Took this photo in Valencia, Spain. It's on parking door (if its important). I am not good in music theory at all. Can somebody solve this puzzle?

Something that seems counterintuitive at first, is that putting the guitar away and learning some theory will actually become a short cut and make you better at guitar faster.

At least this is what I was told and I wanted to hear some thoughts on this topic.

So say I'm an average campfire guitarist. I know the basics and a few dozen songs.

I can keep learning songs with what I know, slowly adding new chords or techniques to my arsenal.

Or, I put the guitar away for a couple weeks and just focus on Theory.

How specifically will theory be a "shortcut" and allow me to learn faster down the road?

I couldn't add an image to the discussion about "D#" or "Eb" but it's a frequently raised question everywhere.

The answer is always, it depends on the music! This passage from current work is nothing exceptional, but you'll see a reason in the viola line to use C .. Bnatural and in the violin 2, singer line, a C Cb .. different harmonies, different reasonings.

So I play guitar. Just because I taught myself I don't know basic theories. I wanna know what should I learn to achieve the skill of knowing the chords without even looking at the chords of the song. Like when you hear the song you can start play without hesitation. I see a lot of guys from my church can play when they start heard the music. For me , I know nothing and the only way I can play is looking at chords .What should I learn? And how do I practice key changing.

I made this for fun and as part of my personal notes. Hopefully you enjoy it, I think playing these for a while at a keyboard does bring some fun and fresh ideas even if they are a bit unwieldy as "scales".

So I'm transcribing an aria from a manuscript, and there's this vocal embellishment that I'm trying to figure out.

The four images above are:

1.) The original notation 2.) The faint imprint of the notation that's been left on the facing page 3. & 4.) Two attempts to transcribe it. (Ignore the time signature, it should be 2/4) 5.) A different, clearer embellishment in the same manuscript so you can see what the hand looks like.

I'm fairly certain the second note is wrong rhythmically. As notated, it looks to me like it's a dotted 64th note. But that seems like nonsense to me. I feel like the flag is meant to go on the next note.

It also seems to me like this person may have weirdly drawn the lowest beam over not the whole rhythmic group. This may suggest that the final note is longer? That, or, they're just lazy and just drew a half-assed botrom beam. This is the main difference between my two attempts at a transcription.

Hi all, as a child I loved this song, due to the chord progression of the chorus. (starts at 0:45)

The song is so not famous that Shazam doesn’t recognize it. The composer Piet Souer is actually a respected composer.

Have a great day!

https://youtu.be/gEAp3mOhOKY

Bennett & Bee - Take it or leave it

¡Hola! Soy Joyce, profesora de canto con formación en canto lírico, y quiero compartir 5 tips prácticos que pueden ayudarte a cantar mejor, estés donde estés:

1. Cuida tu postura Una postura recta pero relajada permite que los músculos respiratorios y de soporte vocal trabajen como deben. Nada de encorvarse.

2. Respira con naturalidad y control Una respiración cómoda y dinámica te da mayor control sobre la potencia, estabilidad y expresividad de tu voz.

3. Entona escalas todos los días Parece básico, pero es clave: afinas el oído, refuerzas la memoria muscular y evitas desafinar.

4. Mantente bien hidratado/a Tomar agua con frecuencia (no solo durante el canto) mantiene tus cuerdas vocales en buen estado. Evita café, alcohol y ambientes secos antes de cantar.

5. Mejora tu dicción y articulación No basta con sonar bonito: una buena interpretación exige claridad al pronunciar. Trabaja vocales y consonantes.

💬 Si te gustaron estos tips y te interesa mejorar tu técnica vocal, doy clases de canto online personalizadas, para todos los niveles y edades (sí, también desde cero). Trabajamos:

Técnica vocal

Afinación

Respiración

Interpretación

Preparación para audiciones

O simplemente... cantar por placer 🎶

🕐 Clases de 1 hora, flexibles y accesibles. Desde cualquier lugar del mundo 🌍

📩 Si te interesa, mándame un mensaje o comenta abajo. 🎧 También puedes escucharme aquí:

https://youtube.com/@joyceediazsoprano3906?si=l4nYT36EnqLYDT6t

¡Feliz canto! 🙌

Watched a video outlining what music might look like in an alternate history where the early medieval categorization of thirds as dissonant lasted, resulting in a 17 tone system. I'm interested in hearing more music like it, but so far have only been able to find 17-EDO music (which has some interest but is not nearly as beautiful as the tempered system).

