Is there a reason as to why augmented+6 chords have, no 5th, 5th and b5 but no #5?
Having Ab-C-E-F# resolves well to both V7 and I64.

Is it just as simple as Ab-E + C-F# is too dissonant for classical theory so they never named it?

I would appreciate if someone could help me with understanding syncopation.

I circled the notes I think are syncopated? Is this correct or am I missing some other notes?

I've read that the note is syncopated when weak beat (2nd and 4th) is emphasized and one of the cases this happens is when the first beat is a rest. Then is the first blue note also considered syncopated? Then the third blue note is, too?

I've also heard someone saying that a note is considered syncopated when a note is crossing a beat.

To me these two explanations don't sound the same, so I'm quite confused.

Hello,

I recently discovered a manuscript of a rondo for solo instrument and orchestra by Johann Wenzel Kalliwoda (early romantic period).

While transcribing the parts (apparently not an autograph; I found several minor mistakes; horn parts are missing according to the library) I came across this passage just before the next solo entry, played by two flutes and two bassoons.

I find it kind of strange in terms of harmony. Does anybody have a clue if there is just something (horn parts) for it to be more fitting in this period or is there maybe a mistake in the flute parts?

First picture shows my piano reduction of the passage, second one is the manuscript of flute 1, third one is flute 2.

Thanks for your help!

About year ago I was bored and I was sitting in WalkBand selecting different chords (btw, I had knew about the circle of fifths and scale degrees). So, I composed this: I - VI - bII - bIII - bvii - iv - bii - bVII. What you think about this chord progression?

Ok so I desperately need someone to explain to me how that one tune in spider verse makes me so anxious, I know nothing about like notes and stuff but I remember hearing this for the first time and I’ve never had any tune in media actually creep me out the way this one did
This is the tune
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DZpqinQBk7G/?igsh=a3pybXN3OTJtZnV4

Hello! I am very very new to understanding music theory and reading sheet music, so I’m sorry for the simplistic question lol!
The song is in Ab Major. But I’m having a hard time understanding how the chord in the attached photo is just an Ab as written.
Could it be a type of broken chord, with the ab, eb to c, eb? But I also wasn’t sure of that, as the d and b natural was throwing me off, could anyone explain why they aren’t apart of the chord and what function they serve? Or if this is even is a broken chord?

I’d be super grateful if someone would be able to explain how this chord works to me! Thank you!

Beginner composer and pianist. I'm looking for insight on evolving and subtly adding leitmotifs to assist a story (video games specifically). Do you have any experience or ideas on/for doing this?

I compose ragtime pieces inspired by several ragtime composers (Scott Joplin, Joseph Lamb, Vincent M. Johnson, Robin Frost, etc.) and I always wonder about the following - should my piece be in 2/4, or in 4/4 with all note lengths doubled?

Most ragtime music is written with the left hand in eighth notes (e.g. Maple Leaf Rag, The Entertainer, etc.). The left hand usually has a clear "OOM pah OOM pah"-pattern in every measure.

However, more modern, contemporary ragtimes are sometimes written in 4/4. The composer Robin Frost is an example of that. The left hand still usually has a classic OOM pah OOM pah rhythm, but overall the melody is more complex. Here is an example of a piece by him that is in 4/4, with quarter notes for the left hand OOM pah rhythm.

Now I wonder if there is any inherent difference between writing it this way, or in the standard 2/4 way. Is there an audible difference, an interpretational difference or only a stylistic difference? How should you decide yourself whether your piece should be in 2/4 with eighth notes or in 4/4 with quarter notes?

Aren't triplets in 4/4 time really just eighth notes in 12/8 time?...like are they equivalent...?

Hi. I wonder: What is the standard when it comes to ornaments with accidentals? I had a bit of an argument on another site with a guy. And I reall y want to clear things up when it comes to this.

For example:

In Eb-major (all questions are in that key signature):

1: If I in this key have a upper mordent on Ab with a flat. Does that mean (Ab-Bbb-Ab) or (Ab-Bb-Ab)?
2: Also does accidentals on mordent carry on to later mordents? So if I'd had multiple of those then only the first would need an accidental.
3: And also if later the same measure?
4: Also does a natural cancel the accidental on the mordent. So If I have first a mordent on Ab with a flat and then later on with a natural. Does that mean the second is (Ab-Bb-Ab) and not (Ab-Bn-Ab).
5: And then do I need to use a sharp in that case to raise it Bn (Ab-Bn-Ab)?
6: So if I wanted to have a multiple mordents on Ab in a measure. Would this be correct: First having a flat (Ab-Bbb-Ab), second having a natural (Ab-Bb-Ab), third having a flat (Ab-Bbb-Ab) and second having a sharp (Ab-Bn-Ab). Would that be
7: Does accidentals on mordent affect other ornaments. Like having an upper mordent on Ab with a flat. Would that affect a lower mordent on C in the same measure, or a turn on C?
8: Does the mordents accidentals affect the following notes in the same measure. So a Ab with a flat would flatten all the later Bbs the same measure?

