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Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

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Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#131

Post by wwweston »

lo_zamoyski wrote: post #119
mtalantikite wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You have to hear and feel the theory, it's not only intellectual. This is the most important part, for sure. The theory needs to get into your body. I'd also suggest to the OP to find a teacher that specializes in jazz, because the practice of improvisation requires you to embody that theory. A good teacher that focuses on improvisation will help you navigate through all the different building blocks you need, whic…

> It's amazing how little you actually learn about music when all you're doing is reading sheet music as a kid. I would add that historically, most musicians did not read music or theorize. They were practitioners who picked up the skill by listening to others, practicing, and improvising. Improvisation was what historically characterized musicianship, not theory, not sight-reading. As the philosophical joke goes: an…

> Theory is about music; it is not the practice of music.

I'd quibble a bit with this: theory is language to speak of certain experiences and patterns one discovers in the practice of / play with music.

Saying this to (perhaps) refine your point rather than contradict it. I quite agree that practice is key and theory was dead for me until one summer as a teen where I noodled freely enough in front of a piano and suddenly noticed "oh, this is what they're talking about." Everything up until you have enough up close and personal experience with the music to notice doesn't matter.

And then once you notice it becomes a name you can call it with.

Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#132

Post by unshavedyak »

efficax wrote: post #102
bitcoinmoney wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought tone deaf was permanent. Can you link Fixed Key? Is it an app?

anyone who can hear can learn relative pitch, although some people seem better equipped and a very very small number seem to have absolute pitch

To add to this, one of the seemingly better examples i was shown was that most of us who like music have a handful of songs that we can hear perfectly. We don't realize it, but that's one foundational tool to find the relative pitch of something.

Ie despite not having absolute perfect pitch, we know can accurately hear a variety of notes by just remembering a song, chorus, hook, etc. In doing so, we can figure out those notes and then use that to help determine the relative pitch of something else.

Works better the more songs you know. It's also not advocating learning songs for this purpose, but rather using songs you already know. Songs you grew up with, etc. Anything you deeply know.

Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#133

Post by smulloni »

Aidevah wrote: post #126
shirleyquirk wrote: post #47

I grew up in a family of classical musicians, got a degree in music, and was briefly a professional classical musician myself. So my advice may be very out of touch with the experience of someone learning for the first time, but my experiences learning beyond European classical music theory left me feeling insulted. The basics of music theory are presented as though they are the foundations upon which all subsequent…

The pianist Charles Rosen mentioned a longstanding error when most pianists play Chopin's B-flat minor sonata: when they repeat the exposition they begin from the Doppio movimento, instead of the very beginning. Rosen's argument is pretty persuasive, and it's really head-scratching why pianist continue to make this mistake for so long. My impression was that most classical musicians aren't very bright, at least the p…

I've never been persuaded by Rosen's account of that repeat. Most accomplished pianists are plenty bright and have read their Rosen, but don't necessarily agree with everything he has to say. (His preference for the early Schumann editions, for instance.)

Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#134

Post by NineStarPoint »

smeej wrote: post #107
ofalkaed wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with flash cards is they don't actually help you with your problems which are remembering the theory and sight reading. Sight reading is more than the note names, it is also the action of moving your fingers and not just finding the note on the keyboard but keeping your hands in the right position so your others fingers can do what they need to do. So you set your metronome nice and slow and play through…

This is a super super super beginner question, but what's a good resource for learning the "correct" fingerings? I took 9 years of piano lessons, but I was very young (I quit when I was 12, 25+ years ago), so I have a vague memory that there's a "right" way to do things, but no idea where to go to re-learn it. I quit as soon as my parents would let me because I thought sight reading was supposed to be as easy as read…

The annoying truth is that what the correct fingering is changes depending on your hand size. So the real thing to learn is “what’s the right way to hold your hand and body at a keyboard to not cause long term damage” and then see what fingerings come out from that for your hand size. Unfortunately, don’t have a good resource there.

Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#135

Post by rreichel03 »

normcoreashore wrote: post #111
tarsinge wrote: post #44

For years I made the error of learning music theory without enough ear training. You have to hear and feel the theory, it's not only intellectual. Then I found 2 exercises are all I needed for playing and composing music by ear: - Functional intervals / scale degrees: https://tonesavvy.com/music-practice-exercise/220/functional... . If you start tone deaf like me checked "Fixed Key", learn all the intervals, then res…

Such a good point about needing to feel it. For intuitive interval training you can try this app (I built). https://harmonyoscillators.brianfogg.com/ Essentially it’s two tunable sine wave oscillators and a simple waveform visualizer. you can manually tune the oscillators to any interval, gradually slide things in/out of tune, select intervals from from scales and see the mathematical calculations generated by variou…

Wow I just played with this for a while - I've never had the opportunity to see and hear the waves at the same time and really enjoyed it. It was really neat getting the frequencies close in binaural mode and hearing the pulsing of the phases being slightly off. Thanks for sharing!

Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#137

Post by normcoreashore »

rreichel03 wrote: post #135
normcoreashore wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such a good point about needing to feel it. For intuitive interval training you can try this app (I built). https://harmonyoscillators.brianfogg.com/ Essentially it’s two tunable sine wave oscillators and a simple waveform visualizer. you can manually tune the oscillators to any interval, gradually slide things in/out of tune, select intervals from from scales and see the mathematical calculations generated by variou…

Wow I just played with this for a while - I've never had the opportunity to see and hear the waves at the same time and really enjoyed it. It was really neat getting the frequencies close in binaural mode and hearing the pulsing of the phases being slightly off. Thanks for sharing!

Absolutely!

Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#138

Post by medler »

dtagames wrote: post #6

Two books I'll throw in here: Foundations of Diatonic Theory [0] which gives the simplest, modern, math-based explanations of how notes and chords relate. It's a college workbook that you write-in for the exercises. Really terrific. Also, not a theory book but the most important music learning book I've read: The Perfect Wrong Note [1]. Reading this permanently changed the way I approach learning the piano (or synth.…

For ages I’ve been looking for a text that would help me understand the structure of the diatonic scale. Foundations of Diatonic Theory looks exactly like the book I was convinced must exist but haven’t been able to find. Thank you!

Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#139

Post by cadr »

I liked the book "Edly's Music Theory for Practical People". It has silly cartoons, and I think it explains things well. But I'd look at a preview or something of it to see if it is your kind of thing.

Re: Ask HN: Tools to learn music theory?

#140

Post by mtalantikite »

analog31 wrote: post #127
mtalantikite wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally agree. The practice is what's important. My teacher won't let you look at sheet music for songs at first, he'll make you listen to Donna Lee 1000 times, sing it and work it out yourself before you check your work with the sheet music. Which reminds me of an anecdote in Hampton Hawes' autobiogrophy [1] where some famous teacher convinces him to take a lesson, after which Hampton writes he didn't really care fo…

I'm a jazz musician, and have likewise learned very little theory. On the other hand, there is a lot of attrition in jazz, so watch out for survivor bias. And it depends on what you want to do. Everybody I know who is active in composition and arrangement is fluent in theory. Being able to create original material is super cool and valuable. And there were certainly theory experts among the greats.

Oh absolutely, there's always the anecdotes of Coltrane carrying around Slonimsky's thesaurus, or George Russel claiming Miles used his lydian chromatic concept. But personally I find none of it really makes much sense until I sit down with the theory and practice it on my instrument. Memorizing theory with flash cards, like the OP mentioned, I don't find to be all that helpful.
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