaker A:I mean.
Speaker A:Well, here's the thing.
Speaker A:Here's the thing, you know, because of what I told you before.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:You know, I feel like I have to, if I stop playing with a band, then I feel like I'm gonna lose my edge.
Speaker A:So, So I play in a Popcorn, which is a little bit north of Orlando.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker A:And I played with the band bass players.
Speaker A:Frank Bruno, he used to, he used to play for Fred Hammond and William McDowell.
Speaker A:So these are guys who are like on a high level.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:So I like that because that still helps me keep that synergy going.
Speaker A:Because if I just stay with teaching, I feel like I would lose, you know, I have to be in it to be able to explain things.
Speaker A:Good.
Speaker A:So I still have that.
Speaker A:But in terms of your question, I also still teach, but it's all online.
Speaker A:So I've dropped any teaching that is not online.
Speaker A:So, so that means that's kind of really where I'm at right now is like, okay, everything I'm doing throughout the week is an online based.
Speaker B:Understood.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:And then it's only on weekends that I have to show up at churches and I play for a church on Saturday and Sunday, so I'll travel for those and.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:You know, but as far as gigging and all that kind of stuff, it wouldn't make sense for me from a money standpoint.
Speaker C:It's like, yeah, live outside of all this.
Speaker C:So you're like, oh, much.
Speaker C:And then you do both Saturdays and Sundays and you play all these gigs and you edit your own videos, which Tariqi's been watching me try to figure out some editing for some really basic stuff.
Speaker C:And it's been taking me days.
Speaker A:Difficult.
Speaker C:When do you live?
Speaker B:Yeah, when do you.
Speaker A:That's a good, that's a great question.
Speaker A:That's a great question.
Speaker A:And you know, I think right now I'm focused on the grind, you know, because I know that as far as, you know, being an entrepreneur, when you're, when you're starting something, if, if nobody else is going to do it, you're, you're doing basically everything.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:So I do have Fridays and Mondays where I kind of take it easy.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:So what I do on those days is I do a lot of, I do a lot of my appointments on those days, but even on those days, I, I, I, I put my appointments in a certain time block.
Speaker B:Right.
