I don't know how you define music theory, but what I was talking about definitely is the required music theory in certain professional settings. Have you seen recording musicians walking out because of messy score?

 

Interesting back and forth... I've been playing the piano so long, most of what comes out (at this point in my life) is instinctive. But it's always a good thing, for any musician, to revisit the fundamentals. Even with all of this back and forth, some 'casual' onlookers have probably learned a thing or two from both sides of this tête-à-tête. It's apparent that the main participants in this thread love music, and that's always a very good thing. "Passion" can be a blood sport...

 

You 're correct, but again... what's the point of me talking about one CONTEXT and having people pushing it towards their own context?

Why do you keep talking about scores and staff? Do you think music or music theory ceasses to exist if we let go of the conventions that we have today for music notation?

The basis for western music is diatonic, which in turn makes notation also diatonically based and the need to use enharmonics CORRECTLY is, for the 56th time, ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY.

Can we move along? More staff? Please...no.

If you want to discuss intervalic relationships and formulaic approaches, nice. Otherwise, I am ignoring it.

 

Wow, I mean seriously. I doff my proverbial hat to those still trying to change the other peoples beliefs/ideas. I didn't come on here to argue.

Thank god Foster911 posted the hypothetical Db to E question... Essentially this explains the Augmented second in any of the Harmonic Minor/Major modes (F harmonic minor). Which definitely sound different to a minor third. Most western harmony is built from diatonic scales EVEN if it's key changes. This is known as Tertiary Harmony. Essentially stacked thirds. Harmony can be built Secundally(Invert for 7ths) or Quarterly (Invert for 5ths).

The 2 - 5 - 1 is the most common progression in jazz as it is one of the easiest progressions to define a new key centre. This goes back to classical (Bach??) and his supposing that if you make a scale minor then you lose the leading note (7th). The leading note wanting to go back to the tonic and create a wonderful cadence (AMEN anybody ?). I don't really know much about that, but I am trying to come up with a brief synopsis of musical history here... Obviously doomed to fail.... Back in the old days dominant chords used to be called 6th chords ??? Beats me...

This goes some way to explaining why every modern instrumentalist (notice I didnt use musician) ends up learning the 4 different scales (Ionian, Melodic minor, Harmonic minor, Harmonic Major) and their diatonic modes...

I understand that Kouros is trying to say that the physical science of this is redundant to the theory, which maybe correct. But would require a fairly dubious PHD on the subject which could never really be proved due to the nation of human conditioning over the past 3000-5000 years. (The oldest pentatonic scale that we know and love on guitar has been found in chinese flutes that are essentially pre-historic.) The real science is not in physical waves that our ears hear but how they are interpreted by the thing on top of your neck. Which is still a pretty big mystery to science, long may it remain so...

I disagree with the entire it's only for a staff argument because I personally don't read music, yet I agree with Duskwings. Ultimately if we were taking it from the source we would be called the tonic (12/12) and the tri-tone (6/12). Why bother with any intervallic talk at all. Just put it into fractions... Then starting going mad when you have a quarter tone bend.

I also think that people should be encouraged to find new ways of doing things but not if it means that they cannot communicate properly with other musicians. Can you imagine trying to explain to anybody (including pianists) a complicated part of music from a piano roll. Piano roll was possibly the first invention to render a human-being benign in the creation of live performance music. Now whadda we got??? Bloody auto-tune.
I have no problem with the study of wacky musical ideas, 21tet, Lydian-Dominant chromatic concept (If it was good for Miles Davis, Bill Evans and John Coltrane then it must hold some value to others) or even the Barry Harris Method which I think is a wonderful idea even if I can't get my head completely around it.

Also what about chord substitutions and enharmonic chords??? Are they just for musical theorists ? Not real physical science theory ?

Am7 - A C E G
CM6 - C E G A
FM9 - F A C E G

They might not define a key on their own but at some point, unless it's atonal, other chords will help the brain define a key.
In a way I am amazed that so much emphasis is being placed on the staffs harmonic importance. As that is why it works so well. Rhythmically on the other hand it is no where near as accurate as harmonically speaking.

Go listen to a guitarist called Joseph Spence or Thelonius Monk and then try and transcribe it for someone else to interpret. You can bet that they wont play it at all rhythmically like them.

