Music Theory for Dummies Quotes

“In the sixth century B.C., the Greek scholar and philosopher Pythagoras decided to try and make things easier for everyone by standardizing, or at least dissecting, musical tuning. He had already discovered the relationship between pitch frequencies and lengths of string and had defined what an octave was, so he figured standardizing tuning was the next logical step. He divided a circle into 12 equal sections, like a clock. The result of his experimentation eventually became known as the Circle of Fifths, which is still used today. Each of the 12 points around the circle was assigned a pitch value, which roughly corresponds to the present system of an octave with 12 half steps. Western music theorists have since updated Pythagoras’s Circle of Fifths to what you see in Figure 8-1.”
― Michael Pilhofer, Music Theory for Dummies

“The first orchestral leader to use a baton was German conductor Louis Spohr, in 1820. Prior to the use of a baton, conductors often tapped a staff on the floor to demonstrate the beat — a practice that led to the death of 17th century French composer Jean-Baptiste Lully, who stabbed himself in the foot with his staff and subsequently died of gangrene.”
― Michael Pilhofer, Music Theory for Dummies

“A whole genre of rock, called math rock, is based on using complex time signatures, such as 7/8, 11/8, 13/8, and so on, in order to break away from the 4/4 time that’s the standard in rock.”
― Michael Pilhofer, Music Theory for Dummies

“The purpose of music theory is to both explain why something sounded the way it did, and how that sound can be made again.”
― Michael Pilhofer, Music Theory For Dummies

“There are a lot of unanswered questions about ancient music, not the least being why so many different cultures came up with so many of the same tonal qualities in their music completely independent of one another. Many theorists have concluded that certain patterns of notes just sound right to listeners, and certain patterns don’t. Music theory, then, very simply, could be said to be a search for how and why music sounds right or wrong.”
― Michael Pilhofer, Music Theory For Dummies

“However, even the healthiest human heart skips a beat now and then, and so does music.”
― Michael Pilhofer, Music Theory For Dummies

“Music theory, then, very simply, could be defined as a search for how and why music sounds right or wrong. In other words, the purpose of music theory is to explain why something sounded the way it did and how that sound can be made again.”
― Michael Pilhofer, Music Theory For Dummies