We all have those awkward moments when accompanying a group or soloist where a page turn goes horribly wrong. I don’t know about you but I always take a moment before starting a song to bend all lower right page corners, but things still happen. Pages stick together, fall off the piano or any number […]
Tag Archives: theory
Over on Facebook, I am running a daily quiz where I ask a theory question and pick a winner at random each day. I am doing it to promote my Music School and every winner gets a free non-live class in starting in August.
Everyone is posting and sharing a video spoof on The Christmas Song right now. The lyrics have been changed to give some bit of insight into the theory behind the song.
I saw on Facebook this week where James Koerts posted the following: “Parallel 5ths” get a bad rap. I have to agree. In fact, I had to laugh because I just posted an arrangement last week that blatantly ignores the prohibition on parallel 5ths. Here is the ending. The prohibition on parallel 5ths is most […]
Four is an important number in modern music. Here is why.
My response to an article that was sent to me recently.
I often talk about how one of the highest goals of your music should be beauty. On the other hand, I spend a lot of time talking about harmony that is in itself, very dissonant. If this seems a bit inconsistent to you, I can understand. Today, I want to talk about dissonance and why […]
Because it is Christmas and no one is working on music anyway, I want to take a week off from anything too heavy and just give you some thoughts about how to practically learn music. This is a controversial subject and I am hardly an expert, but here is the way I see it. Imagine […]
If you are reading this lesson before reading my first lesson on playing lead sheets, please take the time to read it here before continuing. To review the last lesson, I explained why I think there is value in knowing how to read lead sheets, and gave you four steps to get started. Here they […]
Today, I am going to teach you how to play from a lead sheet. If you do not know what I am talking about, a lead sheet is music notation that includes the melody line, the lyrics, and chord symbols. At the present time, you do not see many lead sheets in church music. They […]
How many different chords do you have to know? Probably not as many as you think. Below are examples of the chords I will regularly talk about. By the way, you will not see simple triads here because they are rarely used. You are going to learn that we are almost always going to add […]