Music Theory - can we do without it?

[christianm77]

The more I get into learning and teaching jazz, the more I realise the importance of intuitively learning the language.

The question that pops into my head is - how much do we really need the grammar of music? Is it a distraction from the more important considerations? How important is book learning and theory? Is it just a way for jazz education to acquire academic respect?

I have found myself developing concepts based around the solos I've learned - I do sometimes wonder how helpful it is to intellectualise music in this way....

What do you guys think?

[mr. beaumont]

I don't think most folks can hear jazz when starting out, so yeah, I think some background knowledge really helps.

But I also think you can get pretty far on fundamentals and some basic music theory stuff like chord construction, understanding chord function, etc....a lot less theory than a lot of folks think...

[christianm77]

So - the argument would go - isn't important to get students to hear jazz?

How does harmonic theory help this? Is chord construction early on that important?

In Gypsy jazz circles chords are learned very much as 'grips' and the focus is heavily on rhythm and melodic player, for instance.

[mr. beaumont]

It's a hand in hand thing...you learn tunes, you transcribe, then you analyze how the moments that make you say "hell yeah" work.

It's not an either/or proposition.

[JensL]

In my experience as a teacher most people who wanted to learn jazz were also interested in theory. And probably more than half of them come to me with the question if I can make a better connection between their playing and their theory.

Jazz is by now also something that mostly grown ups want to learn and they tend to lean more towards a learning style based on analysis.

Gypsy guitarist are AFAIK taught from very young by imitating their teacher/idols, which also is an approach that will fit that age of student better.

Jens

[Pukka-J]

Well...even if you don't know or understand the laws of gravity apples will still drop to the floor, so yes, likewise you can make music without knowing theory. Theory just tries to explain why you hear what you hear.

Theory wasn't just conceived out of nothing though: if you play by ear, without knowing any theory, and (in hindsight) you try to grasp why a certain chord you played wants to resolve in a certain way, you're applying, no, devising theory yourself!

Perhaps the OP didn't mean to insinuate this, but why are theory and 'playing by ear' so often considered mutually exclusive? I think playing by ear is king, but there's certainly no harm in understanding why things function as they do. It structures our musical knowledge.

[christianm77]

In my experience as a teacher most people who wanted to learn jazz were also interested in theory. And probably more than half of them come to me with the question if I can make a better connection between their playing and their theory.

Jazz is by now also something that mostly grown ups want to learn and they tend to lean more towards a learning style based on analysis.

Gypsy guitarist are AFAIK taught from very young by imitating their teacher/idols, which also is an approach that will fit that age of student better.

Jens

This is my experience too.

I think it the aural approach can fit adults too, if you can stop from being sidetracked.

Another interesting thing is the tendency to invent theories based on transcriptions. I've come up with a theory of line construction recently that seems to fit with the solos I've learned. Depending what day it is I think it's worth something or a waste of time haha.

In terms of over reliance on analysis I feel it results in a rather cold result - I think the Warne Marsh approach, for example is a good way to counteract this (because of it's emphasis on singing and hearing) but it still involves theory to some extent. Can we chop this out totally?

Lastly a lot of musicians who are great players but don't know much about the theory end up feeling a bit insecure when people start blathering on about this or that scale. On another level, some students feel their playing will be incomplete somehow if they don't know what they are doing in theory terms.

My favourite Jim Mullen quote (from a big list): 'fuck scales!' Interestingly, Jim tends to turn down requests to teach. The feeling I get is that he feels students want him to explain his playing, and he can't and isn't interested in doing so.

[christianm77]

Well...even if you don't know or understand the laws of gravity apples will still drop to the floor, so yes, likewise you can make music without knowing theory. Theory just tries to explain why you hear what you hear.

Theory wasn't just conceived out of nothing though: if you play by ear, without knowing any theory, and (in hindsight) you try to grasp why a certain chord you played wants to resolve in a certain way, you're applying, no, devising theory yourself!

Perhaps the OP didn't mean to insinuate this, but why are theory and 'playing by ear' so often considered mutually exclusive? I think playing by ear is king, but there's certainly no harm in understanding why things function as they do. It structures our musical knowledge.

I didn't mean to insinuate this, in fact, but it is a common viewpoint. *Need* is the important word here. I want to concentrate on a way of educating myself and others that focuses on the real essentials of being a musician.

