File: smithreuben-oh-learningtunes_M.mp3
Speakers:
RS –Reuben Smith
KP – Curator Ken Perlman
RS Learning tunes? Well, I...
KP Did you just get them in your head?
RS Yeah, I just get them in my head. I used to go to the dances and that, and if somebody played something I liked, I always remembered it. And if I thought it was something I'd like to play, I'd probably go home and take a crack at it before I went to bed, while I still had it fresh in my memory. And then, of course, you remembered it. If you can get a note of it all on this thing here (indicates fiddle), you'll remember what key it was you tried to play it in, and you get it after a while. Sometimes you'd start off, and you'd be learnin on the wrong key and you'd have to start over again; that's still a problem for me.
KP How long would you have to listen to a tune before you would get it in those days?
RS Well, not too much. I never had much problem that way. I used to have a good ear for music, I think I can say that, that I had a good ear for learning tunes. Not for possibly playing them so good. But I mean for learning them, I could get them in my mind – I could go over to Cape Breton there and come back with a whole net full of them in my mind. If I heard them there I'd recognize them. I think if you like music well enough, then there's certain - Of course there's certain tunes I guess, that appeal to you more than others. And if you like those, you'll learn them faster, eh. That's the way I thought about it anyhow. I always liked learning them just by ear. It gave me great satisfaction to learn that now. You can listen to somebody that plays by ear and you can always hear those little notes and stuff that you don't get [from notation]. They've got them in there. If you listen long enough, you'll hear them, you'll get them. Mostly you get people that play the fiddle, who learn to play by ear, they play snappy music and it's good and lively – Gets your feet a-tapping, I think.
