The Value of Music Theory

I wanted to back pedal a little and report that, despite the nervously adamant nature of my last post, that yes, I do understand the value of music theory. The funniest, realistic way which I can prove this, is that I have noticed that the jobbing musicians who get paid to play music know music theory. The rambling indie rockers begging for gas money on tour don't. I see this like the light shining from a 100 watt bulb. 

Music theory has a commercial value. Audiences who pay for tickets are often paying to hear people who have studied music formally (not always but often). Those who know music theory can also be hired to do things which mere mortal musicians cannot, ranging from producing, arranging, transcribing, and/or teaching. 

There are definitely exceptions to this, from days of yore to today, where music that does not have an academic backbone, or even an academic pinky bone, appeals to the masses and audiences far more than belabored academic music. 

What I am trying to cull out then, is how can music theory be applied in a practical way? I suppose even my musical comrads who are deep into music theory would be interested, so let's explore it briefly.

To this end, let's call "music theory" the "study of music" as I am using the term to refer to an academic study of music.

• Studying music needs to be rooted in the core of musical curiousity.
• Studying music is all about listening.
• Studying music is all about proclaiming what gets you excited.
• Studying music is all about embracing what intrigues you.
• Studying music is realizing the path is long.
• Studying music is realizing it's not as hard as you thought.

The dangers of formally studying music (rah-hah-hah): yes there are some:

• You think you know more than you do.
• You get cocky.
• You want to tell others how to approach music.
• You are full of the illusion of knowledge.
• You start using your brain more than your ears.
• You are parlyzed when you don't have guardrails.
• You get frustrated.

All of these are a false sense of knowledge, or a false sense of inadequacy. What a roller coaster. 

The challenge is to find natural curiousity and a teacher able to see it. But, that's just a theory!

I will keep you updated, dear reader, on my journey to find that balance between the magic of music and the method.

Image soure: here.

Bubble Wrapped in Music Theory

I have a new equation to share, something along the lines of the more money you have to spend on music lessons, the longer and more complicated music theory becomes. Sadly, music theory, while being handy in some cases, is also the biggest racket known to music lessons.

Through experience of taking lessons with multiple teachers, and doing research online watching videos where people talk about music theory, please allow me to wave my hand and clear the fog.

Music theory is only a small part of what is called music theory. Most of music theory is music facts.

The difference is this: 

Music theory is analyzing. It's deciding whether to call a chord a certain name based on the root note, or based on the key it's in, for example. The "theory" part comes in when a chord can go by multiple names. It's kind of like calling a color orange-red, or red-orange. It's just what you call it. The notes are still the notes. Music theory is a way of looking at music after its been written or played. It's a lens. It's a way of looking.

The word "theory" makes it sound like a scientific principle is at work, but in music theory, the word theory just means "subjective." Looking at chords a certain way can help a composer or help a player navigate a piece of music, but nothing in music theory is about facts. Which leads is to...

Music facts are the common vocabulary and agreed-on vocabulary used in written music. C is C. D is D. A certain string of intervals is an Ionian mode. These are not theories! These are facts and vocabulary of things that everyone has to agree on. If C wasn't C, then sheet music would be pointless. Everyone needs to agree what a C note is. There are tons of facts, and not a single one of them is a theory! It took me awhile to separate these two things. Knowing the vocabulary of music helps to communicate with other musicians, and it helps explore the fretboard (or explore the full range of whatever instrument you play). 

Music theory is often seen as a mysterious, complicated thing, but it's not. It's just a bunch of facts, and a tiny bit of analyzation thrown in on top. I've learned not to let the intimidation of the hardest parts of music theory stop me from just hopping, skipping and jumping through simply learning the music facts. Facts are just something to learn step by step. Like all the other facts we know.

I've heard that there was an idea in classical music that students would learn yards of music theory before being allowed to touch their instrument. In a context where that makes sense, great, but I am not going to be bubble wrapped in music theory, I think I'll just hit the street with the facts--it's much cheaper that way.

Image source: here

Songwriter's Corner: Heroic Speech

In Songwriters on Songwriting by Paul Zollo, the author dives into conversations with super-songwriters about their craft, and his interview with Bob Dylan offers this gem: "Then it just becomes a question of how heroic your speech is. To me it's something to strive after."

