Music theory as a special interest

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Music seems to be a fairly common special interest, but how about music theory? There are so many fascinating things to learn, like various types of chords (major/minor/augmented/diminished/9th/11th/etc), intervals, chord progressions, chord inversions, harmonization, structure of musical pieces, all kinds of scales... in a way it's like exploring math through sound. So any music theory buffs here?

Right here!! ! My particular area of interest is atonality, set theory, and serialism. I'm really fascinated with high modernism and expressionism. You only THINK you know music theory until you study atonal music, and it's a real shame people tend to have such a negative opinion of it. Some atonal works can be dazzlingly beautiful. I'm embedding a video of Anton Webern's opus 21 with score. I did a complete analysis of this piece back in music school. Absolutely brilliant use of klangfarbenmelodie, something you MUST master in order to write good 12-tone.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKD_tZr-ZpY[/youtube]

I have been interested in the physics side of sound as well as the biological process of us hearing sound as a special interest.

Was about to start quite a difficult course on sound production, but pulled out a month before it because it was a lot of money to pay for something i am not going to make a career out of.

Musical theory itself is just amazing if you ask me. shame i cant motivate myself to learn to play.

i have a midi keyboard which i really want to start learning to use.

Edit:

by chance as i was looking for a documentary to watch this came up:

http://www.truththeory.org/how-music-works/

Interesting - the 2 musicians I'm currently working with are both quite heavily into musical theory and thinking about music rather than being spontaneous and letting their souls off the leash.

Me, I'm the wild man of the group, I just busk the stuff up and try to get into the showmanship thing. But it's a learned response. I spent years researching the technical aspects of sound recording, PA and guitar amplification, etc., and lived to regret it because I found the technical aspects so absorbing that I lost the plot - it took me too far away from the art of actually playing music and reaching the audience. I could very easily have got similarly lost in music theory....it's rare that any stuff in that line is clear enough for me to understand easily, but the things I have fathomed, I've thoroughly enjoyed. It's fascinating because it can't be completely understood from s pure science perspective, it seems to occupy the line between science and art.

So I'm not knocking it at all. For anybody who doesn't particularly want to become a musician and reach audiences, it would not be a wasted life. Just that I want to do just that, and because of my obsessional, analytical nature, I daren't stray too far into the technicalities of music, because if I do, it could be a long time before I surface.

I had it as an interest and even took it in college (majored in music), but let it go when I dropped out. It was short-lived as a major thing, but it's still something I think - having the opportunity and impetus - I would definitely get back into.

The main thing learning as much music theory as I learned did was give me the cognitive tools to translate what I learned on one instrument to any other, and made it simpler for me to learn any instrument.

So true. I've been very guilty of this myself, and the obsession thing ground my musical output to a standstill.

If you go back to the basics of making music, it has always been a "free" and "open" process.

The study of Western music theory just means a deep study of harmony and how that harmony functions to create larger forms and large-scale compositions. In general, we tend to want to hear a I chord progress to a IV chord, progress somewhere else, eventually meander to a V chord, and resolve back to I. In a nutshell, that's really all of what most music theory is.

I tend to like music that defies "classical" harmonic structures, and the thing I like about 12-tone music is how it divorces itself from conventional ways of conceiving harmony. The only "rules" are avoid repetitions of notes that might be perceived as tonal centers (notice I didn't say no repetition at all--atonal music can be very repetitive), and avoid consonant harmonic structures (major chords, etc.).

There are other ways of making music, tonal and atonal, that are still WAY out of the box. I LOVE George Crumb's music (e.g. "Vox Balinae"). His scores just LOOK free and liberated, though interpreting them takes a lot of work for someone steeped in conventional styles. I like John Cage, also.

What you have to keep in mind is that the theory of music is just a set of observed occurrences common to particular historical styles and trends. I compose better when I just sit down and jam for a while, record what I'm playing, and then go back, notate it, and clean it up for someone else to read. Really, the bulk of historical composition is no different. I'd love to see what would happen if we could bring Mozart back, hand him an electric guitar, and make him watch a few Van Halen videos. I bet within two or three months he'd make Dragonforce look like a bunch of weaklings. Dude didn't write anything really that special for classical music--he was just really good at picking up on what it was people were doing back then and creating original work based on that.