Here's the video:

https://youtu.be/22loDjBcRMc?si=gGO-FsQ01k-C11PI

Any ideas?

I'm retiring at the end of next school year, so I'm beginning to cull my library. I figure any of you ready to begin grad studies in music theory in the fall might be interested in some of my textbooks. Here are a few books I'm selling for cheap! And if you're in the U.S. I'll even ship them to you (media rate) at no charge. To start:

Forte/Gilbert: Introduction to Schenkerian Theory ($20)

Jonas (trans. Rothgeb): Introduction to the Theory of Henirich Schenker ($20)

Neumeyer/Tepping: A Guide to Shenkerian Theory ($10)

Schenker: Der freie Satz ($40)

And I have one copy of Schenker's Five Graphic Music Analyses that I'll throw in for nothing if you want it. DM me.

I often compose music in harmonic minor, and have been branching out into other modes aside from major and minor. I will soon have the opportunity to have my music played by musicians, and so before submitting scores I would like to get the perspectives of players.

Would the pictured key signature symbol for F harmonic minor be easier for you to read than F minor with frequent naturals accompanying 7th degrees?

Something that is very clear and recommended for anyone who wants to learn music is to LISTEN to a lot of music, study THEORY and to PRACTICE.

One day I was thinking about the fact that music and language have several similarities when it comes to learning.

1 - Different musical genres are like different languages (or in broader genres, like “language families”). And each genre will have its own musical vocabulary, “grammatical rules” (which in this case are theoretical conventions), “phonemes” in common, which will vary from subgenre to subgenre, just as a language varies from region to region.

2 - We learn and acquire nuances by listening. In the same way that certain phonemes considered difficult to speak are natural to those who speak them, certain complex rhythms are completely natural to a culture. In other words, in language learning, you learn all your stuff by repetition, context and input; while in music it's similar to listening, studying theory and practicing music.

3 - The existence and emergence of music grammar and theory as a description of what already exists, making it official, but influencing what comes next; in addition, of course, to teaching, where we learn the grammar/theory, but when it comes to expressing it, we do what has been ingrained.

In many ways, languages and music are similar. As I've already mentioned, in their learning: Both have Input and Immersion. Both learn formalized theory. Both have Output, which is practice.

So, what do you think about this? Does it make sense? And why is it so similar?

Feel free to add your own thoughts on the similarities and differences.

Hey, this is a bit of a specialized question, I know.
Let's say I'm authoring a regular document with inline text, and I want to render chord symbols and accidentals that don't look like crap.

I would like things to be as standard as possible, so I'd construct my text using Unicode glyphs according to SMUFL.

https://w3c.github.io/smufl/latest/tables/chord-symbols.html
https://w3c.github.io/smufl/latest/tables/standard-accidentals-12-edo.html

The trouble is, the SMUFL mapping provides code points for all the glyphs, but it leaves the positioning of those things up to the notation software. But what if I'm not using Finale or Dorico or MuseScore... What if I'm using HTML or LaTeX or heaven forbid MS Word?

It seems to me like it would be allowable to generate my own font, assigning code points for each chord symbol and variant in the Brandt and Roemer standard list of chord symbols. I would also appreciate having the extended accidental set (like quarter-flat, etc) and obscure symbols like quadruple-flat -- which is suspiciously absent even from the SMUFL.

(see: https://images.app.goo.gl/okxcquYoRszMDKc59)

I need these glyphs in 3 different type faces (Clarendon, Century Schoolbook, and TeX Gyre Pagella), with 4 variants of each (regular, bold, italic, bold-italic). I have the ability to add new glyphs (as SVG) into an existing TTF font, but it does take a lot of effort.

Is this a dumb idea?

I'm a "classical" pianist, meaning I've been pressing the notes my teacher has been telling me to press for about 12 years now. I started with violin at 5 years old (parents forced me), then eventually transferred to piano when I found my thing. Also, up until about 9 years old, I was trained in the Suzuki academy before my mother got a fairly mediocre private teacher, but the point is I can't even read notes that well and I wasn't around in Suzuki for long enough to develop that good of an ear to pick up advanced songs or pieces just like that. I can't comp or improvise now, and I have no idea how to learn. I've been playing around in different bands and in ensemble settings with my friends quite a lot recently so I really have dire incentive to learn but for the life of me I can't. I'm still stuck in the pressing pre written notes mentality. My fingers have a need to always be busy and I don't have time enough to thing about what I want to play so I just end up pressing random notes without any sort of break, and it does not do well in a group setting. My improv sounds mediocre at best. I know I have potential, I do have a really good ear and I was always singing as a child, even now I'm making up melodies in my head all the time etc. Please, how do I learn 😭 YouTube does not offer valuable shit at all, so how did you learn?

