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Musicality: How you too can learn music like a gifted prodigy, unlock your musical instinct, and unleash your inner natural.
The 'missing manual' which every musician and music-learner should have been handed on day one.
Have you ever wondered how the musical "greats" do what they do?
Whether it's the child prodigy who masters instrument technique and new music ultra-fast... the creative genius who can conjure up incredible-sounding music on-the-fly and write songs that are remembered for generations... or the campfire hero who can sit with any music group, any time, and nail any song that gets called out, no sheet music in sight.
It's easy to assume that those musicians have some special "talent" or "gift". But the surprising truth is that every single skill we associate with "being a natural" in music is, in fact, learnable—by anyone.
Written based on 15+ years of experience helping 30,000+ adult music-learners of all kinds at Musical U, Musicality covers all the topics and skills which are never normally taught... but can enable anyone to achieve the musical feats most assume take "talent".
Including detailed chapters
• Musicality and Musical Mindset
• Active Listening
• Audiation
• Ear Training (incl. Solfa, Intervals, Chords and Progressions)
• Playing By Ear
• Improvisation
• Songwriting/Composing
• Singing in Tune
• Mastering Rhythm
• Playing With Expression
• Spell-Binding Performance
... and even the modern "Superlearning" techniques which let you learn up to 10x faster.
This book was written with the average adult musician in mind, from hobbyist/beginner through to pro.
Musicality is suitable for all instruments, from piano/keyboard, guitar and bass through to ukulele, trumpet, saxophone, violin, harmonica, mountain dulcimer... And for every genre, from rock/pop, jazz, country, folk and classical through to electronic, dance, punk, R'n'B and techno. The "inner skills" of music are universal.
Its 840+ pages are packed with the information, explanations, methods, and tips and tricks you need to finally become the musician you've dreamed of being.
"An incredible resource."
— David Reed, Improvise For Real
"'Musicality' leads us to a musical land of success and ease. A valuable, meaningful and important text that will be a beacon for musicians for years to come."
— Tim Topham, Top Music
"With this comprehensive yet accessible book Christopher Sutton heartfully guides us into the new era of musicianship, where practice and performance alike can be realms of genius-level play and excellence. The H4 model alone makes this book worth reading. By debunking common myths - and providing models of "superlearning" music practice, accessing one's innate talent, and addressing the true fundamentals of musicianship, this much-needed book can guide anybody to greater enjoyment and effectiveness in their musical journey."
— Mars Gelfo, creator of the Modacity practice app
Have you ever wondered how the musical "greats" do what they do?
Whether it's the child prodigy who masters instrument technique and new music ultra-fast... the creative genius who can conjure up incredible-sounding music on-the-fly and write songs that are remembered for generations... or the campfire hero who can sit with any music group, any time, and nail any song that gets called out, no sheet music in sight.
It's easy to assume that those musicians have some special "talent" or "gift". But the surprising truth is that every single skill we associate with "being a natural" in music is, in fact, learnable—by anyone.
Written based on 15+ years of experience helping 30,000+ adult music-learners of all kinds at Musical U, Musicality covers all the topics and skills which are never normally taught... but can enable anyone to achieve the musical feats most assume take "talent".
Including detailed chapters
• Musicality and Musical Mindset
• Active Listening
• Audiation
• Ear Training (incl. Solfa, Intervals, Chords and Progressions)
• Playing By Ear
• Improvisation
• Songwriting/Composing
• Singing in Tune
• Mastering Rhythm
• Playing With Expression
• Spell-Binding Performance
... and even the modern "Superlearning" techniques which let you learn up to 10x faster.
This book was written with the average adult musician in mind, from hobbyist/beginner through to pro.
Musicality is suitable for all instruments, from piano/keyboard, guitar and bass through to ukulele, trumpet, saxophone, violin, harmonica, mountain dulcimer... And for every genre, from rock/pop, jazz, country, folk and classical through to electronic, dance, punk, R'n'B and techno. The "inner skills" of music are universal.
Its 840+ pages are packed with the information, explanations, methods, and tips and tricks you need to finally become the musician you've dreamed of being.
"An incredible resource."
— David Reed, Improvise For Real
"'Musicality' leads us to a musical land of success and ease. A valuable, meaningful and important text that will be a beacon for musicians for years to come."
— Tim Topham, Top Music
"With this comprehensive yet accessible book Christopher Sutton heartfully guides us into the new era of musicianship, where practice and performance alike can be realms of genius-level play and excellence. The H4 model alone makes this book worth reading. By debunking common myths - and providing models of "superlearning" music practice, accessing one's innate talent, and addressing the true fundamentals of musicianship, this much-needed book can guide anybody to greater enjoyment and effectiveness in their musical journey."
