Customer Reviews

The Musician's Guide to Theory and Analysis

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I bought this book after thoroughly researching music theory book possibilities here. I have been studying music theory in a class with the Benward book, but I did not do well as I wanted on a placement test for university transfer, and I do not easily understand Benward. When this book arrived, it did not take me long to know this is just what I am looking for to review music theory on my own. I opened to figured bass and there were easy to understand verbal and musical explanations right there that took a year for me to understand in theory class. Wish I had this book last year, I would have understood the key concepts in a day. I like also that there are many exercises I can do to test my knowledge, and answers are in the back. Verbal explanations are clear, in a friendly, conversational style, there are many musical examples, key concepts are clearly indicated in blue, and each chapter has an outline right at the beginning indicating what is to be covered. This book is very well organized, there's an appendix of key definitions in the back, and it is easy to locate topics by accessing the index and the table of contents. Nothing dry about this book. The authors make reference to examples in the accompanying anthology and CD set. I do not have this, as I have access to many of these examples at another site, but I might also buy this for convenience. I also bought the workbook, but, with the opportunity to do assignments and have answers in the back of the book, I don't think I really needed the workbook. The layout is very pleasing, popular as well as classical music is referenced for examples, although this is more about classical musical theory, and the authors have done an exemplary job.

The book is fairly comprehensive, but it is rife with mistakes, both in the literature and the workbook. The authors also make use of non-standard terms frequently. You can certainly learn a great deal from the book, but it's not without obvious drawbacks.

The Rutger's University faculty recently tested the book over a two year period and have discontinued its use due to student feedback and teacher opinion.

I was fortunate enough to attend a workshop on this and other textbooks last summer with Dr. Clendenning. Although it is not perfect, it is still basically a good book. The things that are attractive to me are the variety and number of musical examples- many pieces with which my students are already familiar, and lots of practice opportunities in the workbook.

Being a high school AP Music Theory teacher, I need material at the level of my students. It is a good book for us. As someone with a Master's degree in music, I would prefer something a little more in-depth. This book is not aimed at PhD's, and I am amused that some people find it so offensive. To me, giving something the lowest possible rating means that it is utterly useless. That is an unfair statement. It is a good book- effective for teaching HS students. In my opinion, it is not a phenomenal book, but you can do much worse, for certain.

This is one of the best beginning music theory textbooks I have used. The writing follows a logical progression in the presentation and development of subjects. The expositions of the subjects are understandable and concise. There are ample examples and exercises. The authors obviously understand their field and definitely know best how to present it.

This is a WIERD theory book. It has some standard theory in it, but the authors apparently think that it's "cool" to invent terminology for things that already have names in standard theory. For instance, is there some reason that borrowed chords have to be re-named "mixture chords?" Or that the appoggiatura should now be called an "incomplete neighbor tone?" In fact, I looked in vain in the book's index for "nonharmonic tones," a term which I have every right to expect to find in an 800-page music theory book. Ha-ha! The joke's on me!--the authors had decided on using the term "embellishing tones." Also, they insist on using unnecessarily obscure terms. For instance, very few authors nowadays use the octave-numbering system in which Middle C is c4. The more common approach is to refer to it as c1, using the small and great designations for the octaves below. And Clendinning and Marvin use arabic numerals with ^ over them to refer to scale degrees in a melody--no doubt it's an affectatious borrowing from Schenker, but it looks odd to an un-initiated student. The use of the letters T, D, S, and Ts or Ds obviously comes from Riemann, but it's far from standard theory usage. Or, again, what is "metric heirarchy?" It must be something pretty fundamental, because I found it in Chapter Two.

The order of the book is somewhat scrambled, something that puzzles me. For instance, the authors introduce species counterpoint before they get to four-part harmony. And I've never seen a theory book that introduces double and triple counterpoint before getting around to the Neapolitan sixth chord. And the chapters at the end about the tone-row and combinatorial matrices seem awfully specialized for the average theory student. Are the authors just showing off what they know about tone-row combinations? Is that why, in Chapter 1, they start using the term "pitch-class?"

Periodically, there are inserts labelled "Did You Know?" that I, as a theory professor, found interesting, although few of them would have interested a lot of my students. Some of them have to do with the history of music theory, in which I am very interested. Some of them are just historical stuff, such as that "My Country 'Tis of Thee" is also sung in England as "God Save the Queen (or King)," or that Wagner invented the leitmotif. In fact, these little trivia sections were a nice feature of the book. They were certainly a pleasant relief from the job of wading though the authors' unnecessarily complex terminology. Gottfried Weber once said that the theorist's job is "to bring the greatest possible number of species . . .under the smallest possible number of principal classes." [Versuch einer geordneten Theorie der Tonzetskunst]. Clendening and Marvin do not do this at all, and the inevitable result will be confused theory students.

I read that the Theory Department at Rutgers recently dumped this book. I don't blame them.

I expedited my shipment and got it within two days. So, I don't know how fast their normal shipping speeds are. The book came wrapped in plastic and far cheaper than my bookstore.

I'm a college music student, and we're using this book in my first year theory classes. It is pretty in-depth and explains the material well. It has key points summaries throughout the chapter, which shortens the time one needs to take notes =P

Product arrived in great time and in great condition. Definitely an A+ seller!