Music Theory Explained

In order for us to communicate and understand each other in everyday life, we had to develop a common language so we could share and express our ideas. The same applies to Music.
In order to to share and express ideas in music, we had to agree on a tangible way to track and label sounds. What is interesting about music, is that that language of music is the same most everywhere in the world, compared to the diversity of languages throughout the world.

In order to keep track of Sounds, we Label them as Notes.

I'm a Guitar player at heart, so i will use the guitar in my attempt to explain this easily.
Let's take the bottom string of a guitar. If you have a guitar handy, it would be the biggest, thickest string.
The String is held in place at the bottom and is run across a bar(called a bridge),then over the body and all the way up the neck to cross another bar(called a nut) and essentially tied to a post(called a tuning post). This causes the majority of the string to be suspended across the neck and body of the guitar in a manner so that when you pluck it, it vibrates and makes a sound.
The thickness of the string and how tight is from the bridge to the nut is what determines how fast it vibrates. This vibration is called frequency in science. In the music world, its called a Note.
If you were to place a finger on the string in the middle of the neck of the guitar, you are essentially shortening the string. So when you pluck it this time the string will vibrate faster because there is less to vibrate and it gives a higher note.
The faster the vibration, the higher the note.
If you take your finger back off, there is more string to vibrate, so it is slower.
The slower the vibration, the lower the note.
This is how different notes are made, by causing faster or slower vibrations of the string. Make Sense?
Now remember, this is just a short introduction to music theory so I wont be going into tuning or the actual playing of instruments. Those are other challenging lenses to come later.
I do find it useful to use a few instruments to help illustrate how we label our sounds(notes) and lay them out in useable manner.

For this module i will move to the Piano.
For those of you who have never opened up the top of a piano, if you had, what you would've seen is basically the same description of the string on the guitar example that i used earlier. Except there are many, many more strings.
Picture a Harp, if you will.
Inside the piano is a big Harp with all the thinner, short strings on the right hand side leading up to longer, thicker strings all the way over to the left side. The ivory keys on the outside of the piano that you push down with your finger, essentially work a lever that plucks that coordinating string on the inside of the piano. I use the piano to illustrate this part of the module because pianos are generally always pretuned and the notes are laid out in order.
When you push down on the key of a piano you hear a note that is tuned and in its proper order of a sequence of progressive notes.
If you start at the very bottom key, you will hit it and hear a very low, low note. The next one gets a little higher and so forth, until you get to the top and it is a very high, high note.
How do we define these note a little more to identify each one?
We assign them letters. A-B-C-D-E-F-G
It only goes up to G for the simple reason that we get into a repetative cycle and those are all we need.
We call this a SCALE.
You start with a very low A- then B is a little higher, then C is a little higher, Then D is little higher, then E is a little higher and so forth.
When you get to G, the next one is A again, except its an higher Octave of the lower A. and it continues to a higher B, then C Then D and so on all the way up the scale of the piano.
Now, lets make sure we understand what Octave's mean. This is where most people lose it.
Think of the color blue in a rainbow spectrum.
Low in the color spectrum is a Light Blue. As the colors in the spectrum progress, you run into a Dark Blue. Same thing with Red,...Light red....travel up the spectrum and it turns Dark Red. Different octaves of the same color. The Light Blue and The Dark Blue are essentially the Same color but different octaves. Get it? Same goes with the Notes...Low A ....aaaaaa and HIGH A....... AAAAAA!!
Same Note. Different Octave level. It works that way with all the notes, Eventually the Octave will travel out of our hearing range.

Just as there are colors in between the Light Blue leading up to the Dark Blue,(remember the example above) there are notes in between the A-B-C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C-D-E.....etc. I just laid out the Major Notes to give you the Basics. From here, it get's a little more complex.
It takes a bit of study to apply this to your particular instrument or creative genius to actually start reading and writing music. If you are getting a little confused try going back through the modules and soak it up a little at a time.
Hopefully this general understanding of how notes(sounds) are identified, labeled and then progressed up a scale will help you in your music endeavors.
Remember the keys on the piano only represent a small scale of the sound Spectrum.(did you ever here someone refer to middle c on the piano? Now you know what it means)
Just as the light spectrum has a beginning we are unable to see and eventually travels into ultra violet and so forth. The sound spectrum has the same characteristics.
It starts very, very low with base notes. Some say the earth itself puts off the lowest notes that can be heard and recorded with special equipment. A Siesmeograph is a form of recorded earth notes. Then sounds get higher and higher until we reach the dog whistle territory. We can't hear it, but dogs do.
The keys of a piano represents one small scale in the spectrum of sounds that we have identified and labeled using the letters A-B-C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C.....etc. in order for us to tangibly percieve and express to others what exactly we are doing when we create and appreciate the Beauty of Music.
Hopefully this has given a little insight on the basics of Music Theory.
Please leave a comment at the bottom of the page in the Guest book and let me know if you thought this was useful to you.

Here's just a little philosophy to finish things off. I can't help but to add this because I feel it's so relavant to the effect of sounds on our Hearts and Souls.

The new String Theory,(Big Sience stuff!)is a theory of Quantum Physics. It expresses that down in the core level of atoms, they are made up of tiny vibrating strings. What makes atoms different from each other is the rate these tiny strings vibrate. So atoms with faster vibrating strings, combine with atoms with lower vibrating strings, and they form elements and so forth. This in turn leads to the building blocks of all that we know, see and feel...etc.

Now, without getting into to much scientific babble, I prefer to think that this would be a pretty solid theory, But then I'm just a musician. I think it explains a lot of why music effects us so profoundly and can provoke such strong emotions.

Musical sounds are Vibrations!

If you consider the string theory, that everything(atoms,DNA) is just a bunch of different vibrations, you can see how music would effect you and your feelings.

And Wa-la! There you have it. So choose your music wisely cause your ultimately vibrating your Heart and Soul strings everytime you listen to a song.
The Beach Boys had it right from the start!

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