The Music Lesson

Transcript

Hi there! My name is Singer. I'm with the tutoring service.

I. .. Oh! I can see from the look on your face, you must not have gotten the email the company sent.

.. I keep telling them they have to do this by text. I'm so sorry.

So, your assigned tutor is out sick, and I got a last-minute call asking if I could fill in for her. She'll be back after the weekend, but I just. ..

I was on my way home. I was done for the day. I had an open.

.. sorry, an open spot in my afternoon, and I was happy to take it. If you.

.. you know, if that's okay with you. I know this is unexpected.

If you want to reschedule, that's perfectly fine. Okay, well, thanks so much. I really appreciate that.

Of course. Absolutely. Oh, wow! This is a lovely place.

I must admit, I'm a little bit jealous. You do a really good job keeping it. Mine is a little bit more chaotic, but.

.. Okay, no, we're not. ..

Sorry, I'm not here to complain about myself. So, how many lessons have you had so far? Oh, this is going to be your first.

Oh, okay. No, that's perfectly fine. That's totally fine.

I just had to modify. They didn't tell me this. I'm so sorry.

Sometimes these things get a little mixed up, but we'll get on track. We'll get you some plans set up, and we'll. ..

So, what is it that you're looking to learn? Oh, excellent! You're a piano player.

Oh, I love that. Okay. Wonderful.

And you sing! Well, I mean. ..

You don't have to sing for people to sing. As long as you sing, that's. ..

As long as you enjoy it and you do it, that's what singing is, right? Yeah, no, I can help you with both of those. I don't imagine you're.

.. I mean, you kind of have the look of a poet about you. I don't want to be presumptuous, but.

.. By any chance, are you someone who is interested in songwriting but doesn't like to say so? You know, I can help you with that, too.

I'm actually primarily a music theorist for the company. I teach reading and writing music more than I usually teach any particular instrument. So I'm happy to take you through some basics if this is your first lesson.

That's. .. This is your piano, is it? No, it's.

.. I mean, I know it's a keyboard, but. ..

It has white keys and black keys. We can call it a piano for today. That's fine.

Okay, well, I can show you some things that I think you can use to get started here. We'll start fairly basic. So you can sit down on the bench there, and I will pull up a.

.. I'll just pull up. ..

Oh, wow, you really don't have a lot of small chairs, do you? Oh, okay. Well, I mean, you know, if you don't.

.. If I won't be, you know, squishing you too much, sure. I'll just get right on the bench with you.

Okay. Yeah, we're. ..

We're cozy. This is great. Alright, so.

.. So when we're. ..

So before you get started writing music, let's just talk for a second about what music is, right? We know that music is made up of notes. We know that.

But the question, then. .. The question is, what is a note? So a note is what happens when a sound wave has a consistent length and hits the ear steadily.

For example, let's take an A, right? That's an A. Now, what you're hearing there.

.. That's what happens when sound waves hit your ear at exactly 440 waves per second. When you stretch the wave out and make it longer so that it hits your ear less frequently, which we call lowering the frequency, then the sound goes down.

If you shorten the wave so that it hits the ear more often, then the sound goes up. This is 440 waves per second. If we go up to the next A, that's 880.

It's exactly doubled. If we go down to the next A, that's 220. It's exactly half.

The reason that they're all called A instead of having their own names is because they fit perfectly, one inside the other. When they are perfectly in sync, it's like there's just one note being played. Anyway, so that's the building blocks of where all music comes from.

That's what we start with. Now, we call this distance between two notes that fit perfectly. ..

We call it an octave. Which, I mean, it's octo. It comes from eight.

It refers to the fact that that's one section of a scale containing eight notes, generating 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. A scale is all the notes between one note and its next octave up. If you play every single note that can be played in between them, we call that a chromatic scale, like a rainbow.

It's a spectrum of everything. A chromatic scale would sound like this. You play every possible note that can be played.

Those are your options. There's a total of 12. In between one C, for example, and the next C.

So you have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and then we're back to 1. And it repeats. And back to 1.

Endlessly up and endlessly down. But when we play a scale, when we play a normal scale, we take out five of those 12 notes. And we never take out two that are right next to each other.

If you're wondering why there are white keys and black keys on a piano, it's because all of the white keys are the notes on the C major scale. All the black keys are the notes that aren't. A major scale is one we've all heard.