I think music theory (we're really just talking about harmony, here) can help you learn a lot of shortcuts and help you gain a disciplined approach to music-making. It makes music more predictable, allows you to imagine the results you want and then let you just "go for it." What music theory is NOT is a magic potion that will turn you into an overnight genius. You only have your own imagination and willingness to work hard to get to that level.

The music teachers used to tell me that if you play a song in say A minor and then end with A major, it sounds like the sun has come out. I agree, but what I can't fathom is why it does that. Why do minor chords sound sad, doomy and awe-inspiring, and majors sound kind of happy? And why do we equate a shift from awe to happiness with the sun coming out? Is it learned and cultural or is there something about psycho-acoustics that gives us these emotional reactions to the different pitch ratios of chords?

The secret to music appreciation, and to good composition is not to question why. That's for the scientists of this world.

Just learn it, know it, and USE it (or just accept it if you're just a listener), and ENJOY it!

If you get all wrapped up in the "why" question, and truly enjoy exploring why, that's different. You're more of a scientist than an aficionado or composer. Go for it if that's what drives you. But if you want to create music, "WHY" it does what it does is a major distraction. Pun intended.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnbOWi6f_IM&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

I think it's somewhere between learned and cultural. I'm not an expert in psycho-acoustics, and that subject goes WAY deeper than anything I'm prepared to discuss. I don't hear the relationships between major and minor chords as really "special," but I think unless you're really trained to "hear" chords you don't really pay much attention to it but rather your own reaction to it. We've come to associate "minor" sounds with sadness. But if you go back there are tons of works out there that are intended to be jubilant but are sung/played in minor keys.

Ending a minor-key song on a major chord, assuming it's the I chord, is what we call a "Picardy 3rd" (the difference between major/minor chords is the middle note, or the 3rd in relationship to the root). It does have that "sunny" kind of effect to it, but there might be other reasons why the Picardy 3rd developed. In counterpoint, where the focus is on melodies and harmonic relationships between multiple simultaneously voiced melodies, the emphasis tends to be on strong melodic resolutions, like leading-tone 7ths. It used to be commonplace to write musica ficta to reflect the tendency to include a leading tone 7th in minor modes such as Dorian and Aeolian (Phrygian is also a minor mode, but with an upper leading tone and hence the lower leading tone musica ficta was unnecessary) and in Mixolydian (major mode, but no natural leading 7th or upper leading 2nd). Now, in "good counterpoint," each note must resolve, preferably by a leading-tone half-step such as the 7th. The problem is there is no easy way to approach the 3rd in a minor mode or key. If the 1 is already sounding, then the addition of the 2 creates a M2 dissonance which resolves upward to a m3. If you want to avoid that dissonance, you really don't have many options. You can't resolve it going P4 to m3 directly because there's no leading-tone, and you'd have to approach the 2 by leap and THEN resolve the dissonance. Your other option is approach the m3 using what we refer to as a V chord and resolve upward in parallel 3rds, which you are allowed to do. But if you don't WANT to use parallel thirds to end the piece, then you have to "create" an "artificial" upper leading tone by resolving the P4 to a M3, which you can only do by raising the m3. The result is a M3 instead of a m3, the so-called "Picardy 3rd," and it solves a lot of counterpoint problems.

Keep in mind that the point of counterpoint study was to produce "beautiful music" as well as promote the discipline of the composition student. It's a very rigid discipline, but many composers today still swear by it. I took a semester of modal counterpoint (16th-Century style) and barely passed. Beautiful counterpoint is just not my style or my strength. But, and I keep going back to Mozart, it doesn't necessarily HAVE to be. Mozart COULD write beautiful counterpoint, as evidenced by the B Minor Requiem, but much of his music isn't characterized by a lot of rich or complex counterpoint but rather "melody and accompaniment."