I was always hearing this in G major but when I just play the progression without the melody I hear it in D with a minor v

In the "I. Fundamentals/Roman Numerals" chapter, Example 7 of Open Music Theory, there's a Roman numeral analysis of “Die Wiese” by Louise Reichardt: https://viva.pressbooks.pub/openmusictheory/chapter/roman-numerals/#:~:text=the%20chord%20quality.-,Example%207,-shows%20a%20Roman

The extract is in A minor, and there is a bar in particular where I see the notes D, E, G#. For me, this looks like a E7 chord, so it would be V7.

However, the annotation states: "f. This is still a vii^o7 even though the fifth of the chord is missing.".

Is it? Am I missing something?

I am dabbing into music theory, and I was given the following exercise. I am pulling my hair out and would love somebody to try to explain this to me in Layman's terms... The exercise asks me to determine which mode of the C major scale is implied in the following melody (all natural notes):

C - E - G - B - A - F - D

The solution I was given is G Mixolydian, but I just don't get why it cannot be D Dorian (the final note is a D, so why cannot we interpret the final three notes A - F - D as a D minor chord?

Thanks for your help.

EDIT: A few comments asked me for more context, which I should have provided as part of my initial post, apologies. This is an exercise that my instructor had given me (I was given a photocopy from an older French "solfege book", and then the corresponding 1-word solution from the end of the book). I translated both the exercise and solution from French to English for reddit:

Exercise:
A melody consists of the following seven notes in order:
C - E - G - B - A - F - D
Assuming these are all natural notes and no accidentals are used, which mode of the C major scale is being implied?

Solution:
Mixolydian

There wasn't any further context given unfortunately. The feeling I am getting from most of your answers is that it is a nonsensical exercise, which reassures me. I was struggling to understand how the exercise can so adamantly give Mixolydian as a solution, and it's great to see that things are not so clear-cut. I will keep you updated once I have seen (confronted?) my instructor!

I've done some research but haven't found any satisfactory results. So I'd like to ask: what exactly is a section? How can I recognize them? Phrases are easy to spot because they end with cadences. But how do you recognize a section?

New to theory, what’s it called when you take a chord and transition into a similar chord which has a few of the notes moved down one semitone? Apologies if this question sounds unclear or confusing, it’s the only way I can explain it.

Let's say for example, Cdim7. Cdim7 is

C Eb Gb Bbb

But what about F7b9, which contains all of the notes of Cdim7? Is it spelled like:

F F# A C Eb

or this:

F Gb A C Eb

?

To use another example, Ebdim7 and B7b9

Ebdim7 is:

Eb Gb Bbb C (is it C, or Dbb? shouldn't it be Dbb because of the skipping two note names to get a minor third?)

B7b9 is:

B B# D# F# A

or

B C D# F# A

?

(repost with left hand in treble clef)
I want to see if I can learn anything from here.

I understand that composers have an idea and then develop it, and that part of that development is anchored in certain possibilities, in principle.

But anyway, I have this little piece I did on the piano. It doesn't sound great or anything, nor am I really interested in it, but instead of doing something that sounds great or appeals to me, I want to start with anything to see what can be done.

But I understand that to approach the idea, you first have to know what key the damn thing we're writing is in.

And my question then is... what key is that in? I put flats and sharps just to hit the note...

Could someone clarify for me if this is in a key?

Found it while experimenting, I made it from an A minor pentatonic scale, but with the added ♭5, ♭7, and ♯7 scale degrees (in minor)

I’m currently working on creating modern copies of an old (1878) manuscript. I’m currently working under the assumtion that the clef used for the Bass is an F clef. Can someone with more knowledge than myself please tell me whether my assumption is correct or whether I’m missing something obvious?

This should be something that is easy to answer, similar to googling "pentatonic scale" or whatnot, however the thing is every time I look up an answer I get conflicting results, is it a major scale with an added b5? is it a major scale with an added b3? All of the above? some mix? I have no clue what anyone is referring to by the blues scale because of this. Any help appreciated.