c - minor, is this the hardest key to compose in?

[jamesmcfadyen]

Good chords for C minor are: Cm, Bb, Abmaj7, Gm7, Fm7, Dbmaj7 and Ebm7(11). Mix up these chords you'll get some very nice textures!

[The Chase]

There are two things that get on my tits in this theory forum:

- Theory whores that say you NEED to know theory to make complex music
- Knowledge fearers that are scared to learn theory because learning would deny their god-given "genius"

This thread reeks of the latter.

[nuffink]

You missed:

- Commentators. They're not interested in theory, think they're above the fray and like chastising other posters.

[johnny2johnny]

You missed:

- Commentators. They're not interested in theory, think they're above the fray and like chastising other posters.

+1sus 4

[CS80]

Britney doesn't have any theory

[The Chase]

leave her alone.

[Resonant Serpent]

Just use you ears and fingers. f**k all the theory.

Is that what you do?

Theory is what the rest of you do to figure out what those gifted with genius have done without it.

I will just take a dive right into this piece of ignorance...

Mozart, Hendix, Chopan, Satriani, Via, Beethoven, and the list can go on forever, but I figure three gifted contemporaries, and three gifted classicals,

all students of theory...

Where did you read that Hendrix knew theory? Gifted, yes. I love his work. But even in the Miles Davis Autobiography, he states that Hendrix didn't know a thing about theory. And this is a guy that jammed with him often. Different people have different ways of coming to grips with the knowledge and application of theory.

[johnny2johnny]

Just use you ears and fingers. f**k all the theory.

Is that what you do?

Theory is what the rest of you do to figure out what those gifted with genius have done without it.

I will just take a dive right into this piece of ignorance...

Mozart, Hendix, Chopan, Satriani, Via, Beethoven, and the list can go on forever, but I figure three gifted contemporaries, and three gifted classicals,

all students of theory...

Where did you read that Hendrix knew theory? Gifted, yes. I love his work. But even in the Miles Davis Autobiography, he states that Hendrix didn't know a thing about theory. And this is a guy that jammed with him often. Different people have different ways of coming to grips with the knowledge and application of theory.

miles davis had a famous quote... which I have been mentioning a lot lately for some odd reason... quote =


first you learn your instrument, then you learn your thoery, then you forget em both and just play...


There is a lot of mystery around the life of Jimi Hendrix... some think he knew thoery, some think he did not. some think he killed himself, others think he was murdered... the question is not who is right or wrong. the question is who is open enough to see the possibilities....

[Cordelia]

I used to speak like a genius until I learned the difference between a noun and a verb, and now everything I say sounds like something someone else has already said. I don't actually want to communicate, see, I just like the way the sounds go together, like the way th sounds with uhh, and eee of course, with ch and zz.
Now I'm ruined.
Damn those English classes!




+1 what UncleAge said. I want to listen AND learn.

[Toxikator]

I used to speak like a genius until I learned the difference between a noun and a verb, and now everything I say sounds like something someone else has already said.

This guy gets it.

That's how stupid you all sound, talking about Music Theory like it's some old bible of rules that you've 'outgrown'.

[The Chase]

I used to speak like a genius until I learned the difference between a noun and a verb, and now everything I say sounds like something someone else has already said. I don't actually want to communicate, see, I just like the way the sounds go together, like the way th sounds with uhh, and eee of course, with ch and zz.
Now I'm ruined.

Hit the nail on the head

[JumpingJackFlash]

try D# major for a change

I think you meant Db minor, that should be way easier to write in than C# minor

Neither D# major nor Db minor are technically valid keys. (Because they would require the use of double sharps or double flats).
You can however have both Db major and D# minor.

All due respect, but they are perfectly valid keys... double sharps and double flats are musical notes distinct from their enharmonic equivalents; it's just that we have got so used to an equal tempered world that it is easily forgotten where the scales come from. Violins, trombones, slide whistles, etc, when played by people who know their instrument can play a double sharp or flat correctly keeping a scale perfectly intune without any of the equal tempered 'OK, I'll be mostly intune for you' approximations.

I used to work with a clarinetist who would go through melodies I'd written adjusting her fingering so that an A in a C major ascent would be intune, as would the A in an G major decent a few bars later. Both were the same note on a keyboard, but are actually different frequencies when done properly. She took this into account, and even tho' I don't have golden ears by any means, when listening blind I was able to tell the one that sounded 'sweeter' - the one where she didn't play the equal tempered scale... I could have transposed those lines into keys with x and bb, and she would have played them correctly

If double sharps and flats weren't legitimate notes, they would have been dropped from the theory books years ago.



DSP

You're mixing up several different things here; Tonality, Temperament, Accidentals, etc.

Of course double flats and double sharps are legitimate notes. In certain music they occur quite frequently. However, in traditional theory there is no such thing as the key of Db minor. - You can't write a piece in that key, you would have to write it enharmonically in C# minor.

That's just keys we're talking about. You can still have the scale, chord, arpeggio etc. of Db minor. (Chord ii in Cb major for example).

If there were no restrictions, then you'd probably see weird guys writing in the key of B-quadruple-flat-minor, just for the 'fun' of it. There are in fact only 15 possible Major keys and 15 possible minor keys. (In each case there are 3 that are enharmonically equivalent). A complete list can be found here.

None of this is the same as temperament. That's a different issue.

[Klemperer]

Good chords for C minor are: Cm, Bb, Abmaj7, Gm7, Fm7, Dbmaj7 and Ebm7(11). Mix up these chords you'll get some very nice textures!

Very interesting. Will try that out, thank you.

[Toxikator]

Good chords for C minor are: Cm, Bb, Abmaj7, Gm7, Fm7, Dbmaj7 and Ebm7(11). Mix up these chords you'll get some very nice textures!

Very interesting. Will try that out, thank you.

I disagree with jamesmcfayden.

Some of those chords make sense, but Gm7 should DEFINITELY be G7 and BbMaj should in SOME cases be subbed for bdim.

[duncanparsons]

I disagree as well - the last two listed are wrong, and should be EbM7 and Dm7(11).

btw It's normal to list chords in ascending order, but, no matter!