Rant on music theory ignorance.

[TristezaOrange]

Wot? 7 pages and still no flame war?

PEOPLE WITH MACS CAN UNDERSTAND MUSIC THEORY BETTER THAN PEOPLE WITH PCs.

[Meffy]

Bah. Spoiled kids. Get a Commodore 64! When I was a kit... blither blither blither...

[Moritz Morpheus MkIII]

[multree]

I have no clue about music theory....

can't read scores, I'm lucky if I can name the chords I am playing

but then again my music is just hippie noise

[BONES]

I couldn't care less about music theory. That's what ears are for.

[VicDiesel]

McLilith, in the context of the thread, and I must stress that point, your song doesn't show any knowledge of music theory. It has no kind of chord progression, its in a really basic time signature, and the notes aren't exactly in any kind of scale.

There is music theory beyond scales. See my post. It wouldn't have surprised me if McLilith knew about dodecaphony. And if anything is theoretical, that is.

[Rangtangtang]

If you get to hung up about the thoery it can destroy your creativity, same can be said about the technical side too.

[Moritz Morpheus MkIII]

Wot? 7 pages and still no flame war?

PEOPLE WITH MACS CAN UNDERSTAND MUSIC THEORY BETTER THAN PEOPLE WITH PCs.

..good job, tris, here ya go..

[Hink]

They're just making excuses because they don't want to take any time or energy to learn something. They would rather just make cookie cutter dance styles that take half an hour and half a brain to make. Then they can go to all their friends and say, "Yo!! Peep dis new darktrance-deep-psycore-leftstep-herdtech-dance dance revolution!" and their friends will be like "Yo!! Dats tight yo! Dat 303-virus-909-MC 3000 beat is sick, yall!!" and then they go to the club and say "YO!! Drop dis joint yo!" Then the dj will be like "Yo, dats a tizight track yo, ALL THE LAYDEEZ.... SCREAM!!!!!" and then he'll pick up some honeys at da club, and go back to the room and overdose on love boat.


People wan't instant results. Why should they spend years learning to play music when they can just buy some loop cds and get instant attention?

Honestly though, that kind of stuff won't last. It's the people who are making music from their heart and soul that will last forever. People who just make music for money and attention aren't really making music IMO.

However, music isn't about notes and chords and how to resolve a dominant 7th chord. Theory simply gives you basic tools and skills that allow you to communicate, write down, and more easily express yourself. IMHO

you know I totally agree with you, however the fact that they are too lazy to learn theory...well parden the word play but in theory that's correct. But I think it's more due to a changing world and not exactly "laziness".

I guess it is a form of laziness, but I think it has more to do with the way the world is now...we live in an "I want it and I want now" generation". Technology just keeps perpetuating this trend, but that's progress...

[Hink]

If you get to hung up about the thoery it can destroy your creativity, same can be said about the technical side too.

that's crap and I have 34 years of laying to show it...when I write I write for me to play guitar...I use theory to make sure I have a solid foundation and I use improv and theory to combine and to allow creativity that in fact I am free to express with the gi-tar...

[Rangtangtang]

It can make music too predictable?

[BONES]

I don't believe any of that negative shit. Learn it or not, it won't make any difference to your creativity or anythign else. I just feel that the time it would take is more enjoyably spent listening to different combinations of notes and hearing what works. Theory is really far more important for people to collaborate and communicate - for people who are doing it all themsleves it has far less relevance.

[Derek up North]

If you get to hung up about the thoery it can destroy your creativity, same can be said about the technical side too.

that's crap and I have 34 years of laying to show it...

Pick up a lot of groupies did you ??

Regards,

Derek.

[dystonia_ek]

Only the people that study, practice, & perform classical and/or jazz their whole life are THE real musicians. That's not an opinion. That is a fact!

Anyone from the jazz and classical culture can play any music gerne from around the world if they wanted to.

I seriously doubt that - the majority of traditional music in the world originates outside the Western classical tradition, and Jazz is so recent as to be a mere dot on the graph of global music history. Ever heard classical musicians trying to do jazz improv? Most of them can't - they're lost. I would imagine the same sort of thing would apply if they were trying to play Indian or Balinese classical music - the theory is totally different. In many parts of the world the octave isn't even broken up into the same intervals. Jazzists may have an advantage in that they tend to assimilate the theory while developing their ear, and as such will be able to deal with a wider range of situations without sheet music, but classical musicians tend not to function so well without a score in front of them.

As always, the frustrating thing about these threads is the way it's all centred on taking musical traditions from just one part of the planet and turning them into some sort of universal truth. Like Schoenberg 'invented' atonality - that's like saying that Luigi Russolo 'invented' noise in his 1913 manifesto. Of course, atonality never existed in any other musical traditions on earth before those clever white people enlightened the unwashed hordes.

[Sascha Franck]

I don't know a SINGLE jazz or classical musicians doing a great job in a rock lineup - unless they "studied" that as well.
And believe me, I know a lot of them...