Theory is not a bad thing at all, but I feel it can distract from the listening -> ears -> playing process. Most of the truly inspirational guitar lessons I've had over the years have been the ones that pointed that out (which probably speaks volumes about my tendency to over intellectualise things.)

I think some people are always going to seek out or invent theories to describe what they do: it seems many guitarists and pianists are into this particularly. Other people are absolutely not be interested in it, but discount jazz as not for them because of the musical maths! This would be a shame.

[Pukka-J]

I don't believe there are many great players who don't know theory. I think most of them know more theory than they care to admit. Most of them know exactly how functional dominant chords resolve and what a tritone substitution is. Even if they honestly don't know the words or description of those concepts, their own understanding of them makes it a theory nonetheless.
As I and others have stated above: there's no either/or.

And even if Jim Mullen says "f*ck scales" he still draws his material from them...

EDIT: I do believe your point about distraction is valid though. Understanding (theory) is no substitute for hearing, but it certainly can be a pitfall to think so.

[JensL]

This is my experience too.

I think it the aural approach can fit adults too, if you can stop from being sidetracked.

You seem to keep assuming that it does not work, or produces a bad result when teaching with theory? That is not my experience. I think it works quite well if you apply it right and the student works at it.
But just to clarify what I mean typical homework during the lessons would be , analysing standards, composing solos (with arps, arps with leading notes or similar) playing transcribed solos, transcribing solos and playing them and of course improvising and of course technical stuff like scales, arps etc. In that way it is not all theory but more based on internalizing partly the harmony and partly the jazz tradition.

To me composing is the most underrated and underused tool for learning improvisation.

In terms of over reliance on analysis I feel it results in a rather cold result - I think the Warne Marsh approach, for example is a good way to counteract this (because of it's emphasis on singing and hearing) but it still involves theory to some extent. Can we chop this out totally?

I am not familiar with his method of teaching so I cannot really comment on that.

Lastly a lot of musicians who are great players but don't know much about the theory end up feeling a bit insecure when people start blathering on about this or that scale. On another level, some students feel their playing will be incomplete somehow if they don't know what they are doing in theory terms.

I never really encountered that with jazz musicians, and in other styles musicians seems to just reference where they learned stuff from rather than analyzing it (In my experience again..). I did however attend a Chris Cheek Masterclass where he explained how he had figured out all possible modes of major, minor harmonic, minor melodic and harmonic major. Alle possible pentatonic scales of those and then demonstrated how he could make music with them (and trust me he really could!).

Jens

[nick1994]

How could someone approach a chord without having any understanding how it works, or what works over it?

[christianm77]

You seem to keep assuming that it does not work, or produces a bad result when teaching with theory? That is not my experience. I think it works quite well if you apply it right and the student works at it.
Jens

I'm not having a go at this way of teaching really - although I am playing Devil's advocate. It's more a thought experiment. How little terminology and theory can we get away with?

People do invent their own concepts, which is creative in it's own right.

BTW speaking of nomenclature - I recall an interesting interview with Gary Willis (I think) regarding Allan Holdsworth. Allan obviously has his own system of nomenclature - Gary was asked if this was confusing. He said 'we just play music.' So theory - i.e. nomenclature - is really just a way of labelling things.

To me composing is the most underrated and underused tool for learning improvisation.
Jens

Interesting point.

I never really encountered that with jazz musicians, and in other styles musicians seems to just reference where they learned stuff from rather than analyzing it (In my experience again..). Jens

It's rare these days. Unheard of I think in modern jazz. I know maybe two musicians who play jazz who don't really know (or at least never reference) music theory. It's more common in Gypsy jazz, at least among Gypsies.

I did however attend a Chris Cheek Masterclass where he explained how he had figured out all possible modes of major, minor harmonic, minor melodic and harmonic major. Alle possible pentatonic scales of those and then demonstrated how he could make music with them (and trust me he really could!).
Jens

I went to a Lage Lund masterclass on the other hand when someone asked him about the harmonic major, and he sort of shrugged his shoulders and said 'he wasn't a scale guy.' He then showed us about a million cool and very clever things to do with triads. That's why he sounds the way he does I guess.

Still theory though.

[christianm77]

How could someone approach a chord without having any understanding how it works, or what works over it?

