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Music Theory for Beginners

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Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#71

Post by te_chris »

Jun8 wrote: post #39
msluyter wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are there seven notes? Is this due to an property of the ear? The 7 tones that make up a major scale are basically a cultural artifact of western music (which goes back to gregorian chant). Other cultures have more/fewer tones. Ditto, for the octave concept, why should it be multiples of two? Can you clarify this question? Octaves result from the natural harmonic series: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmonic_seri…

I think an octave up (down) means double (half) the frequency of the tone. The usual explanation, I think, is that the Pythagoreans who invented it found this to be the "most pleasing" ratio. I wonder if there are user studies to back this claim. I am also at such a low level, that part of your explanation just goes over my head, i.e. what is chromatic scale? Wikipedia says: "The chromatic scale is a musical scale wi…

"The chromatic scale is a musical scale with twelve equally spaced pitches, each a semitone apart. A chromatic scale is a nondiatonic scale having no tonic due to the symmetry of its equally spaced tones."

basically what this is saying is that in western music we have divided an octave (the space between a frequency and exactly double that frequency) into twelve "pitches" that we call notes. non-diatonic refers to the fact that it has no basis in any of the western minor or major scales (the two fundamental western scales) as it covers every note of the octave, thus is circular and beyond definition.

Hope that helps

Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#72

Post by cynicalkane »

thesethings wrote: post #67
cynicalkane wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like Chomsky's search for universal grammar, the search for music universals has been a failure. Nevertheless, there are some ideas that pop up surprisingly often. Doing a quick mental search, I believe every musical tradition I've heard that emphasizes accurate pitch, and at least one I've heard that doesn't, utilizes the pentatonic scale: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Pentatonic_sc...

I wasn't aware that either of these quests for universals have been a failure. My friend did a relatively recent music thesis about universals. I'm not in either field, but a belief in universal "deep structure" has helped me learn both language + music stuff. Even if they don't exist, I'm going to stick with what helps me :D

Well, you could say music must have rhythm, yet there's music with almost no rhythm at all. You could say music is about melody, but there's lots of examples of music with no melody. And as I hinted above, there's cultures where notes don't really have definite pitches.

I can't really think of anything that universally defines "music", other than that it's sound with an aesthetically pleasing structure.

Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#73

Post by nollidge »

pessimizer wrote: post #65
SwellJoe wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"separating the second and third strings by a major third instead of a perfect fifth" The other strings on a guitar are separated by a fourth, not fifth (perfect or otherwise).

Depends on which way you're counting.

No, it depends on the distance between the notes, which in the standard guitar tuning is a fourth (except between G3 and B4, as mentioned). You can take the lower note an octave up or the higher an octave down to make a fifth, but that changes the interval.

Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#74

Post by icarus_drowning »

mycroftiv wrote: post #4
icarus_drowning wrote: post #3

I teach Music Theory (and piano) for a living-- this is an excellent introduction to the most practical concepts. I was somewhat disappointed that the OP showed us a C Major scale without really explaining what a "major scale" is-- a collection of whole and half steps-- especially since they used a keyboard as an example, which is laid out in exactly the right pattern for teaching the major scale. (Notice that the bl…

I'm also a music theorist and educator. I'm interested in your perspective on whether it is a good idea to try to introduce students to the acoustic/mathematical derivation of the scale. To provide context for non-technical readers, the physical basis of harmonic intervals is integer ratios of frequencies, and European tempered tuning systems create scales and chords as a pragmatic adjustment of mathematically pure t…

I think it would be worth doing with older students as a supplement to the curriculum. One of the bad things about my "major scale-centric" approach is that I never explain why a major scale is WWHWWWH, which is actually a barrier to some students, who are either curious or who need more context for their information.

I teach mostly middle-school and high-school kids, and we barely have enough time to get through what I have, so I skip it. I wish I didn't have to.

Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#75

Post by jerf »

msluyter wrote: post #70
jerf wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The 7 tones that make up a major scale are basically a cultural artifact of western music (which goes back to gregorian chant). Other cultures have more/fewer tones." It's difficult to draw the line between culture and biology, but that's probably too far to the "cultural" side. There is a basis for those, which is that if you start on the base tone of C and run around the circle of fifths you'll get the white keys…

I once asked an ethnomusicologist if any common factors existed across all musical cultures and he said that about all he could point to was: a) some concept of a tonal center and b) the interval of the 5th remained fairly constant, despite whatever scales/tunings might exist. So, I'd grant that much, but beyond that, I don't see much evidence for the diatonic scale as being somehow inherently inevitable. The harmoni…

I answered a slightly different question than I think you think I did. You said "Well, IMHO this is a purely arbitrary cultural artifact resulting from the evolution of the keyboard (first in pipe organs). Since the octave is divided into 12 chromatic tones, you could in theory devise a keyboard with alternating white/black keys." I gave you a plausible non-arbitrary answer for why that particular pattern was chosen. Not why equal temprement is inevitable or why "7" notes in a scale are special, just why the white keys are ABCDEFG as we know them and not some other pattern. You can put more or fewer notes in your scales in stuff we still would call "Western" music without anybody caring or even noticing. (Much good Western music uses all 12 tones pretty freely.)

As for whether it's a Just So story, sometimes that's all you get. However, if it is just coincidence it's a mighty coincidence.

Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#76

Post by icarus_drowning »

pge wrote: post #38

One of the music theory things it took me a while to understand is why different major keys matter. In an idealized world, one can start a scale on any frequency and move up in whole and half steps (WWHWWWH) and have a scale. So why talk about the "key of G" vs the "key of C" if all that denotes is the frequency of the note we start on (which can be shifted up or down arbitrarily to suit the range of the instrument o…

You'll find that listening to music in a single key for extended periods of time can become extremely tiring. Most (not all people) need fresh tonality, or they get bored. (Obviously all of this depends on what kind/style of music you are listening to, etc., but I would wager that even if you switched from "classical" music to "pop" music and stayed in the same key, most people would find it aurally tiring).

Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#77

Post by zwieback »

mycroftiv wrote: post #4
icarus_drowning wrote: post #3

I teach Music Theory (and piano) for a living-- this is an excellent introduction to the most practical concepts. I was somewhat disappointed that the OP showed us a C Major scale without really explaining what a "major scale" is-- a collection of whole and half steps-- especially since they used a keyboard as an example, which is laid out in exactly the right pattern for teaching the major scale. (Notice that the bl…

I'm also a music theorist and educator. I'm interested in your perspective on whether it is a good idea to try to introduce students to the acoustic/mathematical derivation of the scale. To provide context for non-technical readers, the physical basis of harmonic intervals is integer ratios of frequencies, and European tempered tuning systems create scales and chords as a pragmatic adjustment of mathematically pure t…

I think it's very helpful to work back to the math, if the students are capable of understanding it. You can start with the familiar white-piano-keys scale and build forward, exactly like the article shows. Eventually, though, it's important to understand the math and how the different tempers were derived.

Instead of math maybe show pictures of sine waves and how they relate. My kids learned that in elementary school and it seemed to make sense to them. You can even demonstrate it pretty easily with long strings and a cheap strobe or the 60Hz lighting in the room.

Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#78

Post by presidentender »

SwellJoe wrote: post #59
presidentender wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The key-agnostic fretboard is a big part of the reason I enjoy playing guitar. It's not a perfect tool for the application at hand because of the necessity of separating the second and third strings by a major third instead of a perfect fifth, which would confuse the issue. However, I think it'd be more convenient to have a graphical representation of the major scale's construction on which a whole step is always cle…

"separating the second and third strings by a major third instead of a perfect fifth" The other strings on a guitar are separated by a fourth, not fifth (perfect or otherwise).

I am an idiot.

Re: Music Theory for Beginners

#79

Post by maw »

Jun8 wrote: post #56
cynicalkane wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Modern western music is based on medieval church music, which in turn is based on ancient Greek music. These are two cultures that placed strong value on harmony and mathematical ratios, and it so happens that notes in ratios are harmonious to the ear. Mathematically speaking, the ratios between notes come mostly from low-order ratios in 5-limit tunings: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Limit_%28musi...…

Thanks for the information. I wonder if there are any "music universals", like the ones for language, i.e. universal grammar. If favoring certain tone ratios is a characteristic of the human auditory system, then there should be.

Interesting question. I think there are some. Does N hz "sound like" N*2 hz and N/2 hz across cultures? I expect the answer is yes, but I don't really know.

Have a look at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A13_QGMtlRE. I think Bobby McFerrin would say that there indeed are music universals.

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