What's your philosophy regarding " Music theory?"

Discussion in 'Education' started by MMJ2017, Dec 10, 2019.

?

Is Music theory ( how music works) worth learning in your opinion?

  1. Yes

    81.1%
  2. No

    5.7%
  3. Possibly

    9.8%
  4. Whatchoo mean? ( No such thing as how music works ) Foo.

    3.3%
  1. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    I know that sometimes is difficult because in text format you don't get the visual cues from body gesture and tone of voice and things .
    But just know that when answer comments I'm wearing a clown costume with a electronic voice changer speaking into voice to text converter .
    ( That's how you know I'm not hangry right now .)....
     
  2. the real Pict

    the real Pict Kapellmeister

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    I think also that the rhythms of speech affect how music is performed in many cultures the music takes on the rhythymic inflections of the spoken language emulating spoken phrases, so language and music are definitely related the 1st instrument was most probably the voice wouldn't you agree?
     
  3. Ad Heesive

    Ad Heesive Audiosexual

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    I doubt if anyone cares whether a clown is, or is not, wearing a clown costume
     
  4. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    I think that's right .
    Drums and voice where close to first .
    ( Some evidence of flute like instruments and a simple horn go back a ways )
    Melody ties into our heart strings , drum rhythm ties into our body clocks , then harmony ties those together with intellect and emotions .( Has a bit of it all )
     
  5. Ad Heesive

    Ad Heesive Audiosexual

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    Related...
    See the Leonard Bernstein ref in the references on this page
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyah_nyah_nyah_nyah_nyah_nyah
    interesting focus on why the 'na, na, na, na, na' descending minor third, is so culturally widespread among children wanting to sing taunts at each other. Discussion over whether it constitutes a 'musical-linguistic universal'.

    p.s., cannot over-recommend the series of videos that Leonard Bernstein made.
     
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  6. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    I think your right about that 100%
    His version of oedipus rex
    Is so powerful it's in my top 10 music all time.
     
    Last edited: Dec 14, 2019
  7. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    For fun.

    I'm going to show you MMJ version of that. :)
    ( I'll include even more information in less space)
    With a more universal application .
    ..
    KEY of C major .....V chord G7
    ..
    G7
    GBDFA..G#..A#..C#...D#
    13579.. b9.. #9...#11.. b13
    ..
    Melody....AGBFAGD
    Chromatic passing tone ..AA#BFAGD
    Avoid note ....DCBFAGD
    Enclosure...BFAG#F#GD
    Triplet GBDFA
    Triplet with enclosure GBDFAG#FF#G
    Cadence in C major ..Dmin7/G7/Cmaj/
    DFACBAGFE
    Cadence with chromatic passing
    DFACAA#BAGFE
    Cadence with enclosure
    DFAC#A#CBAGCAA#BDFG#G
    ..
    There you go.
    More information more than twice
    Accessable to anyone who reads it.
    Condensed into less space .
    Less intimidating and overwhelming .
     
    Last edited: Dec 14, 2019
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  8. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    Your idea of rhythm is very limited.
    Drums and bass are not the only rhythm you can even remove them ( especially drums )
    And have just as much rhythm .
    You can have a single melody nothing else and have harmony melody rhythm components in it .
    Next your thought experiment is thinking about 1 variable .( So even if it was valid. What happens the moment you are dealing with more than 1 variable?)
    Um, like reality itself which is thousands at least variables to consider .

    Like for example.
    By your concept above only taking into account
    "Dance" variable .
    ( You have already removed depth and meaning .)
    Because you can have a person stomp steadily then clap into between the stomps and by your above example, a person has everything they need to " dance" ( that 1 variable ).
    Boom boom clap boom boom clap
    Theres your dance beat .
    So yes in your above example if the goal is to reduce the thought process entirely to one single variable ( by definition involved the removal of depth and meaning )
    All you need to write is a stomp sounds followed by a clap then loop it .
    And as you say Above you can dance to it.
    So as long as that's your actual 1 consideration ( 1 and only goal (
    Then you would be happy and content with that and satisfied.+ Great
    However for myself , that's empty with no meaning and it's shallow ( no depth )

    { It would be similar to saying " I'm making a motion picture film in which the only requirement is to have shapes and lines and colors changing overtime on the screen.( Motion picture you can watch to right?)

