The Beatles didn't, neither did The Pistols. Does this mean that you can get by without reading music?

Musical notation in Western music was first developed in Medieval times by monks and clerics working in and around the great monasteries of Europe. By the time of the Renaissance it had become sophisticated enough to enable a composer to write complex and artful music played by large numbers of instrumentalists. In a world without the gramophone or the tape recorder the possibilities of notated music were such that it was adopted by the monarchies, aristocracies and religious orders. It became the affluent music.

During all this time there were traditions of Folk and Dance music, handed down and enriched through generations, which did not rely on notation. This music by and large was always the music of the poor and uneducated; the Devil's music.

As the power and sophistication or orchestras increased, the ancient unwritten forms of Europe decreased in significance, so that by the 1940's and 50's the predominant popular music, dominated by Tin Pan Alley, was a written creed. Its protagonists had a fair smattering of musical theory and many of the artistic intentions of the middle class.

Then came Rock and Roll...

And the rest you know. Needless to say, Presley, The Beatles, Hendrix and The Sex Pistols never read music — or needed to. The Devil's music finally had its come-uppance, liberated by the invention of sound recording. However, George Martin read music and was thus able to contribute greatly to the music of The Beatles, and even today Jazz revivalists and perfect Pop-ists still find a use for musical notation.

So what's the answer? Should you feel inferior for being one of music's unlettered, or proud to inherit the most ancient traditions of Western music? To answer this, what better than a debate between eight semi-randomly selected members of the music bizz. Let it begin: Chair (reads the motion); "This house believes that written music has no place in Pop music."

FOR

AGAINST

Matthew Seligman, (non-reader. Bassist with Tom Dolby, played Bowie gig at Live Aid, retired): "I don't think there is a place for reading music in the sphere of music I'm in. You don't write Pop music, you make it up. It's completely different and I've always kept myself dumb on purpose. I've just tried to be a natural which means that sometimes I'm great and sometimes I fuck up because I haven't got a technique to resort to when I'm not inspired. I think a lot more people could play music but they don't because it's presented as such an Ivory Tower. I think that Pop music is for a much more radical sort of talent than just what you'd call a musician."

Tony Visconti (Reader, super producer of David Bowie, Marc Bolan, Thin Lizzy and Elaine Page): "I've never agreed with the idea that reading music and learning about it destroys your creativity. As a music reader I feel confident that I won't become outmoded in the way that a musician relying on a computer will when his computer is outmoded. I don't think there is an excuse to not learn music."

Neil Conti (Onetime reader, now lapsed. Drummer with Prefab Sprout, Bowie at Live Aid): "I'm not interested in being a musician who's just going to relay someone else's ideas. I'm much more interested in coming up with the part myself. I think if musicians worked harder to use their ears they wouldn't need written music because they would be able to pick things up more quickly. You might need it for an orchestra but not for what you might call Contemporary Modern Music."

Alan Winstanley (Partial reader. Producer of Madness, Dexys Midnight Runners, Lloyd Cole, Jagger, Bowie): "When I was a kid I was a big Beatles fan and the big thing about The Beatles was that they didn't read music. And so I thought if they can't do it, fine. But sometimes I regret not reading music because of things like harmonies. What I have to do is picture a piano keyboard or to a piano and work it out, whereas a guy who could read music could suss out quite quickly what notes go with what."

Brian Travis (Partial reader. Saxophonist with UB40): "None of us ever did read music, but it hasn't affected the band, like it hasn't affected any other band. Most people don't read music, they just make it up. I read a little simply because I play saxophone — it's not an instrument like the guitar where everyone knows one chord. I went to this old geezer to learn Jazz and along with the lessons came a little theory which was absolutely no good and bored me to tears."

Dean Garcia (Non reader. Bassist with Eurythmics, Feargal Sharkey, and State of Play): "Working with Dave and Annie the things we do are quite simple really and rely on a lot of feel. I don't think not being able to read is a burden in anyway. Early on I thought it was really important to learn to read in order to become successful. But what changed my mind was playing in my room and realising that it was possible to excite oneself just by playing what one knew, and just getting the phone call to do the Eurythmics stuff was a major boost for me."