Oh and for what it's worth. Many in the Jazz world don't actually believe in true improvisation. You have heard a phrase or rhythmic idea before you play it. I don't know what I believe. I have worked with musicians who don't listen to any music in the fear it'll taint their blank canvas of a brain...

 

This gave away immediately the reason for all your "confusions" that followed.

You're saying that with a twelve equal tones division of the octave you find that an augmented second interval sounds different than a minor third? That can only be staff notation induced placebo.

Augmented second = 3 semitones

Minor third = 3 semitones

...and yet you hear a difference... right..

 

Warning this a tangent:

That quote in itself is almost an analogy of Fourier Transform, without which sound synthesis and analysis would be very difficult. You can only measure accurately in space or time.

 

Yes this is why Duskwings keeps going on about context...

You play fretless bass and presumably guitar so why don't you play a harmonic minor scale. Surely you can hear the more "Arabic" flavour around the augmented 2nd between the 6 and 7 degrees of the scale. Think Indiana Jones.

 

Haha I don't mean the Fanfare thing, I mean the bit when something scary or dubious is going to happen.

Maybe you'll find an example of it in Smack My Bitch up. Female Vocalist breakdown part of tune. Not 100% tho.

 

Nothing here makes any sense. Lack of CONTEXT is what I've been telling you guys, you keep bringing the notational context as if it was music theory itself.

I play plenty of harmonic minor, but again... you're talking about harmony/degrees... that IS NOT THE SAME AS INTERVALS. Fuck me...

The distance between two notes that are 3 semitones is a minor third. There's no enharmonic consideration here, no one is even talking about tonal centers, note names, keys, etc. THAT IS THE INTERVAL plain and simple.

The distance between those notes when inserted into an harmonic context, THATS ANOTHER THING....for the 90th time... yet, you'll say the same shit, I'll say the same shit...

End of loop.

 

Last edited: Oct 21, 2015

One of the instruments I play is flamenco guitar. I guarantee that my harmonic minor is in perfectly good health, don't worry.

 

Okay so why do you keep referring to intervals when what you are trying to say is that the difference between two separate notes in frequency is always the same. Hence the phrase enharmonic.

I have computer programmed music from things like SuperColider or Chuck and if I am ever trying to create a weird composition then it's always best to program the note as fractions, that way I can transpose it to other keys without doing the Mathematics all again.

And technically (I'm being a WUM but forgive me) if your playing Flamenco shouldn't it be the 5th mode of harmonic minor. Spanish Phyrgian/Dominant...

It was the classical composers who derived the harmonic minor scale. As I said earlier they were looking to include the leading note into a minor cadence. Hence the old play up the melodic minor and then back down the natural minor classical stuff.

 

One last try to clear up all those dogmatic views regarding MUSIC THEORY vs MUSIC NOTATION


Pitch waveform, piano roll, staff notation:




All three examples represent the same musical line. Would it be fair to say that the theoretical analysis of this fragment would disappear if we removed the staff option? Think about it.. does that make any sense?


Maybe looking at alternative staff notation conventions will help you freeing your mind from that irrational link between theory and staff notation:

http://musicnotation.org/systems/

 

I am not the one who brought all the enharmonic crap to a thread about intervals. And no, that's not what enharmonic means in the context of C# vs Db.

A mode from harmonic minor is still harmonic minor, the same way a mode from the major scale is still diatonic. Either way, in flamenco it gets theorized both ways since there's not a consensus (again, conventions..) in wether the "home chord" should be called a I or a V.

 

If we remove the staff, will the pitches be any different? Will the theory change just because you don't have staves?

 

If you're listening to a melody and transcribing it without having a reference pitch, does that make you hear intervals wrong?

How about if you raise the pitch of the melody your listening by a few semitones? Are the intervals that you've transcribed wrong now? The perfecth fifth at the beginning suddenly became a major 7th?

..I don't think so.

 

Someone transcribes a tune using a key signature and another guy chooses to write the exact same piece in another key signature.

For instance.. at some spots, the degrees implicate a b5 on dude one's staff and a #4 on the other guy's staff. The notes are exactly the same, they just used a different referential (key signature). Does that change the way we perceive the function of those notes?

No, it surely doesn't.

 

If anyone actually bothers to check this link and at least read a bit about chromatic staff notation, there's no way that you'll keep throwing the same old arguments about the ultimate need to use enharmonics for everything and all that. They ARE NEEDED in THE CONTEXT WHERE THEY ARE NEEDED, that's all.