One possible process:
1) play a chord
2) sing a note or phrase that sounds good to you
3) play the notes on the guitar

[nick1994]

As soon as you find out that an A sounds good over an Fmaj7 chord, you have acquired theoretical knowledge, even if it's from trial and error.

[TH]

Honestly, it depends on what you want to do. I've known people who create compositional masterpieces in real time. Theory and aesthetics are long time partners to these players. I've heard people that just want to get through a jam playing their bag of licks and tricks, not get hurt in the process. They're happy too. It depends on what you want to do.
I've also heard people play without a clue that what they were playing was a train wreck to anyone that knew the changes, and truthfully, when they played it fast enough, and with conviction and volume, there were those in the crowd that loved it.
Maybe the question does not have one answer.
David

[christianm77]

As soon as you find out that an A sounds good over an Fmaj7 chord, you have acquired theoretical knowledge, even if it's from trial and error.

Only if you think that way. You might not know what an A or an Fmaj7 is.

You might come up with your own name.

More interestingly to me, you might internalise the sound/guitar connection in a different way.

Different peoples brains work in different ways. Different processes also work in different ways.

I think the idea that a non theory player might be restricted to licks odd. What about Django, for example?

[nick1994]

Even if you don't know what an Fmaj7 or an A is, if you have established a rule about what notes you think work, or what lines work where, you have a certain theoretical knowledge. It's really about whether the player knows what they are doing that matters. Regardless of whether you know chords, scales names, as long as there is an awareness of consonance and dissonance as well as harmonic awareness.

[christianm77]

Even if you don't know what an Fmaj7 or an A is, if you have established a rule about what notes you think work, or what lines work where, you have a certain theoretical knowledge. It's really about whether the player knows what they are doing that matters. Regardless of whether you know chords, scales names, as long as there is an awareness of consonance and dissonance as well as harmonic awareness.

Maybe we are talking at cross purposes. What do you mean by know? I suspect we mean the same thing reaaaaalllly.

An example. There is absolutely no-one I've ever played a major scale to in class feels it's right if I stop on degree 4 or 7. Almost everyone laughs, actually, especially kids.

The knowledge is in our bones.

[nick1994]

What I mean by knowing what they are doing, I mean that they play with intention. If the stop on a very dissonant note, they did it with intention. It is then up to them to explain why they did it.

[christianm77]

What I mean by knowing what they are doing, I mean that they play with intention. If the stop on a very dissonant note, they did it with intention. It is then up to them to explain why they did it.

YESSSSS! Intention is EVERYTHING!

I'll stop jumping up and down :-P

Fake intention is a trap though. You must *know* what you are going to play before you play it. Feel it with every atom of your being.

[bako]

Sound is the primary plane where music exists. The ability to accurately hear musical detail is the most profound branch of
musical knowledge and a skill set worth developing to highest level we can. Django was a very knowledgeable about music.
---------------
Beyond this we need the physical abilities to bring these sounds to life on an instrument.
---------------
Notation is a system of symbolically presenting pitch and temporal info of a composition as well as other expressive aspects.
It is a representation and not the music itself. Theory is similar in this regard, a representation but not the music.
It attempts to describe important relationships to be observed and at some level understand.
At it's worst it is just a forum for academic debate and at it's best it provides insights and tools to enhance our music making.
It is always at it's most effective when closely linked to the associated sounds.

When you say theory, it's my impression that you are referring to the formal schools of thought.

People do invent their own concepts, which is creative in it's own right.

This is also theory in my opinion. Is it even possible to be devoid of any conception of what you are doing?
Again, I'm not talking about knowing the answers to achieve good grades on college exams,
just a self imagined set of descriptions of what one believes to be going on in the music.
---------------

I did a little bit of studying with Connie Crothers, a fantastic pianist and like Warne Marsh, a close associate of
Lennie Tristano. Learning solos of master artists by singing them was an important component of teaching about this music by all of them. While theory per se was not a central element in her approach with me, she was knowledgeable.
She had me practice some chord scale voicings that were physically challenging (full range lowest to highest).
We also would discuss analysis of song progressions. Connie didn't always reveal her motivations in pursuing a particular avenue, but I suspected that this was connected to grasping an overview of the form and structure, cultivating the ability to hear further into the future. Most info was conveyed through oral tradition and presenting structures to practice creativity, playing duets or alternating choruses on tunes as well as more open structure formats.

