Music Theory Bridges blog posts

Timothy Chenette

I'd like to share a few recent posts from my blog dedicated to putting pop/rock/jazz and "traditional" repertoires/concepts side by side. (Traditional, that is, from the perspective of conservatory training.) I'm not sure how successful I am in this, but I intend for the blog to be accessible and interesting to both music theorists and a broader music-educated public, so I do try to keep posts short and readable even if it means sacrificing some scholarly rigor. I sometimes direct my students to these posts to encourage them to see a broader view on some of the concepts we're studying, and I try to tag posts with the kind of class I feel they're relevant to (e.g., "chromatic harmony," "diatonic harmony," "form," etc.). I hope some of you find these interesting, and please feel free to leave comments.

One last thing--I would love to feature guest posts (Scott Murphy wrote a nice one in January 2015). If anyone is interested, feel free to run your idea by me. Thanks!

Sonata form transition vs. verse-chorus pre-chorus

The dominant's fall from dominance

Parts Upon a Ground

Singers, written music, and syncopation

Rich Pellegrin

Thanks Tim!  Check out the recent special issue of Engaging Students: Essays in Music Pedagogy, "Engaging Students through Jazz."  The articles are written in "blessay" (blog/essay) format (as you of course know from your contribution to volume 2), are fairly accessible, and specifically aim to explore similarities and differences between the classical and jazz idioms.  

http://flipcamp.org/engagingstudents4/index.html

Rich Pellegrin

University of Missouri

Timothy Chenette

Thanks, Rich! I actually have an essay in this volume of ES too, but I haven't yet had the chance to read most of the other contributions. I'll definitely need to find time!