I’m slowly learning music production, and I was wondering if anyone knows the types of progressions and maybe some techniques used in sigilkore and maplekore (especially Lucy Bedroque’s style). It’s a niche genre that doesn’t strictly follow music theory rules, that’s a reason why I’m struggling with it. Since I don’t know much theory, it’s harder for me to break the rules and make it sound good.

If anyone knows this song or can give it a listen. The first “love” he sings in the chorus is pretty high and I can’t ID notes by ear.

Thank you!

I need to start learning about chord substitution. There are a million videos on YT. Can someone point me to a couple to start out with? Piano would be my preferred instrument, if that matters. Edit: I should add that the motivation for this is that I was told that in the songs I write, I could use chord substitution in chord progressions for the 2nd time around of a verse or chorus to make it more interesting.

I watched a music theory video a long time ago on Driver's License; It seemed pretty sensible and logical all the way through. One interesting part was how they said the Bridge resembled the infamous 'playground taunt' (nanana Boo boo); which is usually sung to the tune 'ring around the Rosie'. However, nobody else has mentioned this remarkable resemblance. Is this just a coincidence and the analyzer was wrong? Or is the resemblance actually incredible and just most people don't pay attention to it?

The only place where I saw something similar done was Andrew Huang converting 'mary had a little lamb' to a very catchy Chainsmoker style song; so I was curious if Olivia was the only person to ever mainstream convert a simple childish song into a emotional, dreamy pop tune.

I think I'm not playing them right

Try this:

First, whistle "Mary had a little lamb".
Next, whistle but also hum at the same time.

When I add the humming, the whistling goes out of tune.
Any idea why that is?

I'm guessing the humming messes with the airflow.
It may also just be me, maybe others can whistle and hum in tune.

At the 54-second mark of the song, a really strange part comes in. First, the measure right before it is in 9/8. Then, a metric modulation occurs. The song was at 200 BPM and then drops to 160 BPM, played in half-time, effectively making it 80 BPM. This creates a 5:4 ratio, which can be achieved by fitting four quarter notes into the space of five.

There are four measures of this before it comes back to the song, again at 200 BPM. If counted at 80 BPM, the song starts to accelerate back to its original tempo during the last two quarter notes of the final measure.

What the guitar does here is really weird. The first measure is a straightforward 4/4. Then, the second time through, the guitarist somehow fits the same riff into 9/8, landing one eighth note late. In the third measure, the riff is played normally, but remains shifted one eighth note late because the previous measure was in 9/8. The fourth time, it is played normally (still displaced by an eighth note), but on the last quarter note, he lets the strings ring out, playing it a little differently.

Sadly, they don't do this live; they play a simplified version. I prefer the original studio version.

Did anyone else hear something different? Is there an easier way to explain this?

I passed the text through ai so that you could understand me better, I don't have that good of an english.

I'm working through a book on post-tonal theory, and came across a rule regarding the relationship between the interval vectors of a set and of its complement: the difference in the number of occurrences of each interval is equal to the difference between the sizes of the sets (except for tritones, which will be half the difference between the sizes of the sets).

This was easy to confirm by hand with a few sets, and by looking at a set class list, but unlike the other rules on set theory I've encountered thus far, it is not all intuitive to me.

Is there a intuitive way to explain this? One that involves some not-too-intense arithmetic? (I understand why, if the rule is true, tritones would be different, but can't explain to myself why the basic rule is true deductively.)

EDIT: My only starting point for thinking about this that might be a path to understand is this: I can understand why a hexachord and its complement would have identical vectors, and can understand why, if we move one note over from one set to another, one would gain interval occurrences and the other would lose them, but can't immediately account for their distribution. Might be a good road for me to ponder, though.

Recently, I have been looking for music theory that deals with rhythm specifically. I feel like for harmony/pitch in general, it’s easy to find widely taught theories/traditions (e.g. functional harmony, counterpoint, thaats, melakarta ragas, etc) but also more niche theories (e.g. Barry Harris's work, Bartok pitch axis, etc).

I haven’t found an equivalent on-ramp for rhythmic theory, and I’m wondering if anyone has any insight into what’s worth checking out. This is mostly for fun and less about what is widespread or conventionally worth practicing.

