hey it's injure WOM just a little bit of
context for this video it is a complete
walkthrough of the basics of music
theory in half an hour also sprinkled
throughout are some exercises that you
can do that will help you internalize
these concepts because once they're in
here once they're natural to how you
operate it's like a superpower you'll be
able to come up with more ideas you'll
be able to work faster the things that
are in your head you'll just be able to
do it's magic I love music theory I'm a
huge nerd I actually made this video as
a piece of bonus content for my online
class which you can find out more about
at learn monthly calm slash Andrew I
just wanted to have this there so that
all the students would have the same
foundation before heading into the rest
of the course which is much more about
music production and songwriting and
mixing and that kind of thing but when I
finish putting this lesson together it
really felt like a great thing to just
share for free on YouTube a crash course
on music theory so I hope it's helpful
for you and if you're interested in a 20
lesson course about my whole approach to
music making more info about that at
learn monthly comm slash Andrew here's
the theory lesson so what is music
theory it's essentially the language
behind music it gives you the tools you
need to understand and interpret and
communicate about music everyone in this
class is mastered talking whatever your
home language is it's second nature to
you now you can use it without thinking
about it and it's an incredibly powerful
way to interpret the world around you
and communicate with other people relate
to them express yourself music theory
does the same thing for music it'll help
you understand how chords and notes and
rhythms and melodies all work together
and as you get good at the language
you're able to use it really effectively
without thinking about it I hear from a
lot of people that they get stuck in
this place with music theory where it
feels like it's just work and it's
really cerebral and it's all about what
key am I in and what chord is this and
what scale should I be using and I
really want to stress that there is a
place beyond that where if you use it
enough it becomes as natural and fluid
as talking I know that when you're
talking you're not thinking about do I
use past tense or present tense or like
what is the word for this very common
item that I use every day you're a
natural at it you just look at this and
your brain goes up it's a cat with
enough experience you can absolutely get
to that same level of natural automatic
use of music theory
similarly with language sometimes we
come across a word or a concept that we
don't know but we can learn it if it's
explained to us using the words and the
concepts that we already do understand
in music if I come across something
really advanced that I don't understand
it's the music theory fundamentals that
allow me to figure it out and learn it
and add it to my arsenal so we're gonna
start right at the beginning and talk
about notes what is a note well sound is
made up of vibrations and our ears and
brains are really good at interpreting
those vibrations when the vibrations are
faster we hear them as being higher and
when the vibrations are slower we hear
them as being lower if the vibrations
happen at a consistent rate then we
perceive them as having a consistent
pitch or frequency or a note so for
example if I play this guitar string
it's vibrating it's physically moving
back and forth in this case a hundred
and ten times per second and that's
quickly traveling through the air and
reaching our ears and we perceive that
as the note a now in case you aren't
aware the vast majority of popular music
is made using only twelve notes almost
all the music you've ever heard is made
up of these twelve notes and how they
relate to each other because as a
culture we've discovered that that
generally sounds better than frequencies
that don't relate together in that way
and there are actually mathematical
ratios that explain why all those
relationships sound good together but
for the purposes of this course we don't
need to get into that we've given the
notes names so it's easy to refer to
them and the names relate to the layout
of a piano keyboard so the white notes
are named a through G
[Music]
the Black Keys are named relative to the
white keys with the words sharp and flat
sharp means higher and flat means lower
so for example with this note it's above
an F so it's an F sharp but it's also
below this G so in some situations you'd
call it a G flat as you can see there
are a lot more than just twelve keys on
this keyboard but the same notes
actually repeat themselves higher and
lower that's the one mathematical ratio
that I'll get into here and it's
actually kind of fascinating but our
brains can tell when a vibration is
twice as fast as another one it sounds
like the same note if I play an A here
and an A here it's the same but one's
higher and ones lower it's crazy and by
the way this distance of going twelve
notes up or down to the next identically
named note is called an octave the
increment between each individual note
is called a semitone or a half-step and
the increment between two half steps is
called a whole step or a whole tone or a
tone so music is then built on the
relationships between these notes and
there are common combinations of notes
that we call a key not to be confused
with the word key when we're referring
to a piano key a key is sort of like a
guide of what notes will sound good
together in a piece of music and most
pieces of music use only one key if you