To help wrap your head and craft around this, here's some quotes on heroism:

“I like it when a flower or a little tuft of grass grows through a crack in the concrete. It's so fuckin' heroic.”
― George Carlin

“Heroes didn't leap tall buildings or stop bullets with an outstretched hand; they didn't wear boots and capes. They bled, and they bruised, and their superpowers were as simple as listening, or loving. Heroes were ordinary people who knew that even if their own lives were impossibly knotted, they could untangle someone else's. And maybe that one act could lead someone to rescue you right back.”
― Jodi Picoult, Second Glance

“Anyone who does anything to help a child in his life is a hero to me.”
― Fred Rogers

“One part brave, three parts fool!”
― Christopher Paolini

“To be heroic is to be courageous enough to die for something; to be inspirational is to be crazy enough to live a little.”
― Criss Jami, Venus in Arms

“Heroism doesn't pay very well. I try to be cold-blooded and money-oriented, but I keep screwing it up.”
― Jim Butcher, Dead Beat

“So you love war. I used to think you were a decent man. But I see now I was mistaken. You're a hero.”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Heroes

“Long ago I yearned to be a hero without knowing, in truth, what a hero was. Now, perhaps, I understand it a little better. A grower of turnips or a shaper of clay, a Common farmer or a king--every man is a hero if he strives more for others than for himself alone. Once you told me that the seeking counts more than the finding. So, too, must the striving count more than the gain.”
― Lloyd Alexander, The High King

“Heroes are people who face down their fears. It is that simple. A child afraid of the dark who one day blows out the candle; a women terrified of the pain of childbirth who says, 'It is time to become a mother'. Heroism does not always live on the battlefield.”
― David Gemmell, Dark Moon

“Perhaps a hero is someone who doesn’t register his own vulnerability. Is it courage, then, if you’re too daft to know you’re mortal?”
― David Benioff, City of Thieves

“He found that it was easy to make a heroic gesture, but hard to abide by its results.”
― W. Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage

DAILY HABITS CHANGE YOUR LIFE

While on lockdown, I looked up well over half a dozen music education sources, from free classes online to books, workshops and lessons. This included a wide range of resources. What I noticed among all these varied sources was the emphasis on daily habits. Change what you do each day, and change your life. 

For music makers, this means to write every day, perform every day, practice every day and learn every day.

Resource: a book on this topic is "Atomic Habits". The main take-away is adding new habits to habits you already have. It was interesting to see that multiple sources had this same principle to share; certainly there's something to it.

Results of the Curveball: 2020 Impact on Live Music

Many venues were dark March 2020

Image source

While 2020 saw a historic decline in live show revenue--such as that Live Nation revenue declined 83% year-over-year--there was a 9% increase in recorded music revenue nationally. This is the fifth straight year with rising revenue, led by music subscription services like Amazon Music Unlimited , Apple Music and Spotify. Since there's nowhere to go but up, Live Nation's second quarter of this year had an increase of over 670%. Not bad.

While no industry is risk-free, the music industry especially is known to be constantly changing, and having tight profit margins and many cases of cut-throat business practices, along with ten-year overnight successes and millions of musicians over the decades who have tried to find the magic formula for success, which until proven otherwise is a lifetime of hard work plus a dash of luck. Last year, the brave souls who made the music industry home were thrown the curve ball of the century. Perhaps even the curveball of the past 500 years. For the first time in history, people could not gather. This wasn't optional. It was the law. Venues closed. Stages were dark. Musicians that were entrepreneurial looked to livestreaming to satiate fans and the inner creative beast. But the blow to the live music scene was historical and astronomical.

However, musicians and the music industry folks are not known for uncreative ideas or lack of gumption, and I predict music fans will be eager to get back into music for both its emotional release as well as its social aspects i.e. "where you at?" People will be just kind of eager to see live music again.

Lollapalooza festival Chicago 2021

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WHAT OLD BOOKS AND LIBERAL ARTS CAN TEACH US ABOUT HOW TO LEARN MUSIC

Music is about dance? See #6 and weigh in.

When it's recommended that you read old books, like Aristotle, Plato, and the ilk, in addition to books that are more current the reasoning is simple: these books don't just teach you things, they teach you how to think. Teaching students how to think is also one of the tenets of liberal arts education, and ironically, that got me thinking. In the subjects of Philosophy, Literature and Science, there are "great books" which stand as either classics or do the ultimate job of teaching the reader how to think. Meanwhile, in the subject of music, there is no such thing.

Music is tied more closely to culture and expression, and is constantly moving. While major composers like Bach, Beethoven and Mozart are of course widely known and respected, ultimately the older music is the more "dusty" it is, the less hip, the less current, etc. There are exceptions as listeners enjoy music that stands the test of time and there are many classic songs and styles that outlive their makers. However, it remains that there are no 'go to' texts about music that teach one how to think about music. 

So, I will take a stab at it and continue to update this article as it develops:

1) Your ear, your ears, yes there's two of them!

Sheet music is a language and understanding music theory, composition and such is a skill, but never lose sight, or um, never lose hearing...music is in your ears.

2) Know the instrument. 

The instrument is an instrument in the truest sense of the word. Measure it. Weigh it. Smell it. Look at every angle. Understand every nuance and mechanic of it.