— Mars Gelfo, creator of the Modacity practice app
- GenresMusic
1020 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 27, 2024
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Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
April 3, 2026
Since I'm now 82 years old and a lifetime musician (not all of that professionally), I'm not a typical reader of a book of this sort.
Musicality has been heavily advertised and promoted. I certainly commend the author's enthusiasm and love for music, and his desire to help others to come to both love it and be personally proficient to some degree in listening, understanding, improvisation, and performance.
I won't claim Musicality is just a book for utter beginners. I read the whole 829 pages and found interesting insights and tips that I find useful. Certainly some musicians whose experience is much deeper than my own will find some of the same is true for them.
Much of Musicality is focused on directing the reader to the music school the author, Christopher Sutton, founded: Musical U (at musical-u.com), where there are some free resources to help aspiring musicians, and also a full faculty and programs of study a person may enroll in for a fee. I don't fault anyone for trying to make an honest living from hard work.
Still, some things bother me about this book.
First is the author's indulgence in what I call Upper Case Syndrome. He attempts to systematize almost every aspect of learning music, from the mechanics to the psychology of it, under an endless parade of capitalized phrases meant, I suppose, to organize musical learning using groups of ideas such as the "4 H's" (Hands, Head, Hearing, Heart), the "3 C's" (Creativity, Conversation, Connection), also by simply upper-casing words and phrases that are well known to musicians such as Active Listening, Ear Training, Relative Pitch, Next Level, and on and on. There are dozens of them.
Furthermore, some of the teaching techniques employed, such as Pitch Ladders and Pitch Rulers and a sort of stick notation used to teach rhythm, are shallow and would be better taught in other ways, including taking a few minutes to understand scales and particularly standard rhythmic notation, which IMO is not difficult to master.
For a reference book of 829 pages, it's surprising that Musicality has no index. Even the table of contents is limited to just eighteen chapter names listed on one page, even though there is a subdivision on every page or two within the content. (That's an average of 46 pages per chapter to thumb through if you think you've found the right chapter where something you're looking for is discussed.)
My closely related objection is to the book's great verbosity. The bulk of it could be cut by at least twenty percent if it weren't that nearly every section includes "In chapter N we learned" followed by a string of capitalized concepts as described above with a summary of their descriptions and continuing with "and now will learn" more capitalized concepts. Some of these capitalized ideas are common expressions. Others I've never heard expressed as such in my life.
My conclusion is that Musicality provides pleasant enough reading for persons who love and want to understand or even be involved with music more closely. But I would never think of it as a foundation text on the teaching of music.
Musicality has been heavily advertised and promoted. I certainly commend the author's enthusiasm and love for music, and his desire to help others to come to both love it and be personally proficient to some degree in listening, understanding, improvisation, and performance.
I won't claim Musicality is just a book for utter beginners. I read the whole 829 pages and found interesting insights and tips that I find useful. Certainly some musicians whose experience is much deeper than my own will find some of the same is true for them.
Much of Musicality is focused on directing the reader to the music school the author, Christopher Sutton, founded: Musical U (at musical-u.com), where there are some free resources to help aspiring musicians, and also a full faculty and programs of study a person may enroll in for a fee. I don't fault anyone for trying to make an honest living from hard work.
Still, some things bother me about this book.
First is the author's indulgence in what I call Upper Case Syndrome. He attempts to systematize almost every aspect of learning music, from the mechanics to the psychology of it, under an endless parade of capitalized phrases meant, I suppose, to organize musical learning using groups of ideas such as the "4 H's" (Hands, Head, Hearing, Heart), the "3 C's" (Creativity, Conversation, Connection), also by simply upper-casing words and phrases that are well known to musicians such as Active Listening, Ear Training, Relative Pitch, Next Level, and on and on. There are dozens of them.
Furthermore, some of the teaching techniques employed, such as Pitch Ladders and Pitch Rulers and a sort of stick notation used to teach rhythm, are shallow and would be better taught in other ways, including taking a few minutes to understand scales and particularly standard rhythmic notation, which IMO is not difficult to master.
For a reference book of 829 pages, it's surprising that Musicality has no index. Even the table of contents is limited to just eighteen chapter names listed on one page, even though there is a subdivision on every page or two within the content. (That's an average of 46 pages per chapter to thumb through if you think you've found the right chapter where something you're looking for is discussed.)
My closely related objection is to the book's great verbosity. The bulk of it could be cut by at least twenty percent if it weren't that nearly every section includes "In chapter N we learned" followed by a string of capitalized concepts as described above with a summary of their descriptions and continuing with "and now will learn" more capitalized concepts. Some of these capitalized ideas are common expressions. Others I've never heard expressed as such in my life.
My conclusion is that Musicality provides pleasant enough reading for persons who love and want to understand or even be involved with music more closely. But I would never think of it as a foundation text on the teaching of music.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review