I made a chord progression that i can't explain with my theory knowledge

[nix808]

Yep, the fifth is root * 1.33

I'm quite sure that harmony is frequencies in simple ratios

[Bojmir Raj Raj]

Yep, the fifth is root * 1.33

I'm quite sure that harmony is frequencies in simple ratios

That's the perfect fourth, 4/3. the perfect fifth is root * 1.5, 3/2.

Those are the "Just" or ideal intervals though- the 12-tET fifth is a touch flat, and the fourth correspondingly sharp, of the Just Intonation ideals. The difference between the Just fifth and fourth and the 12-tET fifth and fourth is so small- about 2 cents- that it doesn't really make much of a difference, there's just a very slow acoustic beat or wobble in the 12-tET intervals which you don't even notice unless you're very used to the purity of the Just intervals. The major third in 12-tET however is *way* off, very sharp, of the Just ideal of 5/4 (*1.25).

Western music theory developed during the time of pure 5/4 major thirds, which sound amazing especially when sung by a choir. This was accomplished by heavily sacrificing the purity of the fifths and fourths, using quarter-comma meantone. The fifths of quarter-comma meantone are really wobbly and flabby and sound awful to contemporary ears, but back then they were really tripping on the thirds so they didn't mind the soggy fifths and jangling fourths.

So why not use both Just 5/4 major thirds, and the corresponding 6/5 minor third ( a bit sharp of our 12-tET m3), AND Just fifths and fourths? Well, you can if you're doing music, for example, like Indian classical music, but if you try western music with chords and modulations and so on, you quickly run into the problem of the fact that the Just intervals don't circulate back to be equal to each other, and your whole tune starts to "comma shift" up or down. In 12-tET, if you play a chain of fifths, you wind up at the major third quickly, (C-G, G-D, D-A, A-E) but in Just Intonation you never do! That means if you do a I-vi-V-I chord progression, in meantone or 12-tET your overall pitch stays the same, but in Just intonation, you wind up half a quartertone flat! Do that four times and your whole piece has gone down a semitone, which the bass singers at least are certainly going to feel! It is mathematically impossible to "fix" this, the only thing you can do is adjust your pitch as you go along, which is what the Hermode electronic tuning system tries to do for synths, and which good choirs and orchestras do by ear and lots of practice, and of course having flexibly pitched instruments like voices and fretless strings and even with reeds and horns your embouchure can make the comma adjustments as you go

Sorry for going on about this, professional deformity!

[jancivil]

Yep, the fifth is root * 1.33

I'm quite sure that harmony is frequencies in simple ratios

In one type of Just Intonation it is; if it's done on a so-called equal temperament, ie., 12 to a 'octave' instrument, the math is irrational, the system here is explained as 12th root of 2. [1:1] 2:1 [4:1 etc] is the only real ratio.

So the 12tET major third is around 14¢ sharper than a 5:4 M3.
EG: Indian Classical Music, including sitar, performance will have a variety of major thirds in its melodies. One theory was 5:4 and 81:64, the syntonic comma [81:80] used to ensure 3:2 relationships in lines where it's broken.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_into ... ian_scales

As to the just intonation in transposable harmony problem, if you have Vienna Instruments Pro, you can create a matrix (of sample cells) for a new just intonation, setting that key, and switch to it as needed. The reasoning is instrumentalists in ensemble kind of tend to a more natural concord than 12tET affords.

[Atza]

Not everything can be explained in terms of musical theory. Sometimes something just sounds good no matter what,when that happens you shouldn't try to explain it at any cost,just enjoy it if you like it:)

[ValliSoftware]

my explantion is that it's a bunch of semi random chords that you happen to find nice sounding. I suspect that's as much theory as is required in this instance.

That is not an explanation - just plain ignorance.

What "Simon Says" (yes pun intended) is true.

You don't need to know music theory to create music.
If you create a chord progress and don't know music theory, why is there a need to try to apply music theory, the chord progression has already been created.

As Simon says, "you happen to find nice sounding" and you didn't need music theoy to create it.

To take it even a step further, music theory can't be applied to how you play that chord progression either. That's up to the musician, how they think "you happen to find nice sounding".

So here's how I decided to play the above chord progression.



Music theory can't be applied to how you play the progression, but then again if someone doesn't know music theory and creates a cool chord progression, where does music theory get applied?

[jancivil]

my explantion is that it's a bunch of semi random chords that you happen to find nice sounding. I suspect that's as much theory as is required in this instance.

That is not an explanation - just plain ignorance.

What "Simon Says" (yes pun intended) is true.
[...]
music theory can't be applied to how you play that chord progression either. That's up to the musician, how they think "you happen to find nice sounding".
[...]

Music theory can't be applied to how you play the progression, but then again if someone doesn't know music theory and creates a cool chord progression, where does music theory get applied?

This statement has no relevance whatsoever to the application of or use for music theory. It's a poor man's sophistry, it seemed good to you but it has no real point here.
It is certainly true that some musicians have no knowledge or particular interest in the explanations of what they do - the most notable example I have is Paul McCartney - but turning that into the argument you want to make here is not helpful or useful at all. It's just posturing. You have had a bad reaction to music theory so you sought to negate it. At a music theory sub-forum... really?


Here's what's real: the example, Paul McCartney absolutely is using 'music theory', he can consistently get the effect he wants in music so by definition he knows what he's doing. You actually have misconstructed what music theory is, and presented us with what amounts to a reductive definition which is not really meaningful. Composers do not consult a 'music theory' text in order to work. People create things and form pathways to new ideas that aren't probably in any book, but the pathways forming have a sense to them which may later be explained and codified.

Everyone that understands from their experience what their next move clearly is, eg., the person doing 12-bar blues who grasps I - IV - I then we go to V and a turnaround, typically V - IV - I has music theory working for them. They don't have to even have those numbers but they have something working for them internally, it is something they KNOW. Information is not through itself knowledge.

So for those of us who are not as gifted as McCartney benefit from knowledge handed down to us. And I can assure you that once you have a modi operandi and a coherent way of thinking from the application of knowledge, your readiness to acquire knowledge follows.

But you're choosing to refuse a way of working you don't actually grok. It's an argument from ignorance.