    Except the reason to even watch a motion picture is not about the surface level.( Lines shapes changing over time)
    It's the deeper level of story characters the hero defeating villian learning valuble lesson overcoming challenge and being victorious in the end .
    ( Tension and release )

    Now here is some music where the music itself makes you dance ( no boom click? Huh?


    So you can have beats from drums and beats from instruments and even go back and forth.
    ( There's all kinds of options with music as far as what you can do .)
    Like electronic Instrument does not mean you have to play a certain way or make the music a certain way that's been done .
    And just because a music is dance does not mean it has to fit in a small box of what others did a certain way. I don't strive to do what's been done but more and more generically.
    I strive to do new music from my heart that's expansive and says something that hasn't been said .
    Sound like something that hasn't been heard.
    Feels like something that has not been felt.
    Part of this process .is understanding the way music works like with music theory .
    Your building a database of the patterns .
    ( Whether you use them or avoid them )
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2019
  9. Boom Boom Clap..... was never inspiring for no one never!

     
  10. These are fine musicians playing with impeccable taste and skill, but with all due respect, it does not make me want to dance. You of course are welcome to hit the floor and swing your best gal about while adorned in a pin stripe zoot suit with a pair of spats on your best patent leather shoes, but this is not my idea of music I would dance to. It's place in 2019 would be playing softly in a retirement home where it will bring back memories for the over 80's who remember when these olde time toons were heard on the wireless. Once the set had warmed up of course.

    75C06A51-D6B6-4EF4-B66C-B3A1DC16A739.jpeg
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 15, 2019
  11. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    If that's true , it has to do with yourself a human being. ( Presuppositions , beliefs ,culture )
    Or maybe None of those maybe it's your taste you connect with the sound surface level energetic portion of a drum that's fine too.
    But the music itself contains every rhythm and pattern that any hip hop beat or rap pattern, every edm song you know. It has the mathematically patterns in it.the music contains no drums and has the rhythms that any songs with drums have.
    So it's not an issue with the music.
    For example if I took " breaking bad"
    Made it black and white and 480p
    Is it a worse show ? ( Exact meaning story same but surface level of looks are different )
    Maybe .myself music is not what I'm hearing .
    No more than the sound of words is what English is.

    I believe at the level of a person ( their experiAnce )
    What they like is valid what they feel is valid .
    So any of your preferences connected to you and music is valid in my mind ( valid for your human experiAnce )

    For me time period has nothing to do with what I like.
    I like music as far back as it goes as much or more than a song released this morning .
    ( But I'm just thinking about the music )
    I don't think old people are different than young or old music different than young.
    I'll hang out with a 95 year old and jam or a 21 year old and jam.

    Ps drums my first instrument I started with as kid
    I been playing drums 30 years

    I really mean it when I say the tiniest aspect of music in my life is the music theory .( Super important but a very small part of a much larger area)
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2019
  12. Lager

    Lager Guest

    Who has said?
    Old isn't new.

    In art and also other fields, most of times, "Old is new".:shalom:
     
  13. What I find troubling, is that you assume there is some kind of fault in anybody who doesn't share your particular and personal tastes. Your first sentence informs me that because I don't want to dance to traditional jazz it is an error in my particular state of being and the culture in which I was raised. Just as you are free to enjoy this music on every level, I too should be free to say it ignites a null response in me and that in itself is not an indicator of my intelligence. Personally, I do not listen to "dance music" for the very same reason you do not. I find it repetitive and shallow. However! I did very much enjoy it when I was younger, but only when I was at a club or a rave. Not at home. Same with jazz. I've seen some great jazz bands, both traditional small ensembles and recently, ie the 1970's, the likes of Weather Report and Chick Corea. These bands are some of the best live music I have ever heard. Yet, oddly I don't enjoy jazz without the live aspect, in the way I don't like dance without the crowd. I guess it just means we're all very complex and unique people with singular likes and dislikes.
     
  14. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    Maybe I didn't say it in a way that you connected with what I meant .
    I meant it's your human attributes of what touches you or does not that has to do with what music does to you .
    There's no fault in someone who's different taste than another .
    ( I dont even know how you would makes sense of that I can't connect them ideas of fault and music tastes )
    I don't even have much a concept use for " blame"
    In regular life even.
    Because I think there's an explanation for things
    I used to love totally different things also when I was younger.
     