It sounds like this, right? Everyone knows that pattern, right? It doesn't matter if you've ever played an instrument.

The odds are, in your life, at some point, you've heard that. So that's a major scale. And that's what we'll be working with today.

We'll talk about other kinds of scales, but we'll stick with the major scale today. Now, sorry. I get so excited whenever I get to teach this primordial aspect of it, because it's just.

.. I don't know. I think it's amazing how it works.

I really do. Because, I mean, yes, it's mathematical, and yet, it's art, right? It carries such passion, such feeling.

It can mean and say so much. It cannot help but affect your emotions, one way or another. Whether it has the effect it's trying to, or has the opposite, it's going to do something to you.

That's kind of why it's art. Sorry, I'm just waxing poetic here. Okay, so let's move on.

I don't mean to waste your time. I apologize if I'm a little bit all over the place. I don't know why I'm so short of breath today.

I'm sure it's just been a long day. I will get myself together for you. Okay, so the major scale is actually mathematical.

It's numbers. Dry, passionless numbers. Every step up in a scale is either what we call a semitone, or the equivalent of two of those, which we call a tone.

We call them tones and semitones. I personally like to think of them as ones and twos. This is the smallest possible distance between two notes.

I call that a one-step. I know that's not an official term. I just like to think of it that way.

A tone is the space of two of those. I call that a two-step. So a scale is a collection of ones and twos.

It's a pattern, seven steps upward. A major scale is 2-2-1, 2-2-2-1, like a phone number, right? You pick your starting note, and you go up.

2-2-1, 2-2-2-1. That's your major scale. It doesn't matter where you start.

That's your major scale. Pick any note and follow that pattern, right? 2-2-1, 2-2-2-1.

2-2-1, 2-2-2-1. It works everywhere, because music is mathematical. I know that makes it super nerdy, and I apologize if that's off-putting to you.

That's one of the reasons why it's so beautiful to me. Here we are using this as art. We're using this to express to each other and help each other feel.

And yet, at its core, this is all numbers. This is all non-visible geometry. We're using math to make each other smile, and make each other cry, and make each other dance.

Make each other's hearts beat faster. Bring each other closer. Create shared experiences.

It's a universal language, because numbers are two. I'm sorry, what was I saying? Oh, that's right! Scales, of course.

Okay, so now that we have our scale, we can build our chord. The most basic of chords is just two notes. Take the first note of the scale, and then the fifth note.

This is called an open fifth chord. These two notes feature in a number of different chords that can be built within the scale, but you'll quite often see the first and the fifth. Now, you can build larger chords using just those two notes going up and down the scale here.

That's just first, fifth, first, fifth, first, fifth. If we want to make a major chord, we add the third. That's a major chord.

So now, once we have those patterns, one, three, five, we can build them into combinations, and we can build our songs. You figure out which chords go underneath the tunes you want to sing, and you work your music to fit those chords. So if you're working in C major, when I say something's in the key of C major, it means all the notes we're going to be using, or at least most of the notes we're going to be using, are found on the C major scale.

That's a song in the key of C major. That's what that means, if you've ever wondered. Anyway, you'll use a number of different chords, but the vast majority of songs only ever use three or four, sometimes more.

But you'd be amazed. The vast majority of songs throughout history use just a small handful of chords and build everything around that. So once you have a few chords in mind, you can build songs of your own.

I like to, when I'm just playing around, if you're looking for an easy pattern to try, on your left hand, play an open fifth. So let's take C, for example. Play the first, the fifth, and then the eighth, the next first, right? With your right hand, play the third, the fifth, and the first.

So you get these six notes. And you can start anywhere, and it still works. So once you have first, fifth, first, third, fifth, first, right? First, fifth, first, third, fifth, first.

Move that pattern anywhere. I got distracted for a second there. I guess I'm not used to being looked at the way you're looking at me.

I'm so sorry, that was very unprofessional of me. I don't know what came over me. No, no, you're very forgiving, but I should control myself.

I am a professional. I will keep it together. You hired me to teach you music and not to talk about my feelings.

So let's, I apologize. So now that you have this position, this is an exercise you can do. Build yourself a pattern, whatever you want it to be, right? Just pick something.

And you're going to move it from one chord position to another. Let's go to Bb. Same pattern, different scale, and back up.

