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12 tone row / Serialism, could you share your knowledge?

Karmacazee wrote:It's not really theory, more like technique, but I reckon some basic piano lessons would be super uber cool.

I have no idea about the proper fingering (teehee) of chords or scales - I'm all fingers and thumbs... ha...

So, any piano aficionado's with some good advice to give out there?

general fingering (!) for scales is:

right hand: thumb/index/middle/THUMB/index/middle/ring/pinkie

left hand: pinkie/ring/middle/index/thumb/MIDDLE/index/thumb

so you cross your thumb (RH) or middle finger (LH) over in order to finish the scale.

in F maj and assorted other scales w/ accidentals (black keys), you cross over after the ring finger, and finish on the ring figer instead of the pinkie.

I find this stuff interesting, but I am so behind on my theory I dont even know what you guys are talking about. I guess what I'm getting at is I hope mad ep dumbs his tutorial thing down enough that someone like me can get it.

you guys are off the mark a bit. for basic theory, check out my site, all free, it's a hobby I did to help my own theory knowledge:

http://emeraldtablet.vndv.com/

melodic minor in the classical sense has ascending and descending, but not in modern theory. they are now considered separate. also, straight minor is a b3, b6, and b7. the above post that said b3 and b7 is wrong, that's dorian.

giggedy wrote: melodic minor in the classical sense has ascending and descending, but not in modern theory. they are now considered separate.

??

Not sure what you mean...


...we'll go ahead and bypass history for brevity's sake, but all 'modern' authorities I have consulted still define melodic minor as having separate ascending and descending.

Care to share your source?

technically, it has both, but no one uses them in their original context anymore. my sources are many, for a couple, check out Mark Levine's The Jazz Book or Harmonic Experience.

The whole point of having both was to get around certain structures that were rules over a hundred years ago. Now they are treated separately. The descending is simply the minor scale.

giggedy wrote:technically, it has both, but no one uses them in their original context anymore. my sources are many, for a couple, check out Mark Levine's The Jazz Book or Harmonic Experience.

The whole point of having both was to get around certain structures that were rules over a hundred years ago. Now they are treated separately. The descending is simply the minor scale.

Not exactly true- there are lots of people who use them in their original context. Perhaps not jazz musicians (I don't really do much within jazz so I wouldn't know), but virtually all classical musicians still do.

That said- other than on this particular point, the website you are working on is pretty good.

mad ep wrote:Back on topic...

Are there any other specific areas in theory people are curious about besides the topics I listed?

Not a topic, but it'd be really interesting to see something with a focus on how theory is useful to someone writing dance music - I know a moderate amount of theory, and there are lots of theory guides on the internet, but almost everything I've read assumes that you're either 1) analyzing an existing piece, 2) trying to write something like a four part cantata or 3) trying to add backing parts to a melody in a context like rock or pop or big band jazz. It'd be really good to have stuff about how you use your knowledge of music theory as a creative tool when writing dubstep rather than having it restrict you to what you think is 'allowed.'

Slothrop wrote: Not a topic, but it'd be really interesting to see something with a focus on how theory is useful to someone writing dance music - I know a moderate amount of theory, and there are lots of theory guides on the internet, but almost everything I've read assumes that you're either 1) analyzing an existing piece, 2) trying to write something like a four part cantata or 3) trying to add backing parts to a melody in a context like rock or pop or big band jazz. It'd be really good to have stuff about how you use your knowledge of music theory as a creative tool when writing dubstep rather than having it restrict you to what you think is 'allowed.'

Personally I have never found my knowledge of theory to be restrictive... and I don't know why people often talk about what is 'allowed' and what isn't. If I am doing a chord progression and I choose to invert some chords, it is because I want it to sound that way...not because I am afraid of parallel 5ths or something. In fact, sometimes I purposefully choose parallel motion because I want it to sound that way.

To me- I find that theory helps make the composition more efficient. Say I am working on a bassline, and can hear what I want in my head... I can pretty much play it right away cos I know the intervals in my head (ie: +m3, +M2, -P4, -P5, +m2, -m2) without having to fumble on the keyboard so much.