Neil Conti: "We don't use any music for the purposes of the band. Paddy (McAloon) is pretty much self-taught and he uses tape recorders to record his ideas. A lot of people seem to do that nowadays, even for sessions. It's a similar idea because you're being given a rough ideas but you don't have to follow anything exactly."

Matt Aitken: (Reader. Producer of Princess, Dead or Alive, Hazell Dean, The Three Degrees): "In our capacity as producers neither Mike Stock or I ever find it necessary to read. The only time I use it is when I'm doing a drum programme where I quickly jot down slight differences in drum fills just for reference's sake."

Tony Visconti: "I generally jot down loads of musical ideas when I'm producing at the beginning of a session. In actual fact most musicians really like this because they are amazed to see their music in written form. When I was working with Marc Bolan he used to hum ideas and I would write them down and then a couple of days later we would go into the studio and I'd have the string parts already written. Marc always used to be amazed by this; he used to think it was a sort of magic."

Dean Garcia: "Annie Lennox was classically trained at the Royal College of Music, and she often writes things down when we're working in the studio. I think she does it partly for memory and partly just because she just likes writing down what she's doing and to keep it. She writes out both her voice parts and keyboard parts unless they're quick spontaneous things that she wants to go for straightaway."

Your career choice

Chair: "Perhaps the demands are different depending on whether you want to go into production, just play in a band or pursue a solo career as a singer or songwriter?"

Alan Winstanley: "It is a little bit funny that we're working with arrangers like Ann Dudley or David Bedford. If we could read the score in front of us we'd be able to communicate a lot better. But I'm not saying that everyone should read because there are a lot of talented people around that don't read."

Greg Walsh (Reader. Producer of Heaven 17, Big Sound Authority): "I've worked in studios where the tape op can actually read music and that's amazing because they can actually read the score and write the tape times onto it, so when you want to go to some point on the track for drop-ins he can actually roll the tape straight there. If I was interviewing people for a job in a studio I would definitely consider music reading an advantage. I know a lot of producers who don't read music. If you're on the technical side then your strength is in your abilities working with the equipment, and then you can rely more on arrangers and the band themselves. But if you want to work on the musical aspects then reading music is definitely an asset."

Tony Visconti: "I am perhaps a producer in the vein of George Martin. But other producers who began around the same time as me are not around now because they didn't have the versatility that music reading gives you. Martin Rushent is more of dinosaur than me because all he does is get musicians in and sample them, because he can not communicate his ideas to them."

Chair: "Elsewhere in this magazine Richard Coles mentions that it is essential to read music in order to do sessions."

Neil Conti: "No-one's ever asked me to read. When I first came to London about six years ago people told me that if I wanted to do sessions I'd have to learn to read music, but I've not been asked once. I actually did do a muzak session for a Radio 2 test card thing and I had some music in front of me. I didn't have time to make head or tail of it so I just looked at it and played. I managed to get through it okay because if you're a drummer there are certain beats for which you basically know what they want, and as long as it sounds good you can get away with it."

Matthew Seligman: "When I do sessions either they send me a tape or I make up a part when I get in there. I know nothing about harmony or chords. But I've never felt the need to read because I've never wanted to be just a session player."

Matt Aitken: "I have quite a good grounding in theory, which I think is helpful. I find that musicians who can read are better musicians because generally they have mastered more than one style. As opposed to the drummer in the band who just has to play his own parts in a certain style. Generally people who can read have researched more deeply into things, and I would advise people to learn because then they can learn about music from books as well."

Greg Walsh: "But I think there's a danger there, in that if you know that a D is next to a C and that the notes clash you might not try that. But that's wrong because 'right' is what sounds right."

Tony Visconti: "In America there is more of a music reading attitude. Few people dare to set foot inside a studio if they cannot read. They have a saying over there that in England it doesn't matter if you can only play three chords providing you've got the right haircut. But anyway I prefer to work in England because the musicians are more experimental."

Alan Winstanley: "Mind you Steve Nieve went to the Royal Academy and he reads, so he must bean exception to the rule because he experiments a lot. Most of the time he just plays by ear, and we've learnt to record all the takes he does because he never does the samething twice."

Is ignorance bliss?

Chair: "Are there any situations where non-readers are actually better off?"

