By Phoebe C
What is music theory? Music theory is a practice musicians use to understand and communicate the language of music. It examines the fundamentals of music and provides a system to interpret music compositions. Frequently, music theory describes how composers make music. Music theory is the more technical side of music. It talks about melody, rhythm, dynamics, pitch, tuning, consonance, and more. Now, why is it important to learn music theory? There are several reasons why it is important, but the ones I will be talking about today are the following: boosts music performance, helps musicians understand the structure of music, master pieces faster, and helps sight-read music better.
One important reason to learn music theory is, it boosts musicians’ performances. Music theory allows us to recognize chords and phrases, which helps us read music easier. In music, groups of notes form chords, and those groups of chords form phrases. Music theory also helps make sure a musician understands the structure of their piece before performing. When performing, musicians usually play their piece memorized. Music theory talks about motor memory and harmonic memory. Motor memory, also known as tactile memory, is one of the most unreliable forms of music memory. In motor memory, your fingers know where to go based on where they’ve been on the fingerboard, and one mistake can completely derail the performance. Harmonic memory allows musicians to store large sections of music and thousands of notes in their memory under just a few common chord progressions.
Another reason why it is important to learn music theory is because it helps musicians learn pieces faster. Having a clear understanding of how the piece a musician playing is constructed, helps them learn it faster. In comparison, it’s like knowing a city very well, helps the driver drive more efficiently. In music theory, a musician learns about the Sonata Form. Knowing this form can help with memorization and speeding up the learning process of the piece. The Sonata Form is a musical structure consisting of three main sections in the first movement: an exposition, a development, and a recapitulation. Understanding the Sonata Form can save a musician much time from interpreting how the composition is constructed. Knowing the theme, the repetition of the themes, and the variations in the first movement of the sonata, will help speed up the process of learning the piece.
The last reason that we will be talking about as to why learning music theory is important is that it helps a musician sight-read better. With the knowledge a musician will obtain by learning music theory, they can understand common note/chord progressions and the structure of the piece they are playing. This can help them predict what the next few measures of the piece will sound like. Not to mention, developing a good grasp on intervals will assist in recognizing them on sight. With this information, a musician can sight read faster, and can classify larger patterns in the notes, rather than reading each note one by one.
