Drip Bayless
Superstar
Tryna learn music theory/piano for the next year. What's the best way to go about it? I was thinking just watch YouTube vids, but some people say you should get a private tutor or take a college class.
Best way to learn music theory?
- Thread starter Drip Bayless
- Start date
Yeah, Private tutors and classes are the best choices but, there's some other alternatives like coping a book with all the major and minor scales listed and the chords that accompany them. That's what I did, just got a book with scales and chords listed in them...
Drip Bayless
Superstar
I feel you its just gon be difficult to make time for it. I prefer learning on my own schedule and shyt nahmean. How did you learn to find the key of a sample, and build a background melody or baseline around it? Same book?
Nothing special....I just listen to the sample at whatever pitch I decided to set it to and what I do is, I bring up a piano plugin (make sure it is set on a high octave) and start hitting notes to determine which ones fit into the key of the sample.
Like what this guy does at the 1:37 mark,
When you find out what keys actually go with the sample, it becomes fairly easy to come up with melodies on top of them. For instance, when you play the piano over the sample, you may notice that the only keys that fit into the sample's key are all of the Black notes, and none of the White notes.....Other times you may notice the key is all of the White notes, but, none of the Black notes and you will notice it's often a combination of both, these are the scales.... You have to use your ears to figure this out. You can then play a melody on top of the sample based on those groups of notes....If you change the pitch of the sample, the notes that go with it will ALSO CHANGE.
Anyways, I typically freestyle play most of my melodies until I come up with something nice.
To find the technical names of scales and build chords based on the notes you came up with for the sample....Use this site.
Musical Scale Finder Tool
Plug in the notes that you've determined....For instance, if you find that the sample has a key that is all Black notes...You plug all of those Black notes in the note boxes. (#/b symbols)
And then you come up with a scale based on those notes....
Make sure you pick up a scale that has ONLY those notes......
For instance.....These scales do not work....Why? Because they contain notes not in the group of notes you originally came up with. Like notes F and C in the first scale and notes B and F in the second scale.
These are PROPER scales for the group of notes you came up with....Why? Because they only contain the notes you've come up with.
From there you research that scale accordingly and find online "Gb major pentatonic scale chords" for example.
Cryptocurrency Scarface
Coinbased
Music was the one class I used to act a fool in
I regret it now
Music theory knowledge would have been
I regret it now Music theory knowledge would have been
phantom 4 lyfe
Banned
what do you need to learn?
ill teach you. i got the time.
i can write out anything you need me to
ill teach you. i got the time.
i can write out anything you need me to
Naw you don't need a tutor unless you want to actually play piano. You will need guidance so i'll give you some topics I found that were relevant.
Scale (Mostly Major Scale), Consonance and Dissonance, Chords, Voicing (Open and Closed), Ear training.
phantom 4 lyfe
Banned
Major scales are :
C major CDEFGABC (all white keys)
D major DEF#GABC#D
E major: EF#G#ABC#D#E
F major: FGABbCDEF
G major: GABCDEF#E
A major: ABC#DEF#G#A
B major: BC#D#EF#G#A#B
the scales work in what we call a CIRCLE OF FIFTHS:
so, if you start at C on the piano and count 5 notes you will hit G (cdefg).... C has no sharps (#) while G has ONE.
5 up from G and you hit D, which has TWO sharps....
5 up from D and you hit A, THREE sharps.
A - E , FOUR
E - B, FIVE
B - F, a FLAT (another lesson)
F-C..... bakk at the beginning
the sharps are F C G D A E B in that order.....
a good way to memorize it is;
FRANK
CANT
GO
DOWN
AND
EAT
BUSH.......
them the sharps in order on a key signature
now the scale of F MAJOR is different, it has a flat pattern which is another lesson but you all should try playing them major scale and practice.
then i can go over the minor scales
C major CDEFGABC (all white keys)
D major DEF#GABC#D
E major: EF#G#ABC#D#E
F major: FGABbCDEF
G major: GABCDEF#E
A major: ABC#DEF#G#A
B major: BC#D#EF#G#A#B
the scales work in what we call a CIRCLE OF FIFTHS:
so, if you start at C on the piano and count 5 notes you will hit G (cdefg).... C has no sharps (#) while G has ONE.
5 up from G and you hit D, which has TWO sharps....
5 up from D and you hit A, THREE sharps.
A - E , FOUR
E - B, FIVE
B - F, a FLAT (another lesson)
F-C..... bakk at the beginning
the sharps are F C G D A E B in that order.....
a good way to memorize it is;
FRANK
CANT
GO
DOWN
AND
EAT
BUSH.......
them the sharps in order on a key signature
now the scale of F MAJOR is different, it has a flat pattern which is another lesson but you all should try playing them major scale and practice.
then i can go over the minor scales
phantom 4 lyfe
Banned
Major scales can turn into sharped major scales too.
like C# major, D# major, blah blah.....
but then you got double sharps in that bytch, and its confusing,
start with the SIMPLE MAJOR SCALES.
PLAY THEM.
like C# major, D# major, blah blah.....
but then you got double sharps in that bytch, and its confusing,
start with the SIMPLE MAJOR SCALES.
PLAY THEM.
Get a tent of people to do it for you. 
Drip Bayless
Superstar
I want to make a sub bassline for a song I sampled but my ear isn't trained to tell what key the sample is in.
phantom 4 lyfe
Banned
is it a popular song or a classical piece? most songs you can find out the key nowadays because sheet music exists.
just depends on the song you want to sample.
Drip Bayless
Superstar
It's a song from a soundtrack of an old cartoon, so neither
phantom 4 lyfe
Banned
well, your best bet is to have that sound playing while you find one key on the piano that agrees wit it (matches)
use that one note as percussion and see if it sounds good as the sound is playing (matches)
then tell me that note you used.
ill tell you the key to play to see if it matches with the other notes