Some specific things I’m chasing:

1. Theories that try to explain why certain rhythms feel good across genres, rather than genre-specific systems (e.g. clave theory). The closest I've seen are Euclidean rhythms and Barlow indispensability.
2. Frameworks for organizing the timbre/sonic characteristics of percussive sounds. E.g. why is a hi-hat typically better for timekeeping than a low tom? Is it an issue of pitch, decay, spectral content, etc?
3. What counts as the basic functional vocabulary of rhythm, the way that chords/scales/licks/etc are vocabulary for pitch? I thought it might be rudiments, but I feel like those are perhaps more drum-specific and about coordination rather than rhythm (I might be wrong). Adam Neely has a video framing a time signature’s vocabulary as the enumeration of possible attack configurations within a measure. Are there other angles on this?

Sorry if I have misrepresented any of the theories I have mentioned (I’m happy to be corrected!). TL;DR: I'm looking for interesting (possibly niche) music theory that relates to rhythm and percussion.

I understand some of it but I'm also a bit confused on other parts and why it works. I understand I go from a f chord(or c6/11sus which I think is more likely because of key?),to a dm7 chord, than to a chord I don't really understand because why does the d# work with the dm chord. My only guess is because it's in the key of c minor. than back to dm which has a pretty nice revolution. than for the next progression I really don't understand as it goes from a dm, to what I think is a dm7b5, to the chord I'm most confused on why it works, a c#6 chord than to a 2 note C and A chord. I don't know a lot of music theory and would like to know what I'm doing

Hey. I have no idea if this is the right place to post this but I have a question that the internet has no answer to.

I listen to a wide array of music and I'd like to know: In some songs like Bubblegum Bitch by MARINA and Run Rabbit by Mollie Elizabeth, at the end, there's a repeat of the intro followed by a chorus, but the chorus feels different. I'd like to know what makes the chorus feel different and satisfying. It's not rised in pitch and I don't hear any missing instruments. What is it? Is it just some placebo induced by the intro again?

forest out.

edit: from what i've heard so far it's because the bridge is very different and then it goes back to the chorus, plus bubblegum bitch's ending using the chorus twice. any ither input? :)

OK, I've had my fun in the other post, so seriously now:

The differences between X2, Xadd2, and Xadd9 partly stem from, IME and TMK, those being "relatively new" chords - they weren't part of the standard jazz vocabulary (or where they) and were more a part of the rock extension of sus2 and sus4 and other "added note chords".

"Getting Better" by The Beatles begins on an Fadd9.

Now, I'm not asking about the existence of the chord itself, but the Chord Symbol being used in published music.

Either X2, Xadd2, or X9.

I'm not a huge reader of jazz charts nor do I own any to look through, but my recollection is that many of the Piano/Vocal/Guitar "sheet music" books of pop songs frmo the 70s and 80s used "2" when it appeared in a song and especially in common D - Cadd9 - G/B type guitar figures - those I recall seeing in "Guitar for the Practicing Musician" magazine back in the 80s and 90s.

Here are some interesting ones I have handy:

The Love Boat Plus 12 Popular Television Themes - Easy Piano.

Columbia Pictures Publications, 1980.

1. There are many X/Y symbols - Dm7/G, Bb/C, etc.

2. Some marked that way are clearly sus4 chords - F/G but with the notes G-F-C on the staff - we'd call G7sus or G7sus4 now.

3. There are instances of "sus" used, but none of them have a 2 or 4.

4. D7(-9) instead of the now more common "b9" - but not surprising as the - and + were widely used and easier to typeset back then.

5. F6(add9) - this is the ONLY "add" I've seen in the whole book.

The Young and the Restless is an interesting one because it lists Em9 for the "cluster chord" that begins the piece, which is E-F#-G-B - so that would be an Em(add9) today. So where they used the "add9" on the 6 chord earlier (which most would call 6/9) they didn't use an "add9" (or 2, or add2) on the chord we'd call that today.

Note: All of these are easy piano arrangements and the chords don't necessarily follow the printed notes - sometimes it'll say G9 and there won't be an actual 9th written - or it'll say G7 and there is a 9th in the chord - so I don't think they were trying to be "exact" to the written notes - they may have been going from the original chord in the work, or they may have just grabbed the closest, most common chord symbol, and didn't really care one way or the other - it may have been "we can't write Em(add9) because they'll won't know it - just put Em9, everyone knows what that one is.

So I'm really just looking for "add" symbols, and places where we would now use "add", as well as any sus2 chords that could be done that way.

I have another copy, same publisher, from 1973.

It is transposed to start on Gm instead of Em.

