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Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

academic.udayton.edu

41–50 of 57 posts

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#41
post #7

Teaching music theory is damned hard . You very quickly find yourself making statements like this (taken from the second PDF in this series): "A tuplet is any non-standard division of a note. These are usually written as a group of notes delineated with a bracket and a number showing the division being made." It's correct in grammar and sense, and about as exciting as a lawn-mower repair manual. This is probably the…

Teaching music theory can be hard, but it doesn't have to be. I know, because I do it almost every day (its my day job). To make it relatable, you have to tie it into the elements of music-- for this, I use Copland's "What to Listen for in Music". Once students can generally grasp and talk specifically about Melody, Harmony, Rhythm, and Tone Color, you can relate the music theory to it. I have about 200 6th-8th grade…

That's awesome! I wish you had been my music teacher when I was that age. Keep it up; you are giving a valuable gift to those children.

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#42
post #12

This is truly a great effort. At the same time I am frustrated by the choice of the medium. We are well past the age of disseminating information through print. I would love to "hear" the concepts described. Why not make an interactive web page? Maybe sprinkle some audio samples here and there? It seems convoluted to not use sense of hearing to describe music.

The OP clearly has skills in page-layout as well as music, but maybe not software development. Some musician/programmer combination (maybe yourself?) is needed to produce what you describe.

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#43
post #7

Teaching music theory is damned hard . You very quickly find yourself making statements like this (taken from the second PDF in this series): "A tuplet is any non-standard division of a note. These are usually written as a group of notes delineated with a bracket and a number showing the division being made." It's correct in grammar and sense, and about as exciting as a lawn-mower repair manual. This is probably the…

Agreed. Ironically the only tolerable music theory book I read was "music theory for dummies". Actually learned something from that before falling asleep.

Then again, mashing 3 or 4 memorised chords on an old korg trinity gets you quite far without having to know what you are doing :)

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#44

OK, I can understand never including a leap of an augmented fourth in a single voice. That's just cruel to your singers. But an augmented second? As in a minor third? As in the first two notes of Greensleeves? or Misty? Whyever not?

An augmented fourth sounds great as long as it is then resolved e.g. to the fifth. See "Maria" from West Side Story[1] for the probably the most well known use of an augmented fourth. The first interval when he sings "Maria" is an augmented fourth.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v...

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#45
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you so much. I would love the rest too, if you feel like making another pdf.

Here you go, all pages merged, plus a little bonus: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ln23462k6gu2ay8/Music_Theory.zip

thank you ! issuu is unusable for regular reading.

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#47
post #14

Issuu wins for most annoying way to break my web experience. I have a perfectly serviceable PDF renderer, but instead I have to let Flash have a shot at my security to get a slowly loading page that has navigation obscuring the content and ignores my scrolling input, requiring me to use their invented elements and watch their slow, jerky, scroll animation. Going to the next page requires closing a tab, searching for…

YES! I too hate these annoying PDF-download-pseudo-services that collect your email-address and your interests (extremely valuable virtual goods) in exchange for a PDF, that the author offers for free (extremely cheap) - this is an unbalanced exchange of information.

These kind of information hijacking must be marked as am abusive business modell that is not acceptable in a free world. We have to think longterm here and defend freedom of information on a very basic level, to be prepared for the larger battles that will come when chinese investors will be the only sources of money.

Please write the authors to remove their PDFs from these services and just put them on a webserver into a PDF folder. Or to use any free file hosting service, anything, but please do not support these ancient flash-fetish-stoneagers and information-suppressors, THANKS!

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#48
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you so much. I would love the rest too, if you feel like making another pdf.

Here you go, all pages merged, plus a little bonus: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ln23462k6gu2ay8/Music_Theory.zip

Tip of the hat (repeated in 6/8) for using some of your time to save the rest of us a bit of time.

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#49
post #14

Issuu wins for most annoying way to break my web experience. I have a perfectly serviceable PDF renderer, but instead I have to let Flash have a shot at my security to get a slowly loading page that has navigation obscuring the content and ignores my scrolling input, requiring me to use their invented elements and watch their slow, jerky, scroll animation. Going to the next page requires closing a tab, searching for…

To trigger some activism against these annoying pdf hijacking sites I just pinned down a FREEDOM-FOR-PDFs-TEMPLATE-TEXT side-project :) - you might use this as a starting point for your own emails, certainly this can be extended:

http://pastebin.com/GhKkAnVP

Re: Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People

#50
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you so much. I would love the rest too, if you feel like making another pdf.

Here you go, all pages merged, plus a little bonus: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ln23462k6gu2ay8/Music_Theory.zip

thanks!
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