Members gnr10101 Posted May 6, 2013 Members Share Posted May 6, 2013 Hey everyone, I think this is an interesting topic to discuss amongst musicians of all levels. I wrote a blog about this HERE and I'm curious to hear other people's persectives. Let me know what you think! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BydoEmpire Posted May 6, 2013 Members Share Posted May 6, 2013 Yes. Learning some theory will give you bigger ears and expose you to new things, and it just gives you more tools for your toolbox. Do you need to learn theory to write great songs? Of course not. Does learning theory guarantee your songs will be better? No. Can it help? Yes, absolutely.IMHO, music theory is not a set of rules. It's a consistent way of describing, communicating and understanding music. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members gnr10101 Posted May 6, 2013 Author Members Share Posted May 6, 2013 Agreed! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members JonR Posted May 6, 2013 Members Share Posted May 6, 2013 Yes, but what helps more is learning lots of other people's songs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members gnr10101 Posted May 6, 2013 Author Members Share Posted May 6, 2013 JonR wrote: Yes, but what helps more is learning lots of other people's songs. Good point, that helped alot in my formative years Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members scolfax Posted May 7, 2013 Members Share Posted May 7, 2013 BydoEmpire wrote: IMHO, music theory is not a set of rules. It's a consistent way of describing, communicating and understanding music. Well said! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BenTunessence Posted June 12, 2013 Members Share Posted June 12, 2013 I feel like theory has been most useful to me in working with other musicians. For example, if a songwriter I'm working with is trying to teach me a song they've written, being able to identify the key they're in helps me learn the song more quickly. It also helps me expand on their basic song structure more quickly. If they're playing just like Em to C open chords, knowing that we're in E minor let's me know I can spice it up by playing Em9 and Cmaj7 voicings on top to give the song an extra sense of color that wasn't there.If I'm composing, theory can help me fill things out quickly in sort of the same way, but I often find myself attempting to break out of those theory-based expectations. A friend and I often play the game of playing random notes together to find chord voicings, chord combinations, and chord progressions that we wouldn't have found otherwise. Or jamming in alternate tunings.I sort of feel like when writing, the song has to initially come from some inner voice, uncensored by conditioning or expectations. But maybe that inner voice can be more quickly translated with some theory knowledge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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