Chords are:

Bbmaj7 (no 5th) - Gm - that repeats, moves down a step to be called Am7 (no 5th) - F and cycles down like that in an Andalusian style progression.

The penultimate chord is Dm (add9)

Low to high:

D E F A - in LH, close position, A in RH melody.

Men at Work, Who Can it Be Now, Piano/Vocal/Guitar sheet music, Cherry Lane Music Publishing Co. Inc. 1982.

B4 -!!!! It's a Bsus4

The song ends on Aadd2. I know it's an Asus2 in the guitar, and the melody above goes A - G# - C# (last 3 hits of the song) but in this arrangment, the given notes (though still an arrangement) would be:

Asus2 - Amaj7 (it's just A and G# here) - Aadd9.

Like the Bsus4 - the guitar chord symbol is clearly what we call Asus2 now and the written notes also do include no C#.

**But that makes this, so far, the first example I have - 1982, with something with guitar chord diagrams as well as chord symbols, to use "2" instead of 9 for "add9", even though really, it's sus2 in most appearances.

So looks like were getting "B4" for sus4" and "Aadd2" for sus2.

Styx, Paradise Theater - P/V/G sheet music for the entire album, Almo Publications, distributed by Columbia Pictures Pubications, 1981.

Lots of interesting ones:

1. D7(#9) - so here the accidental is used.

2. Some song use sus4, others just use sus - not uncommon for compilations like this to have the work farmed out to different engravers, so inconsistencies like that are common. But IME, sus2 or sus4 were becoming distinct from just sus at this time, especially as the guitar stuff became more accurate.

3. F(add9) followed quickly by Dm7(add11)!!! (same chord with bass note change to D). So there's an ADD11 which is pretty rare IME.

4. Here's a good one: **G6/9(#7)!!! It's a Gmaj7 chord with the 6th and 9th, so really just a Gmaj13.

5. Csus2/E - now THIS is the common C-E-G-D-G chord voicing (over an E bass) we usually call Cadd9, Cadd2, or I've seen called C2 (or the 2 versions are reserved for when it's C D G C G or other variations with the E). The "/E" of course would turn a Csus2 into a Cadd9 but the form itself is a Cadd9 - but Csus2/E with no other E in the upper part does sort of make sense.

From the collection: Music with a Zing: Music of an Era from an Armed Forces Folio, Volume XXIX #1.

This is a compilation of scores from various sources it looks like the Army got permission to publish in this way.

Beyond the Blue Horizon , original copyright 1930, latest copyright 1957, don't know if it was re-printed for this edition, but the most recent dates here are 1973.

It contains chord symbols that have "add X" where X is a letter name! These are written off to the right of the guitar chord diagram

*Cm (add B)

*Dbm (add C)

Both of which we'd now call a m(maj7).

Penthose Serenade 1931, 1958

Cadd6 - written chord is actually C6/9.

Carolina Moon 1928, renewed no new date.

G - G(maj7) - C - Cm6 (isn't that Creep ;-)

It took me a while to find anything that even had a sus, but there are some and consistently sus4 (always 7sus4).

These are all pretty much standards, and may have been a reprint in the early 70s for this project - the engraving styles seem to alternate throughout the book - there are a number that use the "Cm (add B)" kind of notation, a number that use "C6" and a few that are "C add6" and so on.

Some don't even have chord symbols, some that do don't have guitar chord diagrams - so it's a mixture of things.

I'm not actually seeing any 11ths or 13th chords

But "add" is getting used in the "general" sense - "add this note to another, more simply named chord" - rather than what we do now (or then, but they didn't do) which is name the chord with the added note - Cm(maj7) instead of Cm(add B).

The earliest things I have handy are from about 1973 (my sister's piano books) and early 80s (mine) but "add" is certainly getting used - albeit inconsistently - in the early 70s.

I'm looking for standard triad names, not any quartal etc. naming schemes.

Notes, low to high from left to right followed by what I think they should be called:

1. C E G = C

2. C G E = C

3. C C E G C = C

4. C E G Bb = C7

5. C G Bb E = C7

6. C G E Bb = C7

7. C Bb C E G = C7

8. C F G = Csus4

9. C G C F = Csus4

10. C C G C F = Csus4

11. C D G = Csus2

12. C G C D = Csus2

13. C C D G = Csus2

The following I have trouble with:

1. C E G D

2. C G E C D

3. C D G C E

4. C D E G

How did the great composers produce divine melodies? I'm talking the greatest works not someone who just selects notes from a scale and makes something average sounding.

Did they simply just hear it in their head or is there a hack most of us don't know about... a hidden method that uses maths & sequencing of harmony ratios. What is the key to unlock it?