Or say I have my bassline and some melodic parts already done, but I want to put in some ethereal chords in the background, I can figure out what I want a lot easier by knowing what key I am in and what other chords are naturally in that key. But again- it isn't restrictive cos say I am in D minor... I may still want to use an Eb Major chord, so I do. Having a knowledge of theory doesn't restrict me from doing so (in fact, if anything, empowers me even more cos I know it is a Neapolitan chord).


Look at it this way- no one ever says that knowing about synthesis is restrictive to sound design or that knowing about mixing techniques is restrictive to production... so why would knowing theory be restrictive to composition (regardless of genre)?

^ right on.

Theory can also help you give a name to a particular feeling. That real off-kilter sense of unbalance? minor 7th. etc, etc. so you're better able to harness a vibe you want.

12-tone stuff SHOULD work a lot like raag, in that notes follow a progression; was never a fan of Schoenberg stuff, tho.

mad ep wrote:

Slothrop wrote: Not a topic, but it'd be really interesting to see something with a focus on how theory is useful to someone writing dance music - I know a moderate amount of theory, and there are lots of theory guides on the internet, but almost everything I've read assumes that you're either 1) analyzing an existing piece, 2) trying to write something like a four part cantata or 3) trying to add backing parts to a melody in a context like rock or pop or big band jazz. It'd be really good to have stuff about how you use your knowledge of music theory as a creative tool when writing dubstep rather than having it restrict you to what you think is 'allowed.'

Personally I have never found my knowledge of theory to be restrictive... and I don't know why people often talk about what is 'allowed' and what isn't. If I am doing a chord progression and I choose to invert some chords, it is because I want it to sound that way...not because I am afraid of parallel 5ths or something. In fact, sometimes I purposefully choose parallel motion because I want it to sound that way.

Yeah, totally agree. There seems to be this huge misconception about music theory that it's a set of rules that you aren't allowed to break and that gives an exhaustive list of precisely what chords, scales, progressions, structures etc are allowed. Rather than being to a large extent a bunch of tools and tricks for specific situations (albeit a consistent and theoretically well founded set of them) that come from looking at what people have already done and trying to figure out how and why it works.

It's particularly bad when people look at it that way when they know very very little of it, ie they become convinced that the only things that trained musicians (with their book-learnin' etc.) are allowed to use are vanilla major and minor scales and major and minor triads.

To me- I find that theory helps make the composition more efficient. Say I am working on a bassline, and can hear what I want in my head... I can pretty much play it right away cos I know the intervals in my head (ie: +m3, +M2, -P4, -P5, +m2, -m2) without having to fumble on the keyboard so much.

Or say I have my bassline and some melodic parts already done, but I want to put in some ethereal chords in the background, I can figure out what I want a lot easier by knowing what key I am in and what other chords are naturally in that key. But again- it isn't restrictive cos say I am in D minor... I may still want to use an Eb Major chord, so I do. Having a knowledge of theory doesn't restrict me from doing so (in fact, if anything, empowers me even more cos I know it is a Neapolitan chord).

That's exactly the sort of thing I'd be really interested to hear more about if you have time! It's one thing knowing the difference between a suspended seventh and an augmented ninth and another knowing when you might want to try one or the other in the context of writing dance music, and very few of the largeish number of theory guides that are already around talk about it from that angle...

mad ep wrote:

Slothrop wrote: Not a topic, but it'd be really interesting to see something with a focus on how theory is useful to someone writing dance music - I know a moderate amount of theory, and there are lots of theory guides on the internet, but almost everything I've read assumes that you're either 1) analyzing an existing piece, 2) trying to write something like a four part cantata or 3) trying to add backing parts to a melody in a context like rock or pop or big band jazz. It'd be really good to have stuff about how you use your knowledge of music theory as a creative tool when writing dubstep rather than having it restrict you to what you think is 'allowed.'