remember when I said most songs don't
even use all twelve notes most commonly
they would use seven and that's because
there are seven notes in major and minor
keys which are the most common keys so
let's look at an example of a key the
easiest one is C major because it uses
all the white notes
so when I play the notes out like that
that's called the C major scale and the
word scale and key are often used
interchangeably but for your knowledge a
key is more like the home base group of
notes that a song is based on and a
scale is a set of notes that you would
play in conjunction with that so a lot
of times you're playing the exact scale
that matches the key that you're in but
sometimes depending on the flavor that
you want or the genre that you're
working with you'll use a different
scale over your home key so for example
a lot of blues music is written in a
major because that's like the standard
tuning of a guitar but blues solos
typically happen with the e blues scale
or a pentatonic minor scale those scales
have some of the same notes as a major
but some that are different and that's
what imparts the bluesy flavor but let's
look at the C major scale again and the
relationships between the notes so if
we're in the key of C we call C the root
note and that's the note that we start
the scale on
notice that as we go up the scale the
notes have a spacing of whole whole half
whole whole whole half starting here you
go up two up two up one up two up two up
two and up one whole whole half whole
whole whole half that is the formula of
a major scale so if your song is in C
major you'll know that these are the
notes that you'll mostly or maybe
exclusively use because they'll sound
better than the notes that aren't in C
major
it's also common practice and really
helpful to number the notes of the scale
starting with one at the root so if C is
our 1 then D would be our 2 or the
second degree or just the second e would
be the 3 or the third degree or the
third and so on practice applying the
major scale formula to a few different
notes remember that the spacing between
the notes in the major scale is whole
whole half whole whole whole half so for
example if you picked a major you would
start on a and you would move up a whole
tone so skip one and then play the next
that's B then another whole tone
skip one play the next that's c-sharp
then just a half tone D another whole
tone skip one play the e another whole
tone skip the F play the f-sharp another
whole tone skip the G play the G sharp
and then finally another half tone to
get back up to a
also practice identifying the notes both
using the absolute letter names that go
with them as well as the numbered scale
degrees that go with each key that
you're in in a major scale each letter
name appears exactly once no matter how
many accidentals there are accidentals
meaning a sharp or a flat so to name the
notes in an a major scale we would start
on a and go up alphabetically from there
ABCD efg and of course G is the last
letter that we use in music so be
wrapped back around to an A over here
but we also have to add sharp to the
names of the Black Keys C sharp F sharp
and G sharp so it's a B C sharp d e F
sharp G sharp a so even though these
notes are C sharp F sharp and G sharp
because they're a half step above C F
and G they're also a half step below D G
and a so you could call them D flat G
flat and a flat in a major we use the
sharp names for these notes that way
each letter name appears exactly once in
the scale and it makes it easier to
remember and communicate about these
notes as opposed to if we use the flat
names and then the scale was a B B flat
D
she flat a flat egg where you have skips
between the letters and some of them
repeat twice so to name the notes in the
major scale you start at the root note
and go up alphabetically and that's how
you know whether to name the Black Keys
as sharps or flats in a couple of
special cases you might even name white
keys sharp or flat for instance if you
wrote in a sharp major your second note
a whole tone up would be this which is a
C but in a sharp major we would call it
a B sharp
because of this a lot of people prefer
to refer to this key as b-flat which
reduces the confusion of needing to use
a sharp name on a white key I know this
is a lot of information so don't worry
if it takes you a little bit to get the
hang of it but that's also exactly why
practice is important naming the scale
degrees is much easier obviously the
root note you picked is the first degree
and then you just count up for each
consecutive note in the scale so an a
major a is the first degree
B is the second C sharp is the third D
is the fourth he is the fifth f-sharp is
the sixth and G sharp is the seventh so
the next big piece of the puzzle for
working with notes and making music
sound good is chords chords are just
multiple notes played at the same time
they do most of the work of setting the
emotion in the song and guide the
listener through some kind of musical
story since chords are made up of notes
and notes are in keys chords are almost
always in the same key if you randomly
play a bunch of notes from C major
you're playing some kind of chord from C
major the most common chords contain
three notes that have a very specific
relationship to each other and we call
that the root third and fifth so in C
major I can play the root C the third of
C major E and the fifth of C major G and
that gives us a C major chord root third
fifth you can think of this as playing a
note from the scale skipping a note from
the scale playing a note from the scale
