When I was in high school band, there was a music store where I would go purchase my saxophone reeds. And as it was the 1980s, most of the music store floor space held racks of sheet music in books and quartos and so forth.

Now, I had learned music theory and sheet music, which immediately disqualified me from a career in punk rock. But the music store sold modern pop music as well. It wasn't long before I had Tina Turner, Billy Idol, and Depeche Mode songbooks.

The Billy Idol songbook was especially interesting, as it included guitar tabulature. The text explained how Billy's guitarist, Steve Stevens, used novel techniques to achieve his sound.

Now I did not play guitar, so the tabulature was merely a visual curiosity for me, but me and my sister had some Casio keyboards from Toys-R-Us, in addition to my saxophones. So I would try and play the tunes I knew best from the songbooks.

But it was really weird, because when I played the melodies according to the sheet music, it didn't sound (musically) like the band on the radio. In fact, there was a Howard Jones song that would jar me into a Christmas spirit, because of a certain run of notes in a particular key. But sometimes the rhythms were approximated, or the notes were off.

I lost interest in purchasing these song books. I think it eventually became clear that the artists were not composing pop songs by writing sheet music, but someone with a degree, taking a break from their McDonald's job, was listening to the songs and transcribing them to conventional sheet music.

Many years later, I joined a large secular chorus of mixed voices. The sheet music we received included Rogers & Hammerstein, and John Rutter arrangements. That sheet music was exactly the remedy to restore my faith again, and my high school studies were finally vindicated for a life of non-profit volunteer service!

Not knowing the alphabet of music lets the mind make its own more efficient abstractions.