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Music Theory for Programmers

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Re: Music Theory for Programmers

#72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You say that the article isn't music theory but don't bother to say why. His response sounded kind of gatekeep-y to me. Kind of like an academic with theoretical knowledge, but no practical experience. Many great musicians never learned proper music theory. Innovation comes from outside, not from inside the establishment.

Music theory is a way of describing that cool thing you played, not the other way around

The only people I know who are productive as composers or arrangers are familiar with theory.

Re: Music Theory for Programmers

#73

This is (mostly) not music theory and what is music theory is mostly wrong or incomplete to the point of being wildly misleading. Source: have degree and postgrad in music, was a professional musician until RSI put paid to that career, wife is a professional musician and teaches to postgrad level at 2 conservertoires, most of our friends are professional musicians, have a house full of scores and music books. If you…

You say that the article isn't music theory but don't bother to say why.

I think what he means as music theory is the next step after what this (blatantly AI-written, but passable) article talks about. This is the part that you take for granted, but it certainly is music theory in the same way that Peano's axioms are number theory even though you don't use them explicitly.

The AI style gets boring very quickly, but I liked the explanation of what Western music notation is optimized for. For more information on this, there's a great and long video at https://youtu.be/Eq3bUFgEcb4.

(Edit: I wrote this around the same time as the reply, which more or less confirmed my hunch)

Re: Music Theory for Programmers

#74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Music theory is a way of describing that cool thing you played, not the other way around

The only people I know who are productive as composers or arrangers are familiar with theory.

Because they can write it down. Good for them.

Re: Music Theory for Programmers

#75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say that the article isn't music theory but don't bother to say why.

> You say that the article isn't music theory but don't bother to say why. His response sounded kind of gatekeep-y to me. Kind of like an academic with theoretical knowledge, but no practical experience. Many great musicians never learned proper music theory. Innovation comes from outside, not from inside the establishment.

Definitely gatekeeping. I'm no wiz by any means, but I've done (and still do) a fair amount of paid work (gigs, studio recordings, teaching, etc.) and I would not describe Grade 5 ABRSM as "very basic"

Re: Music Theory for Programmers

#77
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a fun webpage about a programmer dipping their toes in the very most basic elements of music and documenting some of their current understanding.Imagine I wrote an article called "Programming for musicians" that was mostly about how to turn your computer on and install homebrew[1] and finished by showing you step by step how to cut and paste "hello world" in javascript from stack overflow. You might rightly say…

The author admits that this article applies to only a specific flavor of music theory, and says that it only covers a small part of it. The article even mentions at the end it does not cover some of the topics you think are missing. The article is not a comprehensive syllabus of all elementary music theory, and it does not claim to be. I believe you are being too harsh, as this approach to understanding music feels m…

I would not call it harsh. The author don't even bother to assemble sentences themselves. And a title "Music Theory for Programmers" imply it is comprehensive even at an elementary scale.

Re: Music Theory for Programmers

#78
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a fun webpage about a programmer dipping their toes in the very most basic elements of music and documenting some of their current understanding.Imagine I wrote an article called "Programming for musicians" that was mostly about how to turn your computer on and install homebrew[1] and finished by showing you step by step how to cut and paste "hello world" in javascript from stack overflow. You might rightly say…

The author admits that this article applies to only a specific flavor of music theory, and says that it only covers a small part of it. The article even mentions at the end it does not cover some of the topics you think are missing. The article is not a comprehensive syllabus of all elementary music theory, and it does not claim to be. I believe you are being too harsh, as this approach to understanding music feels m…

Because such posts get tiring after a while. Strong dunning kruger and all that.
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