Neil Conti: "I think there's a lot of musicians who are stuck if you take the music away from them, and I think that's an awful state to be in. There's a lot of people who should develop their ears more but don't because they get to rely almost on having the music programmed into them. Some people can't improvise at all and I think that's a real shame."

Brian Travis: "A lot of saxophone players are intimidated by Charlie Parker and Coltrane and Eric Dolphy, whereas I'm not because I'm not trying to compete. So I play something which is easy for me and I can play well, and because of that it will be original.

Matthew Seligman: "The test for whether a song is any good is whether you can remember it, which makes reading a bit redundant."

Brian Travis: "If you can't remember the music yourself and it's not thought provoking and inspirational other people can't be expected to remember it. I don't see myself as a Classical or Jazz Player. I'm just a saxophone player in a Pop band and the criteria for that is to make songs that people like and remember."

Matthew Seligman: "I'm just anti-muso. If I walk into a room I've got to make something good up. I'm not going to hide behind my technique. There's a difference between good basslines and good bass playing."

Neil Conti: "That happens with drums as well. People get these drum manuals and learn what's in them and then just trot them out. I'd much rather get an idea and then go away and practise it, or be inspired by one of Paddy's songs."

Brian Travis: "In the street where I live there's a couple of kids I give saxophone lessons to and I tell them that as far as I'm concerned reading music is not an important aspect of music and won't enhance their careers at all. In fact it'll make them look small fish in a big pond because they'll be swimming alongside the Royal Symphony Orchestra.

"If you don't read music then the biggest asset you can have is balls; not being frightened to go for things. In modern music playing from the heart is much more important than playing what's written. Creativity is the most important thing. I wouldn't compete against Stan Getz. If I did I would be an amateur for the next 15 years. I think prowess no longer plays any part, the thing now is to provoke some thought or make people dance or want to fuck."

Chair: "Is technology making it more or less important to read?

Matt Aitken: "People may learn music the other way round from working with machines like the Fairlight or the Synclavier. Although people just come to those instruments for their creative possibilities, they learn how it looks on the machines' read out."

Tony Visconti: "I find the ability to read very useful when programming the Fairlight and the Synclavier. In fact when I first got the MC4 I programmed a Beethoven symphony into it."

Greg Walsh: "It is useful if you're programming drums into a Fairlight. For instance, if it auto corrects on the wrong side of the beat you will see the mistake come up and change it then instead of waiting for it to playback."

Chair: "Is the biggest problem really one of attitude?"

Brian Travis: "There's a lot of musical bourgeoisie in the outlook of people who do read. They think they're a little above Pop music."

Greg Walsh: "I think a lot of bands respect it if you can read music, but a lot of people use it intimidate and that's wrong, because some of the best musicians I know can't read."

Read out

Chair: "And to sum up gentlemen?"

Brian Travis: "There's certainly a place for reading music, especially with yer singer-songwriter types who rely heavily on session musicians, and they don't actually want that much input from the musicians other than to read the part they've written out."

Dean Garcia: "I haven't got anything against reading music; I think it's best to be totally open to anything that comes along. For instance an arrangement can be approached by writing, or straight out of the head. It's the same thing, just a different way of relating it to other people."

Tony Visconti: "I don't use reading as a criteria by which I judge musicians. I'll readily work with non-readers, and even some session men I use are non-readers. There's no point being snobbish about people who don't read, after all Bowie can't read and he's a genius."

At which point the meeting was adjourned, and few had any pretentions that the question had been settled. The argument rages on.

However, there is one interesting fact to note here. At the court of Isabella d'Este in the 16th Century, the court lutenist, Luciano Tromboncino wrote a little diversion entitled 'Non fa un paso su i miei stivale di pelle azzure' which, roughly translated from Middle-Italian meant: "Kindly refrain from erring onto my indigo pigskin slip-ons."

It featured a novel style of playing, utilizing note-bending, bar-chords, and power chords. Needless to say, Isabella was not impressed and she summarily dismissed him. In order to earn a living he had 500 copies of it made on cheap paper and hawked them on street corners. Hisfame spread rapidly and he printed many more editions. Curiously, the only mention made of him in the history books is as the inventor of toilet paper.