I've been tracking my sight reading practice for four years using an iPad app, storing the results and plotting them. I am still seeing progress even after four years.
Very commendable but I never got the hang of reading score and playing. Even if I could manage some bars, it never stuck. I will definitely try again.
However, meanwhile I am learning the basic skills - starting with chord progressions in different keys (and as a side effect learning different scales) - and I am able to enjoy learning and playing music without the stress and anxiety of sight reading.
I have found a teacher (online from London) who follows this harmony first approach - and it has really changed the game for me.
Different approach and journey - but the destination is probably the same.
I have found being able to sight read relatively easily to unlock a vast trove of music I'd like to be able to play which would have been harder to pick up purely by ear. It's definitely worth learning the things you're talking about. I found the surest way to get good at that kind of playing is to play with other people. The time dependence of having to keep up with everyone makes the feedback really tight.
Playing with other people also highlights other perhaps unexpected skills. I played in a band for a while and I still retain the skill of reading chords off other player's hands. You also need to be able to respond to someone just shouting "OK, let's go to C minor" in ways that only matter in that context. When you're listening or sight reading, you don't need names.
I agree. Sight reading does open up avenues - and my ultimate goal is improvization. I love to analyze various pieces and understand the functional aspects of tunes - so that I don’t need to rely on reading or remembering.
That is why JazzSkills.com really worked for me. You can find several free videos on their YouTube channel - https://m.youtube.com/@JazzSkills
I almost gave up on learning and playing music after struggling for years / decades - and by happenstance came across JazzSkills few years ago. And since then every single day I get joy in learning and playing music.
For me it's less about melody and harmony than it is about rhythm, I often need to see or notate a syncopated rhythm in order to "get" it. Though that might just mean I haven't internalized a lot of syncopated rhythms.
Sight reading never really ends - I tested a friend (professional virtuoso) when he was drunk at a noisy party and he sight read one of the Chopin song transcriptions by Liszt (I deliberately chose something a bit obscure).
Nothing quite as crushing as seeing people sight read things that would take you months/years to learn with the score... :)
The charts are neat. Are you using any insights gained from the data collection to guide your practice?
I'm not tracking my music practice (maybe I should) but I've been wearing a health tracker for years and have collected a ton of data. None of it seems very actionable because there have been no surprises.
These charts are serving a few purposes. First of all, it is motivating to me to see improvement. I can see for instance learning curve dropout when I skip practice, and knowing what a gap will look like on the chart motivates me to keep going. I also use the key-specific curves to choose keys to focus on, so that I don't keep going on the ones I know well. I'm planning to add some more visualisation to understand if there is a pattern to perhaps sharps or flats being harder, or if there is a sharp to flat transition effect which I suspect at the moment - after playing a few days where all the keys are sharps, it feels weird to move to flats.
I played horn for 4 years in middle and high school. Never got good at sight reading. But never really enjoyed playing either, practice was always a drudgery . Finally admitted to myself that I just didn't like it and quit.
