I said plenty times that they are not exculsive. And totally agree as that is what i've been trying to say (but you've summed up things a lot better
). I I'm replying to the thread starter though, he's asking how to write a bridge. Surely if he wasn't relying on a formula he'd have asked how to better translate his ideas, but as far as i see - no usable information was given at the start of this debate to see things from anything other than an exclusively theory based perspective. That's why I'm showing my side of things which is pretty much exclusively naturalistic, i would love to be able to open a thread on a new composition and explain it theoretically and debate with people if I had taken the correct path and how i could make things better. I have a way of doing things that works really well though. That's all I'm trying to say, people took things a little too much to heart though, which would point to them having another agenda other than the continuation of a very interesting debate.
I'd point out again that music already is a language, we translate that language into letters and derive theory from that. So theory is derived from a translation of a language. I can understand what you're saying about some intuative writers not having a grasp of the
translation and that perhaps stunts their abilities. But I disagree that natural writers may have a limited vocabulary as that naturalistic vocabulary reaches beyond the steps that we create. So, I'd say that natural writers actually have infinite vocabulary. I would say that natural writers may have a limited understanding of that vocabulary and that may impact on their writing. But it's dead simple the way I write, I write it in my head - I play it. Perhaps if I had a better understaning of theory it would take less time for me to get things down on a instrument, but I'm fast enough for what I need.
Brian, you say you write from an exclusively "naturalistic" method, but honestly I find this hard to believe.
Theory isn't really knowing the "rules" of music; it's really just knowing the
names of those "rules" (or better yet, "conventions") --- or, at least, the names that have been agreed upon by the musical community.
Whether you think so or not, you're aware of certain relationships between chords and notes, and you know how some things are going to sound before you play them. I'm sure you're aware how a G - C chord progression will sound. Just because you can't say, theoretically, what's going on there, it doesn't mean you don't have it internalized and don't understand it in your own way.
Or even if you don't know that you're playing a G or a C chord, you
are aware that when you put your fingers on this fret (or key if you're a pianist or whatever), it's going to make a certain sound.
Studying the "works of the masters" is just another form of theory. You're going to learn how they did things and why, what you like and what you don't, etc.
I certainly don't agree that, if you don't know theory (in the proper sense), you're limited in your writings. Lots of great writers didn't "know" theory, such as the Beatles and Nirvana. But they obviously knew how music worked, and much of what they wrote falls perfectly within those "conventions" that music theory "teaches." If you know theory, it's a simple matter of seeing what they did in their songs and why, but that's not gonna allow you create your own masterpieces.
There are two ways to look at theory, IMO. One is a snobbish, "If you don't know theory, you're not a real musician and/or you're limiting yourself." That's not the view I take. I think of it as just a way of applying names and labels to things that
we're going to learn regardless with enough exposure and practice. Really, knowing the names and labels isn't the important part. The understanding and internalizing the sounds is the more important part.
It's the being able to
hear it in your head and reproduce it that's the more important part.
Imagine that you're jamming along with someone else. You're playing their song, and you don't know it. Their back is to you, so you can't see what they're doing. Can you follow along with what they're playing?
That's the important thing.
That's knowing music. Just knowing theory terms like "dominant," "parallel minor," "leading tone," etc. isn't gonna allow you to do that. You have to have a developed ear to do that. And whether or not you can dictate the chord progression in your head as it's being played doesn't change your ability to be able to recognize it with your ear and recreate it.
I knew a lot of people at college that knew plenty of theory, but they hadn't developed their ear at all. So, knowing theory allowed them to make "passable" music by themselves, because they're basically "painting by numbers"---i.e., the "rules" tell them where it's ok to put their fingers. But in the above scenario (jamming with someone else and having to rely on their ear), they'd be hunting and pecking because they didn't know what these "rules"
sounded like.
By the same token,
I also certainly don't agree that "knowing" theory impedes the creative process at all. Really, that's just rubbish. I mean, seriously ... by saying that, you're ignoring many, many acknowledged masters of the past. And that's not just including many recent pop music writers like Sting, Billy Joel, Paul Simon, and many others, but also classical masters like Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, etc., etc.
"Knowing" theory may not work
for you, and that's fine. But, like I said, you actually do know some theory; you're just not using the same terms as the collective music communtiy does.
Nobody, and I do mean
nobody, composes purely "from instinct and inspiration" every time. You're aware of how music works, even if you can't put it into words. You can't help it. If you play something, and you don't like it, your brain is going to tell you "don't play that; it doesn't sound good." Just with that, you're learning "music theory," even if you don't know the "proper" term for it.
And it's not a bad thing. It makes sense that the more you do something, the more you'll learn about it and the more fluent you'll be.
, I think *some* musical theorists have a complete lack of musical imagination and have to use lego to create music, that's what annoys them. They don't like to think that someone can come up with something good without having to put all of that theoretical work in. Again I said some
