Music Theory vs Chord VST

[jancivil]

I thought the Babbage thing MIGHT be a joke but sometimes things are too dry for me

I recall it ever so vaguely from long ago. Looking it up (I'm not much at that level of maths, so)... it was never built

[Forgotten]

My take on this is that I like composition software that lets me set a lot of parameters, including 'random-ness'.

I generally find that some of this;



And this;



will give all the random results one ever requires.

Apparently plays itself too, as I have used this combination and have no recollection of playing at 4am, yet the neighbors tell me they could hear very loud guitar at that time.

[sfd]

I've never used any of those chord VSTs. I don't really know what they do. But to me it sounds like as if somebody else is going to drive my car.

Music theory isn't so difficult really. You don't need to learn notation to understand it.

If one is really interested in making music it seems a bit odd to me if one don't bother learning music theory.

And songwriting doesn't need to be complex at all.

Here's a song I wrote. As you can hear it's very simple. Yet still based on basic music theory. Maybe not a killer hit. but there's that satisfaction of being able to say it's entirely your own piece

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBdP1liw_uY

[Forgotten]

There are also plenty of successful musicians who have never learned a lick of music theory - they just learned how to make good sounds from their instruments and took it from there.

Not knowing music theory is neither an impediment to learning a musical instrument or composing music.

[jancivil]

If you learned how a 12-bar blues worked and realized one day that it's the same distance between chords in all keys, you've learning music theory.
If you noticed your little addition or change to it by trial and error, fugging around was something you could extrapolate elsewhere as a consistent procedure you're doing music theory.
It's not book larnin', but it's doing exactly the same job.

People are different. I was a pretty decent guitar player before I formally did anything but there were things I wanted to know in order to grow.
You can be blessed with a better natural ear for pitch than I was.

[datroof]

My take on this is that I like composition software that lets me set a lot of parameters, including 'random-ness'.

I generally find that some of this;



And this;



will give all the random results one ever requires.

I think I know what you're saying. I'm pretty sure.

[datroof]

https://soundcloud.com/datroof/escape-f ... ger-island

pitch bend

Would life be worth living without it?

[jancivil]

that's one of them rhetorical questions, isn't it

[Forgotten]

There's probably a VST that can answer that question....

[sfd]

Learning the basics of music theory shouldn't take more time then learning how to use one of those chord VSTs.

So I don't quite understand this whole discussion. Are there benefits of not learning music theory ?

[Distorted Horizon]

Playing with chord tools can teach you new things from theory

[Forgotten]

Playing with chord tools can teach you new things from theory

Or it could become a crutch that means you never try to learn theory or how to compose your own music...

[datroof]

Playing with chord tools can teach you new things from theory

Or it could become a crutch that means you never try to learn theory or how to compose your own music...

IMO, if someone is content with that, then that's ok. If they want to go beyond that, there's plenty of learning materials and advice available. It's up to the individual to bring the motivation, discipline, effort, creativity, etc.

(I believe Jan has said basically the same earlier in the thread).

[Forgotten]

Playing with chord tools can teach you new things from theory

Or it could become a crutch that means you never try to learn theory or how to compose your own music...

IMO, if someone is content with that, then that's ok. If they want to go beyond that, there's plenty of learning materials and advice available. It's up to the individual to bring the motivation, discipline, effort, creativity, etc.

(I believe Jan has said basically the same earlier in the thread).

I agree - I don't think anyone has argued that a chord VST can't be a stepping stone to learning composition, but there has certainly been more than one person (not just in this thread) who has clearly stated that they use it in place of writing their own compositions and/or learning any theory.

[Gamma-UT]

Playing with chord tools can teach you new things from theory

Or it could become a crutch that means you never try to learn theory or how to compose your own music...

That's not a given. The advantage of something like a chord tool is that it can direct you away from the kinds of chords you would normally play from muscle memory when trying to get some initial inspiration. Having said that, I've found them to be only marginally more useful than a deck of cards with chord names on them because I just find it easier to improv around a single seed or maybe two chords than try to fiddle around with the software once I've got started.

The chord generators also IME tend to lacking in the voicing department - how do different voicings sound with a given progression? However, I haven't used all that many so it's possible that I've missed this function in what's on the market today.