One thing we all realized but never really discussed was that we all came from different musical backgrounds and experiences. Being 34 sprints into our band’s existence this became very evident with terminology and theory. During our sprint boundaries/jams, one person would say something like “that’s in D Dorian”, “we’re doing 5/4”, “that’s a blues A” or, “It’s C but I’m throwing in an accidental” – maybe the rest of us would know what the heck he was talking about or maybe we wouldn’t. We discussed the differences at a high level and came to the conclusion that to stream-line our communications and to better play together it would be best to have a separate (from our sprint boundary) meeting to talk theory. It seemed reasonable that a lunch discussion every-other week, on the week opposite of our sprint boundary/Jam nights, would be good.
We decided that we would take turns in presenting a topic for the lunch discussions. That person would bring the info needed to support the discussion from which we’d all learn. We’d rotate with each band member taking a turn at coming up with a topic. Anything was fair game but we also decided to start with pure basics: timing, key signatures, scales, modes, chords, etc. It is really quite amazing how quickly the conversations became rich with details we were sharing with each other and then realizing how much we really didn’t know. We always seemed to have questions we’d need to look up. If we didn’t have a computer with us or care to look it up on our phones at the time then one or more of us would look it up later and share it on our Slack chat.
Not only have the lunch studies improved our overall knowledge of music, it has helped streamline our communications during jams and sprint boundaries, and has had some unintended benefits. For example, in talking about tempo and timing, Brian discussed how important it is to follow him on the drums. We’ve practiced that every jam we’ve had since that lunch. We’re not as regular as we’d like to be with the lunches but we get them in as often as possible.
What do WE know? Well, more than we did before. AND enough to know we still need to keep learning!
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