Let's go back to Bb now. Down to F. And up.

So. .. I'm not telling you that I don't like it, but I have to point out that your hand is on my thigh, and I'm not used to this.

I just want to make sure that I'm not misinterpreting this signal, because I've kind of been wrong about this before, and I just. .. Oh my god.

Oh. Oh wow. I.

.. Oh my god. I assume that.

.. You don't want me to keep the lesson going for now? You do? I mean, oh my god.

Oh, your hands, oh my god. Okay, I mean it's very. ..

Oh, your lips. Oh god, I love having lips on my neck. I love the way you kiss my neck.

Well, I could try. I could keep talking. I could keep playing like this, but I guess I could.

.. Oh my god. Oh wow, okay.

Here, let me help you with that. This is a. ..

I hate these shirts, they always make us wear these. They're so hard to get on and off. Oh, there we go.

Oh god, you're so beautiful. God, you are so gorgeous. Oh.

Oh. Okay. Oh yes, oh, your mouth is amazing.

Oh, okay. No, I'm sorry, the lesson. Yes, so.

.. You said you were singing, right? You like to sing? Oh wow.

Oh, you're getting right down to your knees. Oh my god. So, singing.

So, you're. .. You are.

.. You're singing because you love to sing, right? You don't.

.. A lot of my students tell me that. ..

Oh my god. Tell me that it is hard. ..

They find that when they're soft, it's really hard to stay in control, and it's only when they are just belting out the big notes that it's. .. They feel like they really have it in hand.

Oh wow. Oh my god. You can take those off.

Oh my god. Oh god, I'm so hard for you. You really want me to keep.

.. Your hands, your hands. Oh my god, your hands.

You're right, you are the customer. Okay, so, if you're going to be singing. ..

Oh my god. Especially if you're going to be singing and playing. Yes.

Yeah, like that. Oh god. If you're going to be singing and playing, you need your lungs to be filled.

Oh yes. You need to keep your lungs as full as you can. You want to have air inside you.

Oh, that's how you control your notes. And the. ..

The average person only really breathes into the upper part of their lungs. So, the trick is to breathe down all the way down into your belly first and then your chest. Let your belly expand and then your chest breathe deep.

Fill the depths of you before you fill the shallows. Oh god. Oh my god.

I am. .. I am.

.. I am. ..

Oh, I have not been teased by lips like that in a long time. Oh god. Oh, you're amazing.

Okay, I'll keep going. I'll keep going. No, I'm sorry.

Yes. You want to breathe deep. Oh god.

Yes, deep. Oh god, your mouth. Oh.

Oh. Oh. Yes.

Yes. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I'll keep going. I'll keep going. Please, I will too.

Okay. Oh, you're trying to hit the highest notes. You're trying to keep control when it's all the way up there.

You don't want to push to get up. The trick is to get. ..

Think from above it like you're reaching high above it and then coming down to it. Sitting down on top of it. Oh, yes.

Yes. And if you're trying to reach the lowest, the deepest notes you can, the trick is to drop your jaw. Oh god, relax.

Oh, your throat. Like that, yes. Oh god.

Okay. Okay. Oh my god, you're amazing.

You are amazing. Okay. I love what you're doing.

You are blowing my mind. But I just. ..

Please, I want to taste you so badly. I want to taste you. You do not have to stop doing this.

It's amazing. Oh god, please let me taste you. Will you do it? Oh, thank you so much.

Okay. Alright. Let me just lay down on the floor for you here.

Oh god. Oh yes. Oh god, I am so happy you're just wearing a skirt.

Oh, that is so perfect. Yes, come straight on my face. Come straight on my face.

Oh, wow. Oh my god, your panties are soaked. Oh, it's so beautiful.

Oh god, your thighs are so warm. Oh yes, you're so sexy. Oh god, your mouth.

I'll pull these to the side. Oh god, you're so wet for me. Oh wow.

Your gorgeous clit is so swollen for me. Oh my god. That sexy ass feels so good in my hands.

Oh god. Oh god, yes, yes, yes. Oh, you're so good.

Oh, you're so good. Oh my god. Now I know.

If I could taste you. Oh god, I want to feel what it's like inside. Can I slip just one of my fingers in you? Or two.

Whatever you like. Oh yes.