Rolling Music Theory Thread

When confronted with a theory one can:

• ignore it
• accept it as dogma
• dismiss it as dogma
• ask: "What is a theory anyway?"
• ask: "Is this 'Theory' in fact a coherent theory?"
• spend all your time on theory instead of practice
• Concentrate on a subarea of the theory until either makes sense or you give up, at which point you move on to a new subarea, or a new theory of give up on theory altogether.

Forgot:

• "Here is a counter-example to your precious theory. Or is it?"

"In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is." -Bob MarleyYogi Berra

No idea whether this site is useful or not, just saw a link to it: http://it-www.teoria.com/

Think what I was trying to get to before the March of the Rubber Strawmen started was that learning theory by itself delivers diminishing returns if you don't have a way to incorporate it efficiently into you playing, should you so desire. The Mick Goodrick and David Berkman books were more "Creative Practice" books -the latter has this in the title- and starts of with a "Lighting Tour of Theory" to get it out of the way. I admire the self-professed "intuitive" musicians in this book, but aren't we all intuitive musicians when we start, well many of us, at least in the key of G, at least in first position. What about when you either need to learn something new or more likely, when the well runs dry? Owen is still young and on a roll and involved in all kinds of different creative situations, but Josh, in a few more years...

"Learn all your scales, then forget 'em all and just play." - Kurt VonnegutCharlie Parker

I definitely went through the "meandering through the notes" business when I took jazz improv in college. What I was unable to get to was the point of real thematic construction and elaboration.

i feel like i have totally different mindsets for 'theory' and 'making music', it's weird. like figuring out chords and melodies that work is the necessary evil that must be done so i can get to the fun part (texture, sounds, arrangement, sampling, rhythm, etc). and once i'm done with the raw material i have no idea what it is (note-wise) when i come back to it, it might as well have been written by someone else.

this is because i'm a dumb drummer who never had to really deal with harmonic stuff in years of practicing/playing, and only started writing to make electronic music.

I wouldn't equate it to following the composer's thought process per se, but wasn't copying scores by hand a big part of the early musical education for a lot of common practice-era composers?

Many largely passive or rote learning methods were highly favoured in the past. Some people do advocate this exercise, although I don't think it's a common practice at most institutions of higher education in the US or Canada today. I think it's useful to the same extent that typing Hamlet into MS Word is a useful exercise. In my undiplomatic opinion, analysis and model composition exercises engage more higher-order creative and critical thinking skills, allow for more meaningful feedback/evaluation, allow a student to produce something that is actually their work, AND probably get someone closer to understanding a composer's thought process. There's no reason why someone couldn't use Sibelius or Finale in the process. (It is required at some schools.)

I recommend this exercise because 95% of "composers" do not know how to use Sibelius/Finale at a rate that is required for any professional activity

probably get someone closer to understanding a composer's thought process

If this is truly your goal, though, you would probably want to do some biographical research.

xpost

Well, yeah, it's a good way to learn notation software.

There is nothing more important for "people looking to create scored music" than learning how to effectively and quickly use the software

Some professional composers who work at a high level still write scores by hand! But this (learning the software) was why I said I could see the value of the exercise. What I questioned originally was that it helped someone follow a composer's thought process.

I... feel like you're being deliberately obtuse in saying that it might not? Dissecting the specifics of the orchestration? Forcing yourself to acknowledge and enter every bowing and "a2" or whatever? Seeing first hand how s/he's doubled the bassoon with a piccolo? How those wind-gestures are all c+p or how they are not and puzzling as to why? Or, if you're so inclined, hearing the specific relationship between "this portion of aleatoric notation and what it sounds like" and attempting to spell it out yourself and wondering if this aleatoric notation is useful? (or quarter-tone or whatever?)

I'm not saying that it couldn't (and someone would probably learn something if they typed out Hamlet too). I'm saying that imo if the goal is for someone to learn these things, analysis and model composition seem like more efficient and effective methods for the reasons I gave above.

Erf, I've had a nightmarish airline experience over the last couple of days and might be overly grumpy, sorry. I'll revisit this tomorrow.

And I disagree with you on this point and kick against that method of pedagogy. "Installing my set of keyboard shortcuts for Sibelius and teaching you how to use them" has far more practical usage than writing hauptschrifts on a score. We're not talking about "typing out Hamlet", it's more like "learning how to program in C"

And no need to apologize Sund4r you aren't coming off as grumpy at all, I hope I'm not either

You two guys seem to be behaving quite civilly and getting along just fine.

Discussion about software reminds me to ask Tim if he is still using MuseScore,

Random comments on skimming through the thread in the cold light of about a week later

Grove on musicology fwiw (they don't have a "music theory" article!):
Misread this as "Groove on musicology." Didn't know if this was the name of a publication, a command, or a first person declaration with the subject missing.

Looking at that MTO rock issue- The "Jailhouse Rock" examples crashes Quicktime. "Gloria" video works though.

In the Guitar Voicings article, the author talks about an "embellishing chromatic mediant" while analyzing, among other things, a Jimi Hendrix tune. Now I think he is talking about a chord but when I first saw it I thought he meant the sharp 9/flat 3 that is added to a 7th chord to turn it into 'The Hendrix chord."

In the article on The Beatles and Voice Leading came across "Walter Everett’s Statement–Restatement–Departure–Conclusion (SRDC) phrase structure" which seems like a useful terminology.