skipping a note from the scale and then
playing another note from the scale this
type of chord is also called a triad now
we can take this triad shape and move
the root so that it's any other note
from C major and we'll get another chord
from C major
[Applause]
so since this court starts on F it's an
F chord but here's where we need to get
a little fluid with our lingo because
the root of an F chord is f the third is
a and the fifth is C but we're still in
the key of C major where C is the root
and F is the fourth in relation to C and
a is the sixth in relation to see don't
worry if this is confusing right now
it's the kind of thing you get the hang
of the more you use it but it's
definitely helpful to get used to the
numbered relationships within chords as
well as how they relate to the overall
key so there are two really common chord
types in music and that's major and
minor people usually say major sounds
happy and minor sounds sad but there's
actually a very specific relationship
that makes up these chords if you take a
chord like c e g that sounds happy and
it is indeed a major chord and look at
how the notes are spaced out we start on
c we go up four three four to e and then
we go up three one two three
- G so the first two notes are four
semitones apart and the next two notes
are three semitones apart that's the
formula for a major triad for then three
major if a chord is three then four its
minor so in this case if we change the e
to an e-flat
we've got C minor so major and minor
scales actually have a really tight-knit
relationship we say that every major
scale has a relative minor scale so if
we look at C major and play that scale
[Music]
just moving that down three semitones to
an a gives us the relative minor and
playing the same notes but starting on
an a gives us the a natural minor scale
[Music]
so the relative minor always starts on
the sixth degree of the relative major
now going back to the key of c-major if
you experiment with moving your triad
shape around and you end up with the
triad that starts on B you'll notice
that's a three then three and that's a
diminished chord and it's used so much
more rarely compared to major and minor
that we're just not going to get into it
right now but it's there choose a few
different major scales and practice
making triads out of the first second
third fourth fifth and sixth degrees so
for example in a major I would start on
a skip the next note in the scale play
the next note in the scale skip the next
note in the scale and then play the next
note in the scale that makes an a major
chord the second degree chord will be B
minor so you're playing the second
degree of the a major scale skipping the
next note in the E major scale playing
the next note in the E major scale
skipping the next note and playing the
next note B D F sharp B minor and that's
how you'll go up and construct all the
main triads from a major also practice
naming each chord name both the root
note and whether the chord is major or
minor so going back to a major our first
triad sounds happy and has a as its root
which means it's a major the second
triad sounds sad and it has B as its
root making it B minor remember you can
also identify major and minor by the
spacing of the notes major is four then
three so if we start on a and go up four
one two three four we get C sharp up
three one two three we get e so a sharp
E that's an a major chord if we change
that to three then for a
one two three gets us to see one two
three four gets us back to that e so AC
e is a minor once you can identify all
the first through sixth degree triads in
a key you have an amazing starting point
for creating songs you can even just
pick three or four of those triads at
random play them in a row and bam you
have a nice sounding chord progression
[Music]
so these scale degrees the numbers that
we've been using are really handy
because they help us understand how
notes and chords function within a key
and they're also used as a shorthand for
discussing chord progressions they help
us understand how chords relate to each
other relatively rather than absolutely
so if you look at any major scale where
you see again as an example the Triads
are major minor minor major major minor
diminished we don't need to finish so
looking at the chord starting on degrees
one through six of a major scale it's
always major minor minor major major
minor there's a common shorthand where
you write these down using Roman
numerals the number indicates the degree
of the scale and capitals are used for
major chords while lowercase is used for
minor let's look at another example with
a specific chord progression one five
six four so if we're in C major it's one
C 5 G a minor is the six and F is the
four
one five six four it has a certain
emotional quality to it and we can
replicate that now in any key because we
can think one five six four in that key
so for example in G we'll go one g 5 D 6
e minor and 4 C same progression
different key now you may have noticed
that both of these chord progressions
contain both a C major and a G major
chord but in each key those chords
function totally differently in C major
C is the root and G is the fifth in G
major G is the root and C is the fourth
as you use chords more often you'll
start to get familiar with what the
degrees are in relationship to certain
keys and as you use the degrees more
you'll start to understand how the
chords function you'll know there's a
certain sound when a 2 goes to a 5 or
you'll understand the sense of yearning
that a 4 can convey by thinking about
chords and notes as scale degrees rather
