What exactly is "music theory"?

I learned a little music theory in college. It starts with the basics of music: melody, harmony, rhythm, etc. It gets into what makes a composer unique and such.

Musical theory isn't really "attached" to a particular instrument. Once you can read music, you could (theoretically) play any instrument if you knew which key/valve/string to strike/push/pluck to get the note you're reading. (Okay, I'll admit it, I can't really answer this question but I'm giving it a "bump".) It's been 30+ years since I studied theory and I don't remember much of it. I remember it dealt with intervals "Sing the minor 6th above this note" and lots of Italian terms -- e.g. diminuendo means gradually getting softer, for instance. We had to learn to transpose -- meaning you rewrite a piece of music in a different key. Have you ever had a soprano start you off with "Happy Birthday" only to find that nobody can hit the notes? You start off again in a lower key -- it still sounds like "Happy Birthday" just easier to sing? That's transposition. If this sounds like a foreign language, well, it is -- the language of music. So I guess that's what theory is. I'm really hoping a music teacher will come along -- I obviously crammed for my theory exams and remember nothing all these years later -- it's the use it or lose it syndrome. For a while I did a lot of transposition, but that's about the only thing that stuck.

I was looking arouond for sites that would serve as illustrations. This one is pretty basic:

http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/theory/theory.htm

While I was there, I found a nice site that is somewhat more advanced:

http://www.musictheory.net/

Music theory as it is taught is extremely arbitrary but it's good to get a foundation. Over the years, any good musician develop her own music theory.

Broadly speaking, music theory is the study of the grammar and syntax of music. At its most basic levels it covers the different organizational systems we use to classify rhythm, scales, harmony, melody, etc. In its more advanced forms it also teaches how these elements can be used: e.g. knowing the different ways that a fully-diminished 7th chord can resolve, or deciding if and when it would be advantageous to use chordal inversions rather than root positions, and so on. Unlike the more academic and specialized field of "music analysis" with which it is often conflated, theory tends to be geared toward performance, composition, and listening skills (whereas "analysis" is primarily aimed at conjecturing how composers made the compositional choices that they did in specific pieces).

I can give you an example of a practical application of theory: I frequently accompany singers at the piano and every so often I am asked to accompany singers who do not have the scores to the songs they want to sing; all they know are the melodies, which they have memorized. Essentially I have to write the accompaniment myself, and this is where theory comes in. Depending on the style that the singer is trying to achieve, my job is made easier knowing that such-and-such passage should probably have the iii chord underneath it. Theory also tends to be indispensible for singers not blessed with perfect pitch. If you know what a descending minor-6th sounds like, you can sing it when you encounter one in a piece, regardless of the key, without having to hear it first.

when i took musical theory back at home (i learned piano and classical guitar), it was the already described basics - melody, harmony, rhythm... but we also, always, in every class, regardless of who was the teacher, listened to a lot of pieces of music, learnt a lot of history of classical music, what was fashionable when, different epochs and how to distinguish between them... i do not remember all that much except that I did enjoy it tremendously.

Yes, it's crucial for thoery teachers to provide actual examples from real pieces of music. Not doing so would be like teaching poetry students that a sonnet is a 14-line poem with such-and-such rhyme scheme and meter... but not showing them actual sonnets.

My advice would be to leave it alone!
Degree level harmony/theory sucks willy.

It's an acquired taste, it's true.

Ha, indeed. To "The Pentacle Queen," you have a point, although Frank Zappa once pointed out that the primary challenge in theory is understanding that every theoretical principle -- every dot or line or symbol or expressed concept on a staff -- has an aural product. Like the difference between the written word and the spoken. Learning music theory is like learning how to write in English just so you can hear someone read your work out loud.

Hmmm, maybe.
Generally I only like doing things I'm good at, but I've had a bit of a break through recently, and am actually quite liking harmony.
It's all thanks to George Pratt.

Hey guys, listen to this! WANG! CHUNG!

Whats the relivance?

It's the theory that spawned a band. What are the first two notes you play the first time you picked up an electric guitar?

Everybody have fun tonight. Everybody Wang Chung tonight.

Similarly, it's important to keep in mind that the basic concepts of Western theory were developed after the fact. There was music long before there were standardized categories into which it was organized. I find that my own students' resistance to theory is lessened when they realize that it is meant to be descriptive rather than prescriptive. Like language, music can be "spoken" without knowledge of theory; but theory helps you to perceive patterns so that you can recognize, reproduce, or modify them more easily (create the "aural product," to use your term) in other situations. That is why theory won't necessarily make you a better performer in any one piece, but it will make you a more versatile one overall.

My cousin is the keyboardist for Dweezil's "Zappa Plays Zappa" tour. How cool is that?

Very.

And shapeless, well put.

In terms of creating new music, what's theory's place? If anything it's a straight jacket - although I'm aware of many modern composers who learn the rules then spend their time breaking them at the edges. But many 'post theory' musics have developed without reference to theory - Blues for example.

Maybe theory is good for reproduction, not necessarily so good for creation.

When I played in bands it was often said that classically trained players felt very uncomfortable when improvisation was called for (a generalisation obviously).

For my part, I learned theory and it helped make up for the fact that I wasn't raised in a musical family but it I feel that the knowledge gained could steer you toward a certain methodicalness in playing, head over heart if you will (or comfortable ear over challenged ear?)

Well, as I said, theory shouldn't be thought of as prescriptive, so I think one is likely to arrive at misguided ideas about theory if one asks how it contributes to creation rather than to performance. That is not its role.

I am not a composer myself, so I would be greatly interested to hear a composer's view on the matter. My guess is that composers (the ones I know, anyway) would respond that theory's usefulness in composition is roughly equivalent grammar's usefulness to a writer. You don't have to know the specific rules of grammar in order to put sentences together, just as you don't have to know theory in order to write melodies. But grammar is not a hindrance to developing one's own style, and most composers I know very enthusiastically teach theory (even the ones who were not raised on it themselves), so I don't get the impression that they think theory is any great hindrance to developing one's own style either. Knowing the name of a chord is not going to make you more prone or less prone to using it.



I'm not sure how theory would influence one's playing style and interpretation. Can you elaborate?