# Complete Music theory Book?



## Alchemist1 (Oct 12, 2012)

Hey guys

Could you recommend a music theory book that is complete in its content. I have found several ones, but they hide certain things out. My goal is to learn a strong foundation in music theory so I can write my musical (piano) pieces down on paper for later use.

Thanks 

I did a search first, but I get all kind of topics that has not so much to do with my question, so I apologize if the question is asked before :D


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## Peter Alexander (Oct 12, 2012)

Schoenberg theory of harmony, $25, Amazon. This is a writer's approach to harmony.


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## wst3 (Oct 12, 2012)

I hate to appear obtuse, but can you be a little more specific?

If you need to learn scales, keys, counting, etc to put your ideas on paper that's one thing.

If you want to learn more about specific approaches to harmony, or counterpoint so that you can improve your craft, well, that's a related, but still very different animal. And even this can be broken down into jazz, baroque, romantic, modern, rock, etc - although oddly enough the rudiments apply to all of them<G>!

And there are probably a dozen things in between, and certainly many topics beyond.

I teach guitar, and as part of that I teach the rudiments of reading and theory. I have been looking for an all-inclusive book for years. One of the classical guitar methods used to have a book that was outstanding, but it's out of print now.

Alfred's had a great book that included a CD for ear training. I think it's this one:

"Alfred's Essentials of Music Theory: A Complete Self-Study Course for All Musicians"

http://www.amazon.com/Alfreds-Essentials-Music-Theory-Self-Study/dp/0739036351/ref=zg_bs_4548_21

But it's really hard to tell from the blurb.

Almost any college Harmony 101 text will also provide you with the basics, and a whole lot more. Berklee recently published an Intro to Harmony book that I've heard good things about. That might be worth a look too.

Hope this helps...


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## Peter Alexander (Oct 12, 2012)

I have two college level harmony books I've written and I certainly don't make any money recommending Schoenberg. I have reviewed the top college harmony books and you have to understand that the premise there is different than learning harmony to write a piano piece. College harmony is a survey course designed to teach a subject, not build a skill. You turn in assignments to get a grade. 

By the time an individual goes through the Schoenberg book, they have all the harmony from a composer's perspective covering through Wagner, Mahler and Quartal harmony. 

Harmony is vocabulary. Once you have the vocabulary you can write what you want.


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## Alchemist1 (Oct 13, 2012)

Thank you guys 

I apologize if I my question was a bit vague, but my main goal is to learn to write my pieces down on paper or notation software.

I'm composing mostly piano music but I do everything by ear without knowing really what key I'm in and whether my chords are a 6th or 7th. I have a lot of fun composing piano music, but my pieces getting longer and longer.

Now I want to write them down on paper, otherwise I forget some of them. So I thought I need a good music theory book to learn to know what key I am using, the chord progressions and how to put them down on paper or notation software.


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## wst3 (Oct 13, 2012)

Hi Peter,

Your Schoenberg suggestion is spot on, if the OP really wants to learn the vocabulary of harmony (I like that analogy!), but if all he wants to do is learn how to put his ideas down on paper it might be a bit much.

And I have a couple of your courses, don't undersell them! They've been really helpful.


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## mark812 (Oct 13, 2012)

Not complete at all, but this site provides a great foundation if you want to learn music theory. It helped me a lot, it's well designed and completely free.

http://www.musictheory.net/lessons


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## ed buller (Oct 13, 2012)

Hi

I have sooooooo many books....but this is by far my fav.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Composing-Music-A-New-Approach/dp/0226732169/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1350135887&sr=8-1 (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Composing-Music ... 887&amp;sr=8-1)


ed


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## wst3 (Oct 13, 2012)

I really like the organization of ideas and information at musictheory.net. But I keep running into, admittedly picky details that don't match what I was taught. So when I recommend that site I do so with minor caveats.

e.g. the description of minor scales say that the melodic minor scale is only used in the ascending direction, and the natural minor is used for descending patterns. While that is, I guess, true, every book I have describes the melodic minor scale as a natural minor scale with the 6th and 7th steps raised only when ascending.

Is that the same thing? Just two ways of describing it? I don't know!


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## Casey Edwards (Oct 13, 2012)

I use a book called 'Tonal Harmony', but it was a college course, and what Peter spoke about sounds like it's something to take into consideration. However, I can also say the book is very complete with musical examples, which is very important that you build an aural memory of these ideas as well. Also, you need to make sure you are studying a lot of music WITH SCORE at the same time to really understand the complete circle. That's been one of the best composition and orchestration lessons of my life!

When writing you need to consider things like, when to use enharmonic spellings, or which spelling to use over another (is it a Gb chord or an F# chord). When it's important to differentiate an easier to read part than a theoretically correct full score. Sometimes you have to break traditional rules of chord spelling to make a part easier to read. Do you want to use key signatures? Just a few questions among the many you should come across in your studies.

Also, I think it's important that you try to write and experiment as much as you can while you study too. It will quiz you on what you know and at the same time make you ask questions and possibly lead you down a path completely different than what you started. Good luck!


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## Casey Edwards (Oct 13, 2012)

wst3 @ Sat Oct 13 said:


> I really like the organization of ideas and information at musictheory.net. But I keep running into, admittedly picky details that don't match what I was taught. So when I recommend that site I do so with minor caveats.
> 
> e.g. the description of minor scales say that the melodic minor scale is only used in the ascending direction, and the natural minor is used for descending patterns. While that is, I guess, true, every book I have describes the melodic minor scale as a natural minor scale with the 6th and 7th steps raised only when ascending.
> 
> Is that the same thing? Just two ways of describing it? I don't know!



This is a thing of it's own regarding to Melodic Minor scales only, and it's a tradition that branches mainly out of the Baroque period.

The natural minor is a separate entity, same up as down.

The melodic minor, in tradition, is taught to be practiced as a raised 6th and 7th, or more easy to remember, a major scale with a flat 3rd, while ascending, and a natural minor scale while descending.


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## Peter Alexander (Oct 13, 2012)

You guys are mixing two things: music 100 (fundamentals, scales, etc) and harmonic practice. 

Natural minor is aeolian mode. In the Instant Composer: Counterpoint by Fux, you learn the origins of raised sixth and seventh and how to use them in composition. In short the raised 6th and 7th in aeolian creates an artificial ii (BMIN) to V (E or E7) to i (AMIN) as opposed to v-i. In Jazz, BMIN to E to AMIN (ii-V) is called a secondary dominant. 

The origins of secondary dominants comes from counterpoint by creating a raised leading tone (except for phrygian where none previously existed. 

In Schoenberg's approach, the raised 6th and 7th are called "turning points" and he gives specific instructions in the minor scale section on how to apply them.


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## wst3 (Oct 14, 2012)

Agreed - my question was which is the OP looking for. My impression was that he was looking for fundamentals... hence my suggestions.

FWIW, you've sold me on Schoenberg!


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## mark812 (Oct 14, 2012)

There are many great music theory and harmony books for sure, but for me, the best way to learn composition and orchestration (after learing music theory fundamentals) is the orchestral score analysis and especially score reduction.


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## wst3 (Oct 14, 2012)

I think I've learned more about the sounds I like by reducing scores and/or transcribing pieces. BUT, I think studying harmony made it possible for me to do those things.


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