Music Theory Cheat Sheet

[Paulie]

For those of you not on the ADSR mailing list, here is a nice basic music theory cheat sheet. It includes some sample chord progressions as well.

http://bit.ly/2bNDrKt

I didn't create it, but I'll be happy to answer any questions on the concepts if you want help.

Paulie

[Len911]

Thx Paulie!

Music theory doesn't seem to be very popular around these parts?!?

There's a guy on youtube, Gareth Green (the British Mr. Rogers?), that has some very good videos.
In particular, the ones on melody writing and harmonizing, because he sets down an 8 bar measure, and by the time he fills in the cadences for both phrases, you have most of the chords. He approaches composing, both ways, melody or harmony first, and shows a simple method of finding melodies and chords, by using triads built from the scales.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8yI8P ... sypera-IQg

[Len911]

Thanks both, that's really helpful.

I studied music theory years ago but it's amazing how much of it you forget....

Yw, the 'real' Mr. Rogers from the U.K.!

[Paulie]

Yep. There are plenty of Taxi members, as well as music supervisors and even famous musicians that have zero musical training or vocabulary. One of the keys to being able to work quickly and to work well with others is the ability to speak the same language. I've been in so many studio sessions where there were no charts or even sketches, where the lead or producer would be singing parts to me.

Knowing the basics of theory, as in the notes of a scale even, can really help people. If you know what a I chord is or a IV chord is, you can work faster, especially when trying to emulate instrumental styles for listings or libraries.

[mojobone]

Singing parts in the studio worked out pretty good for Michael Jackson. I theenk McCartney eventually learned to write some notation, but is still a terrible sight reader; it just matters more that he can sing and play and write, I reckon. I remember being shocked to learn Adrian Belew doesn't read; apparently he's a nusical Rain Man and you just play it for him, once. I find most good musicians are sponges, whether they can read or not; SRV didn't, but he knew where all the notes were on the guitar and what key he was in. I'd say Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder got pretty good at theory without any reading involved, so theory is in a sense three languages in one; written, musical and verbal. All you need to know about theory is the more theory you know, the easier you are to work with.

cool post, Paulie!

[mojobone]

I used to think a "circle of fifths" was when nobody showed up to the guitar pull empty-handed.

[Paulie]

Very funny...

Reading is one thing, theory is another. SRV, Springstein, Buddy Rich, Phil Collins, many others... don't/didn't read music. But I bet they knew the difference between a IV chord and a V chord. They might not have known what to call it, but they could hear the difference. That's the sort of stuff I'd love to teach people, so that they can get a basic vocabulary under their belt and increase their sponge-ness. As to MJ, he had the best of the best in the studio capturing his grunts and groans. I got to work with his horn writer, Jerry Hey... he shared a tape with me of scratch tracks from some MJ charts, as well as EWF.

[hummingbird]

Last week's TAXI TV encouraged me to think more about arrangement and how theory plays into that. I can read music and figure out a key, usually figure out the basic chords to a song, transpose it, stuff like that. I know the cycle of fifths. I've even started looking into modes. There's more, though. It's choosing the instruments, writing their parts, making it all work together in a way that the human ear will find it interesting and the human heart will be moved in some way. The myriad of possible ways one chord can be played - each with its own flavour and relationship to the rest - that's the kind of theory I find fascinating.

[Len911]

I think I've mentioned Sonic Visualiser before,
http://www.sonicvisualiser.org/

It's a great learning/analyzing tool.

It's choosing the instruments, writing their parts, making it all work together in a way that the human ear will find it interesting and the human heart will be moved in some way. The myriad of possible ways one chord can be played - each with its own flavour and relationship to the rest - that's the kind of theory I find fascinating.

It's interesting when you find a really good song, whether on youtube, or your own collection, convert it to a wave file, with Audacity, though some other formats work, and import it into Sonic Visualiser. There you can analyze various song parameters using the various vamp plugins (all free btw). So for Vikki's example, I could open a song, and use I think it's "MELODIA - Melody Extraction", anyway a polyphonic melody extractor, (vamp plugin), and export a midi file. Then you open the midi file in your daw, and separate the notes to different instruments.

Not all layers can be exported as midi, some like tempo, chords, bars, can be exported as text files with the locations.

In other words, you don't have to only use "standards" or old Beatles tunes to learn music theory. You can use whatever you wish. You can even add a text layer and add the lyrics that match the singing, and where in the bars they fall, or you could just add markers for the sections, so you know how many bars to a section, figure from that the song structure, etc., very informative. I won't go on, I think I've mentioned it elsewhere on the forum.

[Len911]

The myriad of possible ways one chord can be played - each with its own flavour and relationship to the rest - that's the kind of theory I find fascinating.

You might like Harmony Builder
http://www.harmonybuilder.com/professional.html

Another "music theory cheater program",

It comes in 3 versions, and a free 28 day trial, the professional is the cat's meow!! It's on special for $219, I know, but I paid more and it's worth every penny.

In a nut shell, you can harmonize a melody, harmonize a bass line, create a chord progression, all within the rules of harmony, or not, depending on what rules you have engaged, and based on proper voice leading. It's based on 4-part harmony, triads and 7ths, however you can add 9ths... or sus chords etc. later in your composition. Tell it what you need, and it gives you the choices of the chords, then you choose on the basis of the melody note, bass note, or other. Export the midi file.

It's really head and shoulders above so many of the so-called chord programs, especially if you really want to have a grasp of the theory and concepts involved, and the foundation.

Anyway, thought it was worth a mention.