In Theory…

Mention the words “music theory” to a bunch of random songwriters and you’ll probably observe a range of reactions: wide-eyed terror, eye-rolling, yawns, a mumbled “sorry, gotta run!”, etc.

Rarely will you hear a songwriter say “Theory? Heck, yeah! I love it!”

I find it hard to understand the fear and sometimes loathing of music theory by other songwriters. But that’s probably because I was steeped in a kettle of music theory from third grade (when I started violin lessons) up through high school (where I took four years of music theory classes!). When you’re raised with wolves, you have no fear of wolves.

But a lot of folks have not been exposed to music theory as youngsters and yet somehow declare themselves to be “musicians” without being able to read a lick of notated music or even tell you how many beats there are in a dotted quarter note.

And that is totally OK!

The (ahem) “excuse” I hear most often from songwriters (and other musicians) about not bothering to try to learn music theory (as adults) has been, “I don’t need it”. And frankly, that’s correct. You don’t need understanding of music theory to be a songwriter or instrument player.

But, like knowing a foreign language, it can sometimes come in pretty handy.

And in many ways, music theory is a language. For example, there are symbols (like clefs and rests), and there are words (like “chord”, “scale”, “diminished”, and “tonic”) that have specific contextual meanings and can be useful shorthands for conveying a musical idea.

For you reluctant but somewhat curious musicians out there who have been trying to avoid music theory like the plague for years, I offer this suggestion: start small. And go slowly. Like you had to do when you wrote your first song or mastered your first guitar barre chords.

Where to start? Plain ol’ scales are great! As kindergarteners, we probably learned “do, re, mi, fa sol, la, ti, do”, right? So, you got that! How ‘bout we assign numbers (let’s get crazy and use Roman numerals!) and say “do” is I, “re” is II, “fa” is IV, “la” is VI and so forth. From there, you can launch into chords (a common, simple chord form is called a “triad”) and in no time at all, you’ll know what some high-brow musician means when they say the “dominant chord resolves to the tonic” or “the relative minor of D major is B minor.”

Do you have to learn the torturous rules of counterpoint? Or be able to identify/name THIS chord: D-F-A-C#-E-G?* No, not at all! Leave that advanced stuff for the music cognoscenti to discuss at cocktail parties. If you can learn some simple, music theory basics, you’ll find you’re able to speak a language shared among other musicians and be able to convey your ideas to them in a more efficient and accurate way… in theory.

* Dm add7 11