Trouble understanding why some people are reluctant to learn music theory.

[vurt]

thank you.

[EatMe]

im not interested in your wife, im just worried im going to be eaten!

I will not report the post, because then I have to take vurt out of his comfortable space for living, so I'm not really going to report this.

[jancivil]

I make sort of dissonant rock and left field electronic tracks and I don't really follow any "rules" from music theory

There are no rules from music theory as though a prescriptive matter.

Now, if the idea is to write or improvise within a given style's parameters we must first understand what isn't done. If the thing has to sound exactly like JS Bach there are many proscriptions abstracted post hoc & codified from observation. There isn't any how-to manual, I don't think. The chief takeaway from this is the composer made his/her own rules. Bach did things others hadn't. someone says "You can't do that!" "Watch me."
The received proscriptions there may appear to show things which are probably a good idea but we find Bach violated them in certain cases.

There's a myriad of style conventions one is fluid in that can't be ignored; basic doo wop is I vi IV V I. Then the convention inevitably mutates. Jazz at a certain point took popular tunes, Broadway show tunes (you're playing gigs and you have to do), abstracting "ii7 V7 I^7" but wanted more action so any chord landed on may be a new "I" ('tonicization' received from the earlier convention). Someone gets a hair up their ass and sticks a flat5 on V7, and hilarity ensues.

So the point is not to become a follower of rules but to have an 'educated' basis in which to make one's own rules.

(typoed 'vii' for 'vi'.)

[liqih]

I think these two things (about the question) :
1) Over the last century, music has come full circle, evolving (?) from the harmony of notes to the texture of timbres. The influence of avant-garde, globalization and electronics has made the development of a comprehensive music theory so complex that it can no longer be expressed using traditional notation.
2) One learns what one needs to know.

[jancivil]

Music Theory is sort of a misnomer; it deals in bare facts more akin to describing grammar or syntax than saying this hypothesis is undergoing testing.

The coursework known typically as 'music theory' was never "comprehensive"; so other things enter into the formal musical education. Counterpoint. Orchestration; the physicality of instruments' construction informing the limits these are capable of, ie., what are the facts of "Horn in F" etc; "Form and Analysis". "The textures of timbre" is studied in an orchestration course. A composition major (see exception below) is expected to study conducting. Then there's Music History.

My old school (early 1980s) had a Buchla II, two Revox A77s, an Otari two-track 'mastering deck' and a couple of mics. This was the material for the Electronic Music comp student. Today it's absolutely gobsmacking what you could do in there (knowing Cubase or Logic et al might be prerequisite).
None of my experience in either situation was out of a textbook. I can, however see someone at SFCM today saying 'RTFM'.

Before we can even speak of "a comprehensive music theory" we need to know well that notation is a (fairly coarse) shorthand. Thank the gods for the piano roll implementation in a modern DAW, as what's captured in notation as pertains to duration is hopelessly short of describing reality. So the areas of hIstory and analysis along with tutelege and guidance ("Appiled Music" is what my major was called) towards a certain prowess on one's instrument seek to inform performance practice...
"can no longer be expressed using traditional notation" - it never was.

So as a matter of fact, I haven't used notation to compose for 20 yrs. I wouldn't even want to try expressing all the microrhythm of a good reggae rhythm guitar part, let alone the more abstruse things; or so-called microtones. This has absolutely nothing to do with the study of so-called music theory. I was there to learn how to part-write, and along the way my performance of a Bach suite was informed by writing a paper for Form and Analysis.

I'd never tell someone else what they need.


all that said, I may figure to do things that were never modeled for me like that, way outside the boundaries or precedence

[Starbright]

Ok, my take on the topic: I thnk music theory is hard for some people because the basics are laid out out wrong.
I studied music and teaching music theory myself as singing coach when it comes to preparation to pass the entrance test for studying music.

I'll always start with premise number one: every theory has its origin in practice.

Then comes premise number two: all scales are just collection of notes that sound well and exciting in context to each other.

Premise number: music theory is a toolset, not a rule set. It gives you opportunities to achieve different things.

Number 3: it's just a mere communication tool so you can guide your fellow to the result you want to achieve and vice versa.

To make it fun, for each topic choose a song that you want to learn, learn it and then improvise above it using phrases from that song - all the scales become part of your musical intuition by that. Also still note out some chords. Then create songs with it.
So here's a level plan to make it a bit easier:

L1 - Major and Minor scales and chords and songforms
L2 add 7ths, major 7th, 6ths, 9ths in your voicings
L3 add Lydian and Dorian
L4 add Phrygian and Mixolydian (Bonus: add Locrian)
L5 learn the basic cncept of "functions" aka roots to home
L6 Learn about the idea of borrowed chords and tones ( basically it's the idea that you can borrow from scales with the same root or thet stand in relation via the circle of fifths). In that relation learn the circle of fifths
L7 learn about the IIm V7 I progression /aka Jazz
L8 learn about tritonus substitution
L9 learn/realise the tonal vs modal approach (each chord a scale vs all chords form a scale)
L 10 learn funny and cool exceptions...

[wagtunes]

People are generally lazy. Plus. music theory is not easy. There is a lot to it. I went to 4 years of college for music theory and even then didn't learn everything. Who has the time? Especially in today's "give it to me yesterday" society.

It's just too much work.