[Shooter]

Hey. I'm not sure how many people here read music, but I'm having a bitch of a time improving my sight reading. I can read music, of course, but just doing it quickly is really difficult. I have to sit and figure it out, then play it... I can't just do it as I play. Any advice? Thanks.

[ShawnFjellstad]

just sight read a lot. you'll slowly get better at it as you start to recognize rhythmic patterns. also, it helps to familiarize yourself with how certain intervals look. if you see a note that is a full line (staff? i had a brain fart and forgot what this is called...) away from another note, you can recognize it as a third, and jump to that note without having to think so quickly about finding the note on your guitar.

do you know all of the notes on the fretboard? that's really important as well.

[The Dark Wolf]

Originally Posted by Shooter

Hey. I'm not sure how many people here read music, but I'm having a bitch of a time improving my sight reading. I can read music, of course, but just doing it quickly is really difficult. I have to sit and figure it out, then play it... I can't just do it as I play. Any advice? Thanks.

Advice I received while studying classical guitar at college.

1. Write down note names on the score. It helps for faster identification. You'll quickly begin to associate note names with the marks on the staff.
2. Write down chord names above chords/arpeggios. It helps for finger positioning. You'll be thinking, "Ah, ok! An inversion of A minor here!" instead of, "Hmm, ok... C... E...A..."
3. Make little diagrams above the notes and patterns in the score. Again, like above, helps with finger positioning. You can write a triangle, for a triangle shaped chord (like D major), or little tab-like notes.


Basically, mark the fuck out of your score. Write all over it, and then just keep at it. It's a helluva a way to pick up sight reading relatively fast.


Hope this helps you.

[The Dark Wolf]

Gonna sticky this one too, on a trial basis, see if it helps.

Sight reading is an important element of traditional theory education. Sadly, many of us lack in this area (myself included. I'm rusty as hell.) Mastery isn't necessary, but a modicum of proficiency is useful. Like the old joke goes, "Wanna confuse a guitar player? Put some sheet music in front of him."

[Michael]

I spent a lot of time sight reading when I was having theory lessons a while back. It helped me to start out with some really basic stuff. Like, acending straight up scales, little melodies in beginer books and also using the correct fingering types. If you memerise the fingering types in a range of positions it will take the focus away from the technical side of things and allow you to focus more on what you're reading.

Also, this is probably a bit obvious but try not to read/play over the same thing(s) too many times. Or at least allow some time to pass before you play/read the same thing again.

Originally Posted by The Dark Wolf

"Wanna confuse a guitar player? Put some sheet music in front of him."

[Durero]

A method book can be very helpful for this.

I'd recommend Music Reading for Guitar
Music Reading for Guitar Musicians Institute Press Series from Music 44

[distressed_romeo]

I've been working a lot at reading recently, with all the classical pieces I've been practicing. Bob, I'm going to experiment with your method of marking the score and see if it speeds things up.

[The Dark Wolf]

I actually learned that from some very accomplished musicians, DR.

[Xtremevillan]

This topic is for me.

I started to do basic one note sight reading and then just stopped. Now I forgot it all.

[josh821]

I think it's intimidating when you think about doing it but once you get into it and start figuring things out it seems to come pretty naturally. I just started reading on guitar like a month ago. I was very good at sight reading when I was younger from playing trumpet but with that you don't have to play chords or worry about what position to play each note in. I think that's why I waited so long to learn on guitar.

I think the just do it idea is the most obvious. I've gotten in the habit of translating notation into tab while I'm at work too which helps. Actually, before I started trying to sight read on guitar I spent a couple weeks using this fretboard trainer which has helped tremendously.

While we're talking about notation, I have a question that someone out there may know the answer to. What on earth do all these CVIII and other roman numeral markings on the top of this piece mean??