Personally I have never found my knowledge of theory to be restrictive... and I don't know why people often talk about what is 'allowed' and what isn't. If I am doing a chord progression and I choose to invert some chords, it is because I want it to sound that way...not because I am afraid of parallel 5ths or something. In fact, sometimes I purposefully choose parallel motion because I want it to sound that way.

To me- I find that theory helps make the composition more efficient. Say I am working on a bassline, and can hear what I want in my head... I can pretty much play it right away cos I know the intervals in my head (ie: +m3, +M2, -P4, -P5, +m2, -m2) without having to fumble on the keyboard so much.

Or say I have my bassline and some melodic parts already done, but I want to put in some ethereal chords in the background, I can figure out what I want a lot easier by knowing what key I am in and what other chords are naturally in that key. But again- it isn't restrictive cos say I am in D minor... I may still want to use an Eb Major chord, so I do. Having a knowledge of theory doesn't restrict me from doing so (in fact, if anything, empowers me even more cos I know it is a Neapolitan chord).


Look at it this way- no one ever says that knowing about synthesis is restrictive to sound design or that knowing about mixing techniques is restrictive to production... so why would knowing theory be restrictive to composition (regardless of genre)?

All that. Good post. Knowledge is never a bad thing.

In fact, Squarepusher's as classically trained as they come and he makes fucking mental music.

hurtdeer wrote: 12 tone row / Serialism, could you share your knowledge?


It's a music-writing system that Schoenberg went for so his freer "expressionistic" work had "structure" like all his peers said it should. He was better before he listened to them.

Basically, you write a melody compromising of all 12 notes in an octave, each note only used once. You take that melody, and invert it to make another melody (ie, last note is first, first note last, etc). And you flip the melody upside down, relative to the score, for another new melody. Then, finally, you take the melody and both flip AND invert it, for a forth new melody. Then you write your piece using those four melodies you just made, arranging each block in whatever order you like

there's more to it than that, but that's the basics of it. It's a fundamentally rigid system, and has made for some of the more boring compositions in the last century... I'm not a huge fan

Thanks man, I agree its a very academic way of thinking, and does produce some very boring results. But like everything, it could have applications.

TeReKeTe wrote: 12-tone stuff SHOULD work a lot like raag, in that notes follow a progression; was never a fan of Schoenberg stuff, tho.

I feel this, I am not a huge fan of schoenberg but approaching a song from a 12-tone perspective could achieve some very interesting dissonant progressions that might be suited for some dark dubstep. I wouldn't go 100% serialism though.

WiREZ wrote:Does anybody think they can sum these up in a way that would stick in my mind for the rest of my life?
I want to be able to use them without thinking about it...

You guys are making it too complicated.
Harmonic Minor is just a sharp 7th....

So:

Am
a b c d e f g a

A Harm Minor
a b c d e f g# a

---------

Bm
b c# d e f# g a b

B Harm Minor
b c# d e f# g a# b

etc

I know it was probably just a typo-- but b minor has c# in it...

mad ep wrote:

giggedy wrote:technically, it has both, but no one uses them in their original context anymore. my sources are many, for a couple, check out Mark Levine's The Jazz Book or Harmonic Experience.

The whole point of having both was to get around certain structures that were rules over a hundred years ago. Now they are treated separately. The descending is simply the minor scale.

Not exactly true- there are lots of people who use them in their original context. Perhaps not jazz musicians (I don't really do much within jazz so I wouldn't know), but virtually all classical musicians still do.

That said- other than on this particular point, the website you are working on is pretty good.

thank you. I'm sure you're right, that there are people who still use it in the complete traditional sense, I'd like to hear some examples if you know of any. I just have always talked shop with musicians (although yes, it is mostly on the subject of jazz) who understand the current state of melodic minor to be one scale, and not have the fluctuation of the 6th and 7th.

I think it's important that if people are going to use both, then understand the reasons why, of course, if the ear goes that way, then the ear goes that way. It's always subjective anyways.

mad ep wrote:I know it was probably just a typo-- but b minor has c# in it...

maybe I was thinking of Em.... haha who knows, fixed