Where did you study music theory and the arts of composing?

Hi, I don't think anyone remembers me, I was here shortly about a couple of month's back.

I was really busy with college and didn't have time for anything.

Anyway, I'm really curious about this. everybody seems to have a different approach to this, some learnt from the Internet, some from books, some from teachers Etc...

Where have you guys learned Music theory and the art of composing?

I had a bit of knowledge from various places, Mainly books.

but I knew so little that you can say I didn't know anything.

without proper ear training, and only other music to inspire me and give me ideas to reinvent my music, my music began to be repetitive and uninspired. eventually I went to a Preparatory course in collage and got the basics.

What's your story?

I have learned by listening the music, then study the scores (if available) then a few things about this and that with the years, and basically that is all, not very large list of sources ...

Yes, listening to music and score studying is a great method.

I've also studied music at college, and taught myself more advance music theory :)

In highschool and a short course in musicschool I learned only the most basic things. Pianoplaying has helped me with the technical and performance side of music, but real music theory and composing I have been learning by myself since a year or 2-3. And listening to a lot of music, obviously.

high school, college, books, lessons

you know, the usual places

I am 45 so bear with the long resume:

Started piano at 7 but when I was about 5 I recall promising my Mom I'd write her a symphony while flopping my hand on the piano.

About 10 tried my hand at writing a piece, later I showed a piece to my piano teacher inspired by the D flat major Nocturne by Chopin. She reined me in severely and had me write something else. It was a very Anna Magdelena like Bach piece. But at 17 I wrote this nice Chopinesque piece based on a descending bass line. That was first good piece I ever wrote ... I am sorry I lost it.

I went to Oberlin College and took a few theory and piano courses while getting a BA in English.

From childhood to college I listened to tons of music from the Romantic, late Classical to early 20th century. In college I got into Bowie and Eno and exposed to a few music concerts at Oberlin.

Then a few years later I went to Westminster to study piano and piano pedagogy. I dropped out but that was the first [place I heard wonderful choral and organ literature. But that was the second time I wrote a good piece for piano - very Phillip Glass - with the help of my piano teacher.

There was a break for awhile where I had a few piano teachers, but things didn't get going again until 2004 when i took an organ job and began to explore Bach organ works in earnest and take private comp lessons. I began to do more score study. That was the

next major turning point. I cannot say how much the combo of score study, listening and working with performers improves your composition. You can go so far with just basic theory.

Right now plan to go to Hunter and write more and continue piano study. Organ I enjoy but Iit is too much right now to do all three at once.

I can't emphasize this enough... gather scores of your favorite works. Start a library of your favorites. Even if they are popular songs, get a song book and start learning everything you can about it.

How do you do this? There are several methods you can learn in music theory that can help. The best way I've found is to take some of those methods and make them work for you, so that eventually, you're looking at music in a way you can understand. Sure, along the way, you may want to pick up more methods for creating your own music and even invent some of your own if what you want to express cannot be expressed using the methods that exist.

Beyond that, college course work can speed this learning tremendously. You'll have a great deal of material and course work that helps you apply principles and concepts that may, at some point, apply to the music you want to create. In the end, though, with all the college material, with all the subject areas covered in music, in the end it's up to you with what you decide to do with it. You can accumulate a great deal of the information over the internet and try to apply it on your own. This can also feel like trying to find a needle in a haystack, which is why you need scores to study that will take you closer to where you want to be. You'll have to do this either way. I find that I'm more efficient at my studying of scores and producing what I hear in my mind in notation (yeah, that's my method, it's not the quickest, but I enjoy the results).

So, whatever you decide to do, there are a plethora of approaches to learning music, and the YC community itself is a great resource. Glad to have you back.

Had a lot of exposure to music through churches and my parents. I went to a top-50 university not for music. Decided to pick up a music major, enjoyed it, turned it into a separate degree. Played in a jazz-metal band for a bit in college.

About in my last year, I started to really "get" music because of reading a book called "Decline of the West" by Oswald Spengler. I connected it to another book called "Noise: The Political Economy of Music" by Jacques Attali.

I started with writing and studying very basic theory and music in middle school. Then more advance with AP theory in high school. And now Im a semester away from a BM in composition, so yeah most of my music education was given to me in school. Which is probably a good thing since prior to that I had no musical ambition and would have found my way on a path that I would have later regretted.