than just the letter names you're able
to transcend the key that you're in and
use what you learn in all keys for
example if you only think about the
letters and you find a chord progression
you really like like let's say e f-sharp
minor a
you don't have any way to convert that
to another key but if you think about
that as 1 to 4 now you can understand
how that could be played in any key you
could do 1 to 4 and D 1 to 4 na and this
is useful not only when you're creating
music but also when you're learning from
other songs if you can understand these
scale degrees and decipher the songs
that you listen to you'll start to
notice patterns after all you only have
these first through 6 scale degrees that
almost every song is using to build
their chords on so you'll probably start
to notice I really like songs that are
around the 4 5 & 6 or I'm not really a
fan of the flavor of a 3 going to a 5 by
using this number system you really
allow so much more musical knowledge to
accumulate and compound practice
creating chord progressions based on
numbers pick a random key and random
number sequences between 1 and 6 and
practice playing those chord
progressions so for an example I'm gonna
pick a key that we haven't seen in this
lesson yet how about a flat major
the 1st through 6th degree chords are a
flat major f minor G minor a flat major
B flat major and C minor so now if we
pick random sequences of numbers between
1 and 6 we can play them as chord
progressions so how about 5 6 4 4 about
4 3 2 1
how about that example from earlier in
the lesson one five six four also
practice the ciphering keys and scale
degrees look up the chords to a song
that you like you can usually just
google song name + chords and see if you
can figure out what key it's in with our
triads we've covered the really
important chord fundamentals but I also
want to talk about inversions so that's
when you change the position of one or
more notes in the chord so that the root
is no longer the lowest so if we look at
C major c EG has c at the bottom but
what if we move it to the top EG c or
GCE
these are the same notes so it's still a
C major chord it's just inverted this is
handy because with chord progressions it
often sounds better to find inversions
that have the notes closer together
rather than what we were doing before
moving the triad shape all around so for
instance we played that one six five
four and g g d E minor C why don't we
move some of those chords around while
we make some of them into inversions so
that the notes are closer together and
maybe we can find something that's
easier to play and that sounds better so
I think I'm still gonna start with this
G triad this is called first inversion
now to move to a D next I think instead
of playing it up here with this f-sharp
an a I'm gonna move both of those down
to this octave and play this D so now
we're going from G to D this D stays the
same and the B moves to an a the G moves
to an f-sharp it's a really nice
movement from G to D in that inversion
now from the D we want to go to an E
minor and I think the most natural thing
to do would be for these notes to move
back up to G and B because those notes
are an E minor and then we'll play this
a up here
[Music]
that's probably the most natural
movement from this inversion of D to go
to an E minor so our whole progression
right now is and from this Imai nur to
go to a see it's super easy because
again a minor and C share two of the
same notes so we just need to move this
B to a C and so now our chord
progression which before sounded like
this has become this it's nicer it
sounds more natural and it'll also fit
better with other instruments as they
all occupy a bit more of a consistent
range for themselves
another thing about inversions is that
they'll subtly change the flavor of a
chord and we can emphasize this by
reinforcing the lowest notes of our
chords so for instance let's stay in G
let's play a one to four so G to C with
the added lower octave but what if I use
G in second inversion with the B at the
bottom of the G chord to move to that C
now if we reinforce that with the lower
notes
[Music]
I've always really loved that flavor of
a one moving to a four but having the
third of the one in the base
[Music]
try making a few different chord
progressions and this time use
inversions so that they're a little
closer together and not just the same
shape moving up and down the keyboard
[Music]
you now have the knowledge necessary to
pick a key by picking a root and out and
finding the other notes in that key
using the formula for the major scale
you're able to make chords out of those
notes and you're also able to call those
chords by they're numbered names and
make chord progressions the next step is
to look at melodies which are single
sequences of notes played with the
chords usually above them this is
usually the thing that you would sing
along to in a song but even in
instrumental music there's usually some
kind of lead melodic part that's the
most interesting and the thing that's
the most memorable for people to create
a melody you already have all the raw
ingredients you can just start stringing
together notes that are in the key that
you're in overtop of a chord progression
but there is a really interesting
interplay between what notes you're
playing over which chords a lot of it
has to do with tension versus stability
and whether the note in your melody is a
note that's in the chord that's
currently playing melodies that only use
notes that match the chords are usually
pretty bland
and it tends to be more interesting to
use some notes that are outside the