  15. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    Yes, live jazz is so powerful like other music where you feel it right in your body and the people it's a spiritual like experiance almost.
    I know what you mean.
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2019
  16. Ad Heesive

    Ad Heesive Audiosexual

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    You say 'for fun'

    I'm looking for the fun. Can't find it.
    Is it to be found in trying to figure out whether you are
    a) just provoking reactions,
    or
    b) genuinely crazy.

    Sincerely, all I can see is just another stunning example of total delusion.
    Any suggestion that those incoherent error-riddled notes are in any way better than that Jazz sheet is just madness.
    Fantasising and bragging doesn't even begin to make those delusions true.

    I'm not praising the Jazz sheet as being anything other than a reasonable example of presenting some music theory ideas in a coherent manner.
    By contrast, your scruffy notes are pure junk and hopelessly inaccurate. And they completely shy away from even trying to explain some of the more subtle ideas in that Jazz sheet. I assume those ideas just went way over your head - again!
     
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  17. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    No matter how many times I attempt to talk with you normally .
    You respond to me with ambiguous hate speech.
    And yet .
    I am going to expose you right this moment.
    No more games Bandaid.
    Instead of generic storytelling and name calling.
    I want to to specifically articulate and demonstrate what you are talking about.
    That's all you can do is say words like " junk" and " inaccurate "
    But what you have never accomplished to to point to something and demonstrate something.
    Again, I'm not sure what you think my version is missing that the other one has .
    I quadrupled the information content.
    ( Covered every fragment of information and then quadrupled the information while squeezing the size down to 1/10th of the space.
    Look real close is there cadence descriptions on the original?
    So first of all ANY living human being can read mine
    And only people who read sheet music can read that one.
    I give not only examples of the chord but the chord in it's parent keys Cadence .
    I cannot play games with you forever .
    You are literally just saying what sounds like insulting words.this what you done for 3 years.
    It's possible to have a conversation with you.
    Because you never speak aBout anything specific .
    I'm asking you do stop with the vague words .
    Just demonstrate something .
    It's so easy to say words right?
    But having your actions demonstrate something that's where the real value is.



    "
    Sincerely, all I can see is just another stunning example of total delusion.
    Any suggestion that those incoherent error-riddled notes are in any way better than that Jazz sheet is just madness.
    Fantasising and bragging doesn't even begin to make those delusions true."


    When I read that I have no way to connect it to anything.
    You are just using vague " fighting" language.
    I don't have a way to know what you mean except .
    " Angry attitude"
    What portion are you speaking about?
    In what way do you mean these things?
    No way to tell.
    This is troll speak .
    ( Vague seemingly insult )
    I have no way to feel a response to your " fighting words"
    Because I have no way to connect it to reality.
    This means ultimately you have written words which have the capacity to accomplish nothing.
    There's no value meaning involved.
    It's like " your ugly " " your dumb dumb"
    Okay fine that's the way you feel then.
    If there's a capacity to have a conversation.
    Display that now or forever be " ignore buttoned".
    ( Clown shoes I'd what I call that behavior)
    No capacity to have intellectual conversation about disagreements .

    The " for fun" part is demonstrating
    Something. That's what that meant .
    Now it's your turn .
    Demonstrate something.

    This is what I will do.
    I will describe your sheet music page in the same vague way and ambiguous way you speak to me ready?

    1.take a dominant chord
    2.create a Melody by jumbling up the order of the chord tones.
    3.using that same melody each time
    Apply embellishments

    Done.

    See that what used to be a full page I said vaguely in a couple lines.
    If you want a more descriptive take read my MMJ version.
    There's no " subtle" information missing .
    ( Other than the way you have a conversation)
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2019
  18. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    Ad heesive,
    To have such a tiny proportion of trolls that I get .
    For every 5000 views on my theory threads I get 1 angry commenter , That is as good as it gets. I mean successful YouTube videos get a larger proportion of angry responses than that.
    I consider that a win that 1 out of 5000 people happens to misunderstand and then get mad .
    That's better than normal.
    Please go ahead and make your own threads with your views.
    Thanks for sharing , and voicing your ideas .
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2019
  19. 5teezo

    5teezo Audiosexual

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    So much wrong with theses "Rules" I don't even know where to start.

