bandgeek0295

You'll have to excuse my last post. I've been spending an unhealthy amount of time studying for my music theory class lately... :facepalm:

Ditto! Me personally, I'd be pretty flattered. And I'd get a nice little kick out of it! :D

tuohey, you are absolutely right. (In fact, I do admit even I had that a bit mixed together in my head when I wrote my original post.) Yes, both atonal and tonal have various degrees of consonance and dissonance. For instance, any first year theory course would tell us that intervals such as minor seconds and Major sevenths are dissonances. I don't think anyone will argue a lack of dissonance in common practice music. But look at Mozart, he had dissonance in his music like any composer, but he also had clear (if bland) harmonies and harmonic progressions. The bottom line is that music can't have absolutely no sense of direction. I think it's wonderful that people are experimenting and pushing the envelope musically, but whether it be tonal or atonal, music needs some type of harmonic structure to be truly pleasing and satisfying. (of course there are instances where this does not apply, but for the most part, it does.)

Here's the impression I'm getting is somewhat of a "purist" who believes that the only proper way to utilize harmony, consonance, dissonance and all that jazz is by staying within the realm of common practice techniques. (and that is completely OK) I think what is happening is that more people compose atonal works than tonal works nowadays. It's great that people want to do something different with all of the different elements of music, but more often than not, this atonal approach can result in awkward dissonances, and harmonies with no flow or sense of direction.(as I do believe the OP mentioned somewhere) The bottom line is that any composer, whether they compose in any style, common practice or now, needs a firm grounding in music theory. I'm not saying that the theory has to guide your work, but one shouldn't be completely oblivious to theory,