Well, unless you're a conservative old fart that refuses to see past his own yard. In that case, you're god and your little town is the universe. Kill all atheists!!


In case you don't read anything because you already know everything (if you're really god)... then my question is: What would be the point of enharmonic rules in a chromatic staff?

 

Last edited: Oct 21, 2015

On a side note:

The "fun" part of all this discussion is that it reminded me of how impossible it was to make elderly people understand mobile phones in the 90's.


"No grandma, just because Sony Ericsson phones have 7 bars and your Nokia only has 5 bars to REPRESENT battery, it doesn't mean that the Sony one has a bigger battery..."

"No grandpa, the phone doesn't know people's names or who's the person calling you, they are just stored along with the numbers in the SIM card... No grandpa, let me just change your contacts names so you'll believe me"

 

BUT U FUCKING HAVE TO SPLELL THOSE FUCKING INTERVALS,IN EVERY FUCKING KEY,BECAUSE WITH YOUR REASONING ONLY APPLIES AS A GENERAL RULE, LIKE THE DISTANCE BETWEEN ONE NOTE AND ANOTHER MAKES A CERTAIN INTERVALS,RIGHT?
SO ACCORDING TO YOUR RETARDED BRAIN ONCE U HAVE SEVEN NUMBERS THAT S ALL U NEED TO KNOW INTERVALS?
NO!
FIRST OF ALL IF NAMES MEAN NOTHING IN THE ABSOLUTE WHY NOT USING A NUMBER FOR EACH SEMITONE INSTEAD OF OF ONLY 7?THIS WOULD KEEP U FROM USING SHARPS AND/OR FLATS COMPLETELY.
OR MAYBE THEORY FOR U DOENS T WORK WHEN IT S ABOUT GIVING A NAME TO INTERVLAS AND USING ENHARMONY, BUT IT S VALID WHEN U HAVE TO GIVE THOSE SEVEN NUMBERS TO THE DEGREES OF A NAMELESS MAJOR SCALE?
BECAUSE IF U FORGOT IT THE MAJOR SCALE IS A MODERN CREATION,IT S A CHILD OF THEORY ,A WESTERN CONVENTION,YET FOR U IT CAN BE USED TO STUDY INTERVALS AND DECIDE IF THEIR MAJOR, MINOR ETC..
SINCE U COUNT THE SEMITONES U CAN QUIETLY USE 12 NUMBERS, IT SHOULDN T MAKE ANY DIFFERENCE TO U.
AT THIS POINT REMIN STUCK TO NUMBERS AND AS DOUBLESHARP SAID USE FRACTIONS.THEN APPLY THEM TO REAL SOUNDS AND NOT ABSOLUTE HYPERURANIC IDEAS AND LET S SEE HOW EASY IT WILL BE FOR U,BECAUSE EVERYONE BUT U IS A MORON WHO GIVES NAMES TO NOTES AND USES ENHARMONY.
AD FOR (I HOPE) THE LAST TIME THIS HAS GOT NOTHING TO DO WITH STAFF AND NOTATION,EVEN IF U CAN T READ MUSIC THESE CONCEPTS DON T CHANGE IF U ARE GOING TO USE THEM WITHIN A CONTEXT,BECAUSE THAT S THEIR PURPOSE,UNLESS U REFUSE TO GIVE NAMES AT ALL AND REMAIN STUCK TO NUMBERS OR WITHOU CARING OF THE RULES OF HARMONY,BECAUSE THEY WERE WRITTEN BY OLD FARTS,AND THOSE THAT U DON T LIKE ARE USELESS AND OUTDATED.
LAST BUT NOT LEAST,SINCE U BROUGHT THE EXAMPLE OF THE GUITAR AND HOW INTERVALS ARE CONSTRUCTED ON THE FRETBOARD,IM SORRY FOR U, BUT THAT S A KIND OF NOTATION TOO, SO YOUR DENIAL OF THE STAFF IS JUST ANOTHER EVIDENCE OF YOUR SESQUIPEDAL STUPIDITY

 

Why don't you find it out for yourself?

I've already gave examples, told you to check the history of music, even posted links to various notation methods and you insist on beating your dead horse instead of actually looking things up.

Sorry but that's a retarded attitude, specially when you keep answering (and now with CAPS but thanks, no need for that.. people can use their browsers zoom function if needed ).