Understanding the "why," as you put it, allows the composer to think of music in predictable terms. The goal is to make music sound the way we WANT it to sound, to dream up all sorts of ideas and then make them happen. Composition is not about following some rigid set of rules and regulations. Understanding the components of music and sound is one of many tools we have at our disposal. The study of music theory or harmony gives us all the shortcuts so we don't fumble around figuring out how to get the results we want. It helps you find a greater degree of freedom in composing because you learn a wider musical vocabulary, saving time by knowing exactly how to say what you want to express. Fumbling around for the "right" notes when you ought to already know what various combinations sound like or what effect they have just results in musically incoherent babble. Now, sometimes I get bored or experience composer's block, in which case I might spend more time d!cking around than actual composing. Anything I commit to paper during these periods will probably sound contrived, and I mean BADLY contrived. But work is work, and sooner or later I'll come across something that I may have discovered by "accident" and work it in to suit a given musical purpose. Either way, when I write something, I'm purposeful and deliberate in my writing. Music theory helps you understand the musical language in which you're composing so you can spend more time being productive, rather than everything you compose just be a bunch of happy accidents. As to being distracting--well, it's more distracting fumbling around for the best way to work out a musical idea when you don't know what you're doing. When I write out a C Major chord, I MEAN play a C Major chord! If I use irregular resolutions of dissonant intervals to consonant harmonies, it's because I MEANT to resolve dissonances that way. If I want a m2, I write a m2, or if set out to write klangfarbenmelodie, it's because I WANTED to trade off notes of a melodic passage among a group of instruments.

I'm the same way about sound design. If I want to emphasize the 4th partial in a square wave, then that's exactly what I'll do (hint: square waves don't have 4th partials. Doubling the fundamental at the 2nd octave can certainly be musically useful when programming synthesizers). If I'm working with a synth lead preset and I really want a pad, I can certainly get it (switch from mono to poly, lengthen the attack and release transients).

If I have a professional clarinet player in a chamber ensemble and I want to scare the h3ll out of my audience, I can write instructions into my score on how to play a certain multiphonic by overblowing the written partials. Or if I have a string orchestra and I want to send shivers up the audience's spine, I can write instructions for my violinists to randomly bow behind the bridge. Or if I want percussion effects from string players, I can tell them to play col legno.

Having a good grasp on certain things like harmony, orchestration, extended playing techniques/instrument sound effects, sound design, and so on gives you a LOT of freedom to write whatever you want. Music theory helps you understand how to reach your musical goals.

For me, I divide my time between composing and sound design when electronic sources are involved. I have a passion for synthesizers and, figuratively speaking, sold my soul to buy the synth I use now. I'm well aware of the "what" and "why" of notes that sound pleasant together, but I'm also aware of the components that make up the notes themselves. I can create any sound that I imagine and have a number of tools available to realize those sounds--using additive synthesis, a combination additive and frequency modulation, subtractive using filters, sampling, granular synthesis, and a wide range of methods to modulate or distort those sounds, crafting them into exactly what I hear in my head. I can sit around all day and just dream up virtual orchestras of sounds that only I have ever heard, and then I can sit at the Synclavier and/or my laptop and begin building those otherworldly orchestras.

Once I have those in place, I can start writing music for those orchestras, which I generally do now in real time. If I'm just jamming out and having a good time, like what I played, but am plagued by a single wrong-sounding note, I don't have to guess which note it is that doesn't belong. I just think, "oh, that was supposed to be an F9sus chord, but I hear a m2 that must be an accident." If it is a m2 above the root, I can instantly identify the wrong note as a Gb (or F#, but that would be an augmented unison ), find the measure the wrong note appears in, look for an F# in the event list (because accidentals are displayed only as #s), move the cursor to it and hit "delete."

The point is that harmony is the language we speak when we talk about creating music. It might be a foreign language to a lot of people, and there may be a lot of primitive dialectic versions of it (like when members of a rock band learn a new song), but it is nonetheless a language you can learn and speak fluently. When I sit down to write a forum post, I think about what will best communicate my ideas on a given topic, and then I just let the words flow. Without some kind of vocabulary to express what I think, I have no means to write anything at all. Harmony is the same way. I want to communicate what's in my head, but without the harmonic vocabulary needed to communicate those ideas, I run the risk of being misunderstood. As a composer, I can write something, understand that something I wrote isn't going to work or it's going to distract from the idea I'm trying to express, and I can delete it, change it, just chunk the whole thing, or file it away as something maybe I can come back to later. Not all ideas are good ones, but they might turn into good ideas given the right time and the right mood.