    1: This Rule is wrong – because there is not "a music theory" in general. You are referring to WESTERN music theory. Since eastern cultures have various different approaches to the perception of what's harmonic/inharmonic. So it's by no means simply and absolutely that. As a matter of fact it's all drivern by culture tradition in hearing.

    2: Your sentence makes no sense at all. Sounds clever, but it's far from it. The original flow of audible information from which music theory was deducted over centuries sure stems from hearing, analysis, notation, reproduction and teaching. But when teaching music theory the actual flow of information is exactly the opposite : Eyes, Brain, Hands, Ears.

    3: If you talented in music doesn't mean that you know music theaory. You might play the most beautiful and complex chord progressoins and don't know nothing about the theory. You put it like there's some apriori underlying genetic predertimination for music theory encoded in the genes people play by. Complete non-sense.

    4. Sounds like the next marvel moveie of a guild of conspiracy nuts with super-human hearing who try to take over the world :D

    5. Counter- Argument: Regular Music based on regular theory is not bad either :D

    6. Contradicting your own rule #5

    SMH.
     
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  20. MMJ2017

    MMJ2017 Audiosexual

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    Hello friend,
    I know you were not speaking to me .
    ( And I don't disagree with much of what you are saying )
    But I was just wondering if you could show examples of this ( or explain what you mean.
    For example
    Do you believe a person who does not know the music theory would be able to play this?
    ( KEY of C major )
    Progression is
    C6( tonic/F#dim7( subdominant)F6(subdom(G7(dom

    C6 CEGA
    F#dim7 CEbGbA
    F6 FACD
    G7 G#BDF

    Now here is that form
    Repeated 4 times ( however it's repeating descending through the voice leading using inversions)
    If you begin at highest octave and keep playing it down to the lowest octave .

    Here are the exact Voicings ( low to high

    AEGC..AD#F#C..ADFC..G#DFB..
    GCEA..F#CEA..FCDA..FBDG#..
    EACG..D#ACF#..DACF..DG#BF
    CGAE..CF#AD#..CFAD..BFG#D..

    Now that is the first octave .
    The form now begins in the next octave below where it started.

    AEGC..AD#F#C..ADFC..G#DFB..
    GCEA..F#CEA..FCDA..FBDG#..
    EACG..D#ACF#..DACF..DG#BF
    CGAE..CF#AD#..CFAD..BFG#D..
    AEGC..AD#F#C..ADFC..G#DFB..
    GCEA..F#CEA..FCDA..FBDG#..
    EACG..D#ACF#..DACF..DG#BF
    CGAE..CF#AD#..CFAD..BFG#D..
    AEGC..AD#F#C..ADFC..G#DFB..
    GCEA..F#CEA..FCDA..FBDG#..
    EACG..D#ACF#..DACF..DG#BF
    CGAE..CF#AD#..CFAD..BFG#D..
    AEGC..AD#F#C..ADFC..G#DFB..
    GCEA..F#CEA..FCDA..FBDG#..
    EACG..D#ACF#..DACF..DG#BF
    CGAE..CF#AD#..CFAD..BFG#D..

    So this is demonstrating taking a form .

    Then 1 voicing at a time voice leading to next chord
    The progression covers the entire instrument .

    Do you believe that could accidentally be done?

    With myself I use the music theory to run through every possibility of a form like that ,
    ( Not to come up with a part in a moment of time for like a song )
    It's a bigger picture thing.
    I'm just wondering if that aspect you believe without music theory one could know every possibility available to them ( for any particular form they decide to use )
    Like above cover the whole instrument in each note, then chord, then chord progression
    All while going chord to chord only changing the notes that change by the smallest amount .
    ( Voice leading )
    Where once you select a chord progression you can cover all octaves and inversions .

    You see above , once you cover the entire instrument with your progression,
    Now you can create Any melodic motion or direction you want while having a harmony attached to each note then finally you attach a rhythm to your melody/harmony.
    This means you can play 1 million melodies ( with harmony and rhythm .
    That all equally represent that progression .
    C6/ F#dim/ F6/ G7/

    This means you have unlimited variation.
    Total freedom to express anything possible.

    You could take that progression write 72 hours of music that never repeats it self a single time .
    ( Which outlines the progression perfectly )
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2019
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