Maybe one of you classical background guys can explain that I 6/4 stuff one day.

I 6/4? I-chord in 2nd inversion. The 6 and 4 refer to the intervals on top of the root note (i.e. G C E is a p4 from G to C, a +6 from G to E). This terminology is esp iseful in describing inversions of V7 or ii7 chords. For example V7 = G B D F, V65 = B D F G, V43 = D F G B, V42 = F G B D. Looks way more elegant when handwritten under Bach chorale :)

Thanks. Just came across this website which seems to a do a decent job of describing this stuff: http://spider.georgetowncollege.edu/music/burnette/MUS111/111i.htm

I have a feeling that we might be arguing about this for a while but

"Installing my set of keyboard shortcuts for Sibelius and teaching you how to use them" has far more practical usage than writing hauptschrifts on a score.

These are two different skillsets that have different uses.

We're not talking about "typing out Hamlet", it's more like "learning how to program in C"

I don't see that. Music notation software is more complicated than word processing software but Sibelius is not Max/MSP. Copying a score into notation software is still entry of information. ("Learning how to create a database in Excel" may be a better comparison than "typing out Hamlet, I'll grant, given that most people already know how to use Word.)

Species counterpoint and chorale harmonization, on the other hand, actually involve learning rule-governed systems and applying them to make decisions in order to generate results when given input, which comes closer to the logical processes used when writing a computer program. (I use that analogy all the time.) What I'll give you is that those skills are mainly applicable to CPP music and music that is closely related to it. If you are mainly teaching people to compose contemporary music (which most theory teachers are not), they very well may not be the most useful tools to use, although I don't see why other analysis and model composition tasks couldn't work tbh. (And, certainly, if someone has no clue how to use Sibelius well, recreating a score is a good way to learn it right off the bat.) But, I mean, obv, whatever works for you.

JR&tB, it may be a good idea to check out a basic theory textbook to fill you in on classical terminology for these things: Benward/Saker, Clendinning/Marvin, Sarnecki, Kostka/Payne, ...

This is a quick simple explanation of chromatic mediants as they are most commonly used: http://learnmusictheory.net/PDFs/pdffiles/03-12-TypesOfMediantRelationships.pdf

Thanks. Wow, some of those texts kind of pricey. Is there one that is past its first blush and gone to Dover?

I don't know what that question means but, yeah, I was thinking that maybe you could check those out from a library if they are available. Sarnecki is affordable (and v good imo) but I don't know if that one is available in the US.

Thanks. Sorry. In math and science, textbooks from a few generations ago are available at quite cheap prices from Dover Publications and are often just as useful as the shiny new official books.

I can't talk about this any more! Fundamentally Sund4r we're not going to ever agree because your paycheque involves teaching a course in counterpoint and my paycheque involves turning around an orchestral arrangement in four hours or less

Yep.

(although it's kind of interesting that those two things would put us at odds on this)

It's not that I don't think that shit is interesting, obv I do. I guess... the reason I'm using phrases like "kicking against that form of pedagogy" is because I feel that the more successful new music scenes I've observed in the world are rooted in an absurd level of productivity, fun, social atmosphere. The Toronto scene in comparison, well, I never heard a work in five years there that I really loved, though talent was obviously on display. I intuitively feel, in observing my own tendencies, and observing the workings of other young composers, that getting caught up in the theory of what one-is-working-on is often an enormous stumbling block for finding one's natural writing voice, responding to current music

Just a bit of fundamentals, let's be cool

Yeah, Ken, I still use MuseScore. I've used Finale (years ago) and it seems similar. Pretty great for a free program, at least for how I've used it so far.

Haven't used it in a while, may have some usage questions for you at some point.

Seems to me what Owen is saying is that he already has enough theory background to do what he is doing, further study at this point would only beget even more study, what he needs is practical stuff to help him execute faster and creative models to keep him inspired.

Anyway, would love to continue to discuses this esoterica at further length, but have to go see what can be done with my recalcitrant right hand.

o_O

Oh wait

OK wow @ this syllabus: https://sites.google.com/a/calarts.edu/counterpoint-mt-204/syllabus

I thought I was a hardass.

.

He does mention Dover Publications early on, to balance out the "hideously expensive" texts.

Although I imagine if you took that course you would save money just by not having any time to spend it.

Ha, if you're really concerned about money, you can download those scores for free from IMSLP.

xpost lol

No Gradus in that course? Is that considered passé?

Tbh, I've never read it but I don't know of anyone who would use an 18th-century treatise to teach a counterpoint class in 2014. It seems more like something you'd read in a course on the history of music theory.

B-b-but there are some 18th century compositions recommended for study in the course.

18th-century music is typically what we focus on in (tonal) counterpoint courses. However, I don't know of anyone who uses theoretical treatises that were written in the 18th century to teach about the contrapuntal techniques in this music, just as you would probably not read Newton in an undergraduate physics or calculus course. (My understanding was that Gradus is largely concerned with 16th-century counterpoint btw?) Ime, it is far more common to study 18th-century scores but to use modern texts on analysis and model composition.

I mean, as I understand it, the modern texts all probably owe a lot to Fux; not arguing that.

There's a pretty solid-looking ebook torrent atm, for those who are prone to such things.