chord typically these are passing notes
so notes that are in between two notes
that are in the chord
you
you can even have a melody where none of
the notes are part of the chords that
they're played with
[Applause]
but that's pretty uncommon and typically
you are playing with this tension and
release of involving melody notes that
are part of the chord and not part of
the chord as one little tip often you
would end on a note that's within the
chord rather than ending on a note
that's not in the chord
another little shortcut to melodies that
mostly sound good is if you use the
major pentatonic scale so if we look at
C major and we remove the fourth and
seventh degrees so that's F and B then
we just have this and if you play
melodies with those notes over chords
from C major typically it'll sound
pretty good
that's because overall those notes are
the most stable over most of the chords
pick a key and create a chord
progression in that key then record that
into your music software once you have
that try to play some melodies over it
thinking about what notes are in the
court that's currently playing and maybe
some that aren't but that can resolve
two notes that are in the chord also try
removing the fourth and seventh degrees
from your major scale to make a major
pentatonic scale and then try playing
melodies using that scale you might find
that it's even easier to get something
sounding good for a quick example of
finding a major pentatonic scale why
don't we look at the key of F the notes
there are F G a B flat C D E so if we
number those it's one two three four
five six seven B flat is the four e is
the seven we'll take that out of our
scale leaving us with F
a CD that is the F major pentatonic
scale
[Music]
the last component of theory
fundamentals is rhythm and how to count
it how do you tell when things are
played whether that's chords or melodies
or drum beats that's based on the
musical counting system music is divided
into equal sized portions called bars or
measures and typically in western music
you'll have 4 beats to a measure which
we count 1 2 3 4 so if one note is the
length of a bar we'd call it a whole
note if it's 2 beats which is half of
the bar we call it a half note and then
each of those 4 notes that we were
counting as beats in the bar are
quarters of the bar those are quarter
notes so you can have sounds instruments
whatever playing on these beats or
anywhere in between them and if
something is on the beat then we would
say it's on the 1 for example but if
it's in between these beats then we need
to do what's called subdividing which is
like increasing the resolution of our
counting if we subdivide beats in half
we count it as one and two and three and
four and and those ends are exactly
halfway in between each of those beats
so now that resolution is eighth notes
we can subdivide further again getting
exactly halfway in between our main
beats and our ands so that would be 1 e
and a 2 e and a 3 E and a 4 E and a so
that puts us at 16th notes and even
though you can keep on subdividing
forever the main parts of songs are
usually not played any faster than
sixteenth notes and this really is a
pretty universal system in western music
if you're talking to anybody who's had
some music education and you say
something is on the TUI they'll probably
know what you're talking about
so getting used to using this counting
system will allow you to play music
better because you'll be able to better
feel where you are within the beats
it'll also allow you to interpret and
decipher and remember different kinds of
rhythmic material because it gives you a
structure for those rhythms to live in
so let's say you're out and about and
you get an idea or you hear something
that you want to try but you can't
actually make it right then you can make
a quick note of it using this kind of
rhythmic note
let's say we had a bead idea that was
like we could jot that down into this
number system I've made this one a
little pretty for the video but you can
do this really quickly freehand I do
that all the time so I've got kick snare
and a hat here and then a grid of
sixteen spaces lining up with our
one-e-and-a two-e-and-a three-e-and-a
four-e-and-a bats well I know that the
snare is on the end of one and the four
I know there's a kick on one so it's
gonna do two and three and then the high
hats are 1e and a 2e I think it's on the
2e that's yeah yeah that's our bead idea
and the first few times you do this you
might have to really slow it down and be
counting along really deliberately and
finding those beats and where they line
up to what you want to do but as you do
this more and more you'll get way better
at it you'll get way faster at it you'll
just know what it feels like to be on
certain beats and you'll know how to
make note of your ideas or again this
grid is just like your dog you'll know
how to input those beats into your dog
really quickly for practice take a song
that you like and select an element like
one line of melody or a drum beat and
see if you can write out its rhythm
using this basic sixteenth note notation
[Music]
[Music]
all right I know that's a lot to take in
definitely try to make some time for
those practice exercises and of course
come back to this video as much as you
want to use it as reference if you're
interested in videos like this but about
writing and producing and recording and
mixing and mastering I have a very
comprehensive interactive online class
that runs a few times a year
again you can learn more about that at
learn monthly calm slash andrew music
theory is the best I'll see you in the
next video