People who "jam" are naturally conversant in this language, even if they aren't necessarily "literate" in it. My 3-year-old... Heck, my 2-year-old can tell you her name or what she likes to be called ("Nugget!"), but she can't write her name ("Hannah Claire"). But she DOES use elements of language to communicate, and that is something she has had to learn over time. Harmony is not "scientific" any more than your written ABC's of the usual spoken language. In essence, there's no real point to learning to read or write. So why bother? You learn to read and write for the sake of transmitting information. Written music is the same way. I can predict the effect my words have because I've been learning to read and write the English language since I was in kindergarten back in 1984. Any time I'm going to depend on written music to transmit my musical ideas, I need to be concerned with harmony and other aspects of music theory in order to communicate those ideas effectively. You may not need to be musically "literate" the same way I do, but any time we are using melodic and harmonic devices (chords, melodic intervals), we are both speaking the same musical language. The only difference is that I may have a fuller-developed and more sophisticated vocabulary than you do.

I've recently gotten interested in music and music theory. I have a lot of music software which I obtained last semester, and after Christmas I bought a Casio CTK-3000 keyboard (just $110 for a whole bundle of stuff) and I've been looking online for fingering exercises (I will never stop laughing at the phrase "I've been practicing fingering all day") and music theory lessons. I have about 5 DVDs worth of piano lessons I downloaded, but I've put off advancing in those until I memorize at least all the major/minor scales (not just the order of the notes, but the degree of each note as well). Depending on how long that takes, I might also memorize the pentatonic scales and different modes (I know how all of them are made, but I don't want to have to think to play them). What resources have you found for music theory that you've found helpful or enlightening?

There seem to be a few insinuations here that if one is interested in music theory and why music works, it somehow takes something away from creativity or "real musicianship". I have to say, as a composer and performing musician who is also highly interested in music theory/how and why music works, I find that more than a little insulting. It's a false dichotomy.

Indeed. John Coltrane vigorously studied advanced music theory as part of his daily practice regime. It didn't impede his creativity and appreciation of music--rather it enabled him to go where no other jazz improviser has gone before. That's fine if a listener of music wants music to be a mystery to them, but for those who compose or perform music on that expert level need music theory. Saying otherwise is like saying Picasso didn't need to understand color theory or how to mix paints. I also think it has nothing to do with the OP's question, which is valid or the discussion of AS.

I don't think enjoying music is really an Aspie interest, if it's just occupational and for enjoyment, even if you're obsessive about it. NTs can be obsessive fans too. But for me music was an Aspie interest--I was not interested in being a "fan" but instead, I had to know everything I could about it and be as proficient and expert at it as could. Naturally, part of that was learning music theory. Aside from wanting to known everything about performers and different styles, I taught myself to read music and play piano and clarinet at 9, then I taught myself several other instrument in the following years, and in high school I taught myself more advanced music theory. I later got a degree in music, although I had a breakdown right after graduating that pretty much ruined my chances of starting a profession career. I haven't been able to play music nearly as well since my breakdown as I did after, and I avoided doing much with music for many years because of my residual anger and disappointment about being a "failure" at something I spent almost my entire life up to that point doing.

People in my family who have the stronger AS traits tend to be very good at music theory. I was great at it, almost intuitive, like with reading music. My brother, on the other hand, who's not very Aspie-ish and probably would be considered not on the spectrum clinically, can't get his head around music theory.

Sure, it's not necessarily impossible for a person to do both well. Just that in many people, especially Aspies, there's a risk of one special interest taking over the whole game. And I know people who have good technical music skills but can't play anything without sheet music.

That's a matter of creativity, I think, and not necessarily overfocusing on one thing over another.