[Smt-talk] Keyboards for theory classes?

[Jonathan Santore]

Stephen's comment about "terrain" reminded me of the most difficult pedagogical challenge I ever faced -- when I was in grad school, I was asked to help a "native" harpist -- one whose only contact with music performance had been on a chromatic pedal harp -- with basic theory concepts. This student had no concept of, for example, Db-F# being a "larger" third than D-F -- for this student, accidentals were merely markers for setting pedals correctly, rather than having any effect on the distance between notes. 

I don't think that using a keyboard is a sign that we're trying to turn all musicians into keyboardists -- it's a fast, relatively compact way to foster an association between distances in frequency and physical distances, one which happens more effectively in some non-keyboard performance situations than in others. 

Jonathan Santore 
Plymouth State University (NH) 

----- Original Message -----

> It is all about terrain. Depending on what instrument you play, your
> understanding of harmony comes from the field in which you play. Guitarists
> have a terrain that involves six strings tuned in a strangely wonderful way,
> bass players have four strings tuned in fourths, trumpet players go up and
> down on three pistons, and piano players have that field of blacks and
> whites. Jazz and rock drummers play no pitches and travel through a time
> continuum bathed in harmony coming from the nearby amps.

> Many guitarists have difficulty converting from tablature to piano notation.
> A few of them succeed and become college professors of Schenkerian analysis
> or post-tonal note counting for reasons no one can explain!

> Dr. Stephen Jablonsky, Ph.D.
> Music Department Chair
> The City College of New York
> Shepard Hall Room 72
> New York NY 10031
> (212) 650-7663
> music at ccny.cuny.edu

> America's Greatest Chair
> in the low-priced field

> On May 5, 2014, at 11:06 PM, Zachary Cairns < zacharycairns at gmail.com >
> wrote:

> > > Guitarists are just ahead of drummers in their inability to comfortably
> > > deal with the challenges of traditional music theory. There is no way
> > > around it—you have to have keyboard chops
> 

> > I understand that this is tongue-in-cheek, but as a former teenage
> > percussionist/metal-guitarist-wannabe, I can say from experience that there
> > *is* a way around it. I recall class after class of my undergrad theory
> > experience thinking, "Oh, *that's* what Yngwie/Vai/Satriani was doing..."
> 

> > Best,
> 
> > Zac
> 

> > _______________________________
> 
> > Zachary Cairns, Ph.D.
> 
> > Assistant Professor of Music Theory
> 
> > Associate Music Department Chair
> 
> > University of Missouri - St. Louis
> 
> > cairnsz at umsl.edu
> 

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