Music Theory For Dummies | 
 enlarge | Authors: Michael Pilhofer, Holly Day
Publisher: For Dummies
Category: Book
List Price: $24.99
Buy New: $13.58
You Save: $11.41 (46%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  12 reviews
Sales Rank: 9789
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 360
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 9.2 x 7.4 x 0.9
ISBN: 0764578383
Dewey Decimal Number: 781
EAN: 9780764578380
ASIN: 0764578383
Publication Date: April 2, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand New, Perfect Condition, Please allow 4-14 business days for delivery. 100% Money Back Guarantee, Over 1,000,000 customers served.
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Many people grimace at the sound of music theory. It can conjure up bad memories of grade school music classes, rattle the brains of college students, and make self-taught musicians feel self-defeated. Music Theory may seem tedious and unnecessary, especially since not many people can read music. Luckily, Music Theory for Dummies shows you the fun and easy way to understanding the concepts needed to compose, deconstruct, and comprehend music. This helpful guide will give you a great grasp of: - Note value and counting notes
- Treble and bass clefs
- Time signatures and measures
- Naturalizing the rhythm
- Tempo and dynamic
- Tone, color, and harmonics
- Half steps and whole steps
- Harmonic and melodic intervals
- Key signatures and circles of fifths
- Scales, chords, and their progressions
- Elements of form
- Music theory’s fascinating history
This friendly guide not only explores these concepts, it provides examples of music to compliment them so you can hear how they sound firsthand. With a bonus CD that demonstrates these ideas with musical excerpts on guitar and piano, this hands-on resource will prove to you that music theory is as enjoyable as it is useful. Don’t get discouraged by the seemingly complicated written structure. With Music Theory for Dummies, understanding music has never been easier! Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 7 more reviews...
 Music Theory For Dummies March 27, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
It was easy read, and it gets to the meat of what is necessary to learn about music theory.
A good introduction and a solid foundation February 25, 2008
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
Being an obsessive music listener, music theory is something I have always thought I should know more about, but it's a subject I have never seriously approached before reading this book. The author does a good job of gently leading you through the door, and also introduces more challenging ideas in a readable style. The chapters on building chords and chord progressions gave a nice glimpse into the construction of even quite complex music, something that had previously seemed impenetrable. The examples used were well chosen, and were written without any condescension. As a way to ground the more abstract ideas, I especially appreciated the commentary by modern composers and musicians. Recommended for anyone wanting a good introduction and a solid foundation from which to build.
 Patchy discussion of music theory November 30, 2007
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
The first few chapters of this book -- on notes, scales, rests, etc. -- are done well -- though it would be hard to do them poorly, since they are such basic topics. Once the book gets to intervals, chords and beyond, it all falls apart. The text is confusing and incomplete. I took a year of music theory, and play classical guitar. I bought this book as a review of music theory, but it is unsatisfactory even in that role. The later chapters serve to confuse, not illuminate, the topic.
I finally put 2 and 2 together thanks to this book November 23, 2007
9 out of 9 found this review helpful
I'm 48, and I've been playing guitar, bass, keyboards and a lot of other instruments since I was 12. Two of them well, all of them by ear. I didn't have a clue what to call anything I did, aside from knowing when I was playing a major, a minor, a 7th or a 9th. But only because better players told me so. Having found some success in other areas with other books in the Dummies franchise, I took a shot at this one.
Turns out I was doing a lot of things right all these years and even being fairly close to correct in the way I described them to my guitar students. Yes, a guy who needs a Dummies book for music teaches kids to play. The nerve, right? Well, I feel a lot better about it now. I'm able to give my students some theory with their Green Day, and using the same matter-of-fact way of describing and discussing it as I found in the book, it gets across quite nicely. I'd bought a different book on music theory that was supposed to be very simple. In fact, it seemed extremely short and unintimidating... at first. Shortest book I ever failed to complete. THIS book, on the other hand, clocks in at 330-some pages and it never bogs down. They stay with a topic instead of flying past it without making sure you are ready to move on. In my opinion, that's the most important quality a Dummies book should have: a flat-out refusal to leave any reader in the dust. I appreciate that. Now if the same authors will just do a MIDI For Dummies book, aaaaand maybe books for Studio-In-A-Box 24Track Digital Recording, Signal Processing, Microphone Techniques, Child Rearing and a few other topics I need help with, life will be complete.
More than a Dummies Guide November 18, 2007
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
While I have been a musician for most of my life, I don't know much about music theory (including sight reading). It would be difficult for me to pick my favorite chapter in this book, since I learned something new about music theory in every chapter, but Chapter 10 (Intervals) was probably the biggest bang for the buck in my mind. The later chapters that described the use of the intervals were reinforcement, but the explaination of the qualities of major, minor, diminished, and augmented intervals was a breakthrough for me. Chapter 13 (Building Chords) was almost as valuable to me, since it built on the same concepts.
This is a textbook that I will be referring to for years. I strongly recommend it to anyone who is struggling with music theory.
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