[christianm77]

Thanks for the in depth post bako. Interesting stuff. Yes, that basically covers it as far as I can see.

I really like the Tristano approach personally in so much as I have worked with it. I find players who follow that path have a richness of line and freedom rhythmically that is really wonderful - Warne Marsh of course being a case in point. I should check out Connie's playing.

I haven't come across much info on a harmonic approach from this school - would you be able to describe what type of voicings were you working on?

[pkirk]

How little terminology and theory can we get away with?

To me, this sentence exposes a problem with the original question. I think 90% of what is called "theory" on this forum is really terminology. Knowing terminology is useful for communication. There are other ways to communicate musical information, eg by explicitly demonstrating something on an instrument. You don't need to know the terminology, but it sure streamlines the communication process. As mentioned upstream, there are traditions (gypsy, most of jazz history) that bypass standard "academic music" terminology, but that doesn't mean there is no theory, just that it is expressed differently.


That said, learning musical terminology is not hard, and anyone serious about jazz ought to spend the few hours it takes to learn the basic terminology. What musical purpose could it possibly serve to avoid the few hours it takes to learn this? It may take a lifetime to put this information to creative musical use, but that's a separate issue.

[cmajor9]

Good post, pkirk ~

This is what I think when I hear statements like "Wes Montgomery didn't know theory" - maybe he didn't know or use all the (academic) terminology, but just listen to what he does with harmony - he certainly knows it better than many, albeit with a different way of knowing!

Not trying to be off-topic in this. It may or may not be useful for the OP to go far down the road of academic music theory, which can get pretty complex. But to be creative with music, you have to know/have an understanding of what's happening in the music, at bigger (aka "structure") and smaller (this line, this chord, this note) levels. Some players find the whole bag of theory quite useful, others make their own way of understanding, but IMO there's no getting around developing a detailed understanding of it.

My composition teacher used to say "the composers create, the theorists pick up the droppings." :>)

Theory is really just a way to understand and talk about (communicate) what is happening in the music. Its too bad that it often is seen negatively by some students/musicians (sometimes because its taught in a way that's hard to connect with).

[JensL]

I'm not having a go at this way of teaching really - although I am playing Devil's advocate. It's more a thought experiment. How little terminology and theory can we get away with?

People do invent their own concepts, which is creative in it's own right.

BTW speaking of nomenclature - I recall an interesting interview with Gary Willis (I think) regarding Allan Holdsworth. Allan obviously has his own system of nomenclature - Gary was asked if this was confusing. He said 'we just play music.' So theory - i.e. nomenclature - is really just a way of labelling things.

I think you cannot talk about theory like this without discussing the method of teaching. The theory was created for communication, and a lesson is the place where it is mostly in use. In my experience being a comlpete musician includes having a solid knowledge of theory.

If you look at Allans lesson video on YouTube you'll see that all he did was invent his own symbols for chords and scales, so only how he writes it down not what it is and how it works together. The first realbook almost did the same thing. Aebersold also has his own way of writing certain chords, in fact most people I know do. Do you think that the ones who wrote the real book are as creative as Holdsworth? (Ironically, they are more influential for sure , wrong chords have been text book harmony ever since... )

I think it is mostly more efficient to teach the students a way to group and look at notes in a context rather than letting them name it themselves. We don't let kids invent their own alphabet when they have to learn to read either, that simply would take too long.

That is in fact my point. You probably can sit down and learn to play jazz by ear, but even most jazz players (who are capable of sitting down and learning how to play changes..) don't have the patience to do so.

A music theory system is not only a system for labeling though, or at least then it is pretty poor. It should also be able to let you understand how the harmony and melody moves. This is not something that is possible for all pieces, but for standards it is, and we almost never talk about it because we only use the labels and the "m7=dorian"ish rules and that's a II V in Blabla Minor. What key the piece is in or which chord in that key is minor is not taken into consideration, and therefore not connecting to our ears.

It's rare these days. Unheard of I think in modern jazz. I know maybe two musicians who play jazz who don't really know (or at least never reference) music theory. It's more common in Gypsy jazz, at least among Gypsies.

But then again compared to jazz in general Gypsy Jazz has been almost standing still for the last 50 years, so maybe there's a connection there? If it takes so long to learn the tradition there is little room to develop it.

Jens

Edit: sorry for the long post....