Music Theory: Introduction

The information on this site assumes that you do not know how to read music and that you do not know any music theory.

RC: What is theory in musical composition?
IS: Hindsight. It doesn't exist. There are compositions from which it is deduced. Or, if this isn't quite true, it has a by-product existence that is powerless to create or even to justify. Nevertheless, composition involves a deep intuition of theory.
--Igor Stravinsky and Robert Craft, Conversations with Igor Stravinsky
[A] key signature is a king's court in miniature. It is ruled by a king (the first step) and his two right-hand men (steps four and five). They have four other dignitaries at their command, each of whom has his own special relation to the king and his right-hand men. The court houses five additional tones as well, which are known as chromatic. They have important roles to play in other keys, but here they are simply guests.
Since each of the twelve notes has its own job, title, and function, any piece we hear is more than mere sound: it unfolds a certain action before us. Sometimes the events are terribly involved (as in Mahler or--even more--Bartók or Stravinsky): princes from other courts intervene, and before long there is no telling which court a tone belongs to and no assurance it isn't working undercover as a double or triple agent. But even the most naive of listeners can figure out more or less what is going on. The most complex music is still a language.
--Milan Kundera, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting

Introduction

Music theory is about the relationships between different notes and groups of notes. We start with half-steps and whole steps, which are the basic building blocks of music theory. We then use these steps to build intervals, which are the names for the relationships between any two notes. Then we come to scales, which are defined in terms of intervals. Using scales and intervals, we further define particular groups of notes as chords. And, lastly for this site, we take up the idea of keys, making use of all the preceding materials.

There is a lot more to music theory than this. However, these basics should get you started. Please feel free to email me with any questions or comments about the information presented here.

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