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#Post#: 16672--------------------------------------------------
Reading Music vs Reading Text
By: Nikola Date: June 8, 2019, 11:18 am
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I was going to write about this in the discussion about learning
new scripts because I was wondering how much these two were
connected but then I found the article below and decided to
start a new thread instead.
I was wondering if the "deadline" for learning a new script
would also apply to reading sheet music because I felt they
weren't too dissimilar. It's a code which consists of symbols
that refer to certain sounds, after all. Moreover, it's partly
iconic (the higher the symbol is on the staff, the higher the
pitch). The trouble is, I am hopelessly dyslexic when it comes
to reading sheet music, even though I gave it a good go when I
was a kid. I understand the system and I can play several
instruments (not well but still), so I "speak the language", I
just can't "read" it, even if it's a tune I know.
Well, I was wrong. According to the article, reading music is a
whole other kettle of fish. Some people who suffered brain
injury and were not able to read text anymore, were still able
to read music, and vice versa. Turns out the up-and-down scale I
thought would make it easier, actually adds more challenge (as
you're already going left-to-right) and you have to watch the
duration on top of that. The processes behind reading music
sound so complex, I don't feel so bad for not being able to do
it anymore. Also, it sounds like musical dyslexia (dysmusia)
really exists.
HTML https://theconversation.com/how-the-brain-reads-music-the-evidence-for-musical-dyslexia-39550
#Post#: 16674--------------------------------------------------
Re: Reading Music vs Reading Text
By: Susan Date: June 8, 2019, 2:29 pm
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Your comment is making me think more about something I thought
about regarding the other thread about reading scripts. There
are some basic skills that reading one kind of material would
probably help you with others, but there are differences in the
skills as well. I remember that playing Dance, Dance,
Revolution, with having to read the musical symbols, helped
children learn visual sequencing skills which helped them learn
to read. The nuerons store some basic visual skills which both
types of reading share, and it is helpful to lay that foundation
in the early years, which can later become more specialized.
However, there are other things that are not shared.
English and Spanish share most of the same script. However, in
English there are not dots and squiggles over letters-- it only
has the i, and the dot is frequently omitted in handwriting
because it really isn´t that essential for meaning. Those
accent marks in Spanish are essential for meaning. Still,
reading English and Spanish share most of the same skills.
To me, it looks like Arabic and Chinese would be a whole
different ballgame-- that I would have some skills to slowly
discern the script, but it would be difficult for my brain to
intuitively accept that those tiny differences in where the dots
and the patterns are are so critical--my brain would have a
tendency to ignore things and I would have to teach myself to
see them. I have been taught to ignore alot of subtle
differences in the handwriting in English that do not affect the
meaning.
I was thinking about hearing in college that eskimos had
something like 40 different words for different types of snow.
Learning those words, and the observations about how to
categorize the different types of snow, if learned in early
childhood, would make someone observe things that adults from
warmer climates would ignore. I think it would be very hard for
adults from places that do not pay that much attention to the
qualities of snows, to learn to do so in adulthood. Our brains
are taught to only discriminate what is important.
My guess is that somewhat literate in reading one language could
learn to read another language easier than an adult who had
never learned to read any language or to read music-- because
they would lack some basic skills which most of us have spent
many, many hours developing. But some languages are so
different that knowing how to read a different language only
helps a bit-- because there are huge areas of having to learn to
pay attention to what your other languages have taught you to
ignore as meaningless.
I recently started to learn to play the harmonica. I can read
music for the piano, so learning to read the harmonica music is
not too bad. But still there are differences and it does not
come as quickly, like a language that only has some basic
differences.
#Post#: 16716--------------------------------------------------
Re: Reading Music vs Reading Text
By: SHL Date: June 9, 2019, 11:02 pm
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Wow- all I can say is hats off to anyone who can read music. It
looks to me like trying to read Chinese or Arabic. I‘d be
hopeless trying to figure that stuff out.
And, if Susan can read music for a piano, that is something. I
couldn’t get close to a skill like that (and I’m probably too
old to learn anyway).
But, then I‘m the guy whose English language skills are not up
to English Stack Exchanges‘ „quality standards,“ and, of course,
they find my „foreign language orthography“ to be „off-putting“.
Then those geeks blocked me before I could tell them what I
thought of their „quality standards“ myself. I was ready to fire
a good one back at them. :'(
But, reading music? Great if you can, but I‘m not the one.
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