Preface

The manner in which music theory has been traditionally taught is now in a state of
flux. Originally, the study of music theory was designed to acquaint the music
student or knowledgeable amateur with the composer’s working materials in
“Classical” music roughly spanning the 17th- through the 19th Centuries.

The role of music theory has expanded far beyond this mandate: theory training
now incorporates greater or lesser explanations of music after 1900, music before
1600, idiomatic Jazz practices, elements of World Music, and Popular Song idioms.

Such an expansion of means and methods in learning and teaching the fundamental
language of music presents a formidable and almost daunting challenge: what to
teach, how to teach it, and in what sequence?

Additionally, music theory has become a favored required Arts elective in College
and University curricula, and most music programs have a developmental music
theory class to address the needs of under-prepared music majors. Often, music
theory is required companion material for private instruction as well.

This textbook seeks to address these multiple needs: to serve as a basic to moderate
text for the typical fundamentals of music course and to serve as an introductory
text for those interested in acquiring a rudimentary knowledge of the language of
music.

The text also provides supplemental information, such as chord symbolization,
aspects of Jazz harmony, vernacular song form and its attributes, and so on. Usually
when this material is added to existing texts, it is incomplete and delivered in a
manner that reflects only limited real-world experience.

This author is fortunate to have had extensive experience as a teacher of music
theory at the college and university level, as a teacher of AP music theory in an Arts
Magnet high school, as a teacher of the Jazz idiom, as a practicing Classical and Jazz
musician, and as a composer in many styles.

Therefore the scope of this text is to:

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