3) Know the melody

There's lots of chord charts out there, but do you know the melody? How well? Intimately?

4) It's about the audience, not you

It's liberating to be freed from the self, so check the ego at the door.

5) It's about you, and the audience of the universe

An addendum to #4, you need some ego to get the fire started, but the expression is higher.

6) Dance

Not always, but very often, music is ultimately about dance. This can be dancing with the body, or even dancing of the mind and heart.

This is just a start. What ways of thinking about music are important to you?

Image source: here

YouTube: Three Subtle Downsides to this Super Site

What's your favorite part about YouTube? More importantly, what are the downsides to this resource?

1) Learning

Enough said. While there is a lot of fluff to sift through, overall, learning about nearly any music topic or technique is a search word away. This is very very different than decades past where you needed to be at the right place, at the right time, in person, to learn many of the things YouTube shares readily. Plus, you can get many perspectives on the same topic.

The downside: information overload. Plus, it is sometimes it's just easier to learn with a human. YouTube video watching is addictive, and while learning here saves time, the extra time you saved could be eaten up. What giveth, also taketh.

2) Locality

When radio was king, each region had its own sound. This was because the musicians in one area would play with one another, creating a style. Now, there is less emphasis on geography and music is drawing from influences far and wide. This could make for an ecclectic stew. 

The downside: as music rises to the top when it appeals to the masses--who on the Internet are a bunch of bored people--the result could be that the artform of music just becomes a bunch of clickbait horse#hit. Let's see how it plays out in the coming decades.

3) It's the radio now...and the library...and your cool friend's record collection

YouTube includes many songs from the past and present which are searchable. You can create playlists, and find nearly any song you seek...all without visiting the record store. All without paying the artist nor the record label. Of course, you still pay, that is what those annoying ads are. Yet, despite these ads, being able to find nearly any music imaginable is worth its weight in gold. 

The downside: as an artist you are not just competing with the music happening now, you are competing with all the music that ever was.

Feel free to share your favorite part about YouTube in the comments. 

Image source: here

Social Media Break: Update

I challenged myself to take a break from social media for one year. That was in August and August is rolling around again. So far, mostly good. I scroll occassionally, I click like occassionally, I see what people are up to and even discovered some new music. 

For the most part, I have kept to my guns and am taking a break. I used to feel my IQ melting like an ice cube in the sun on a hot day in Cuba, and somehow wind up posting an irate comment on someone's wall whom I didn't even know. It was in some of those moments, I had to let go. What really made me pull away and set the proverbial gun down was that the rage and comments in social media have real life impact. The way we think and imagine the world to be affects people's lives, and deaths. 

It was kind of heavy. I had to stand outside and look at the sky for ahwhile. Virtual reality is a thing unto itself, but social media is also an example of virtual reality. Our preconceptions, stereotypes, concepts, world view, et. al.--they are all a form of virtual reality in the sense that much of the world exists only in our head. 

Clearly, COVID times allowed me to get philosophical but it was well overdue. Lockdown allowed to the world to stop--and suddenly all those things I "had" to do, well, I didn't really have to do them. It was an illusion of productivity and an illusion of urgency. Of course, we must fill our days with something. We don't even "have" to go to the grocery store, but we have tasks and goals that we set our mind to, whether we are fulfilling Maslov's needs, or some higher vision or lesser impulse. Being able to let go of not one but almost all of my "must do" items on the list wasn't just liberating it was show-stopping. I could create my life, my own life, like clay from the ground when the world started.

The first part of this reinvention was setting down the painting that had been created of me. Social media photos are from reality, but the sum is greater than the parts. That, I believe, is the point. Like iconography in a church or temple, it creates myth and reinforces it. This is perfect for music and entertainment, branding and self identity.

Social media is itself also entertainment. People use it for fun! Somehow, though, the seriousness of the myths and ideas we create, and how they affect us all was a concept that is prevalent (so prevalent it's hard to see it like the forest through the trees) that social media was like the prism that showed the beam of light on the wall. I finally "got it"--Eureka.

Each platform is different, for example while Facebook is more about self identity and a public scrapbook, TikTok, from what I understand (I do not use the platform as I am too busy hollering 'get off my lawn'), is like copper for the electric current of trends, allowing them to speed through culture at the rate of 100mph. Twitter is about hashtags. So, for awhile yet...I will be #creatingmyreality.

The Breadcrumb Trail Back to My Roots

I had to search through multiple emails and passwords before finding my way back to the login of this account. I feel like Hansel and Gretel, returning home and promising to pack more breadcrumbs next time. After turning On Axis Music into a proper website, and almost going into the oven of a corporate identity I have decided to cool out and redirect the URL back to this blog, where it started. My main focus is Music with a capital M and sharing my thoughts with you here.