A directory of books, resources and courses to study everything about music and sound
This is version 2. Version 1 was a single-page with all screenshots that may load slowly
- Go through Ableton's guide
- Explore Hooktheory's TheoryTab
- Return here and explore futher
Music languages can be divided into a number of families. Historically, the most dominant and influencial one is Western family of languages. Its languages share some common traits:
- 12-tone temperament
- major/minor keys
- homophony
- chords in thirds
- any of the 12 notes can be a tonic
The languages are (roughly speaking):
- Rock - probably worth exploring the first, as it's the simplest and pretty popular. It makes sense to start here and expand into other Western languages later on - as they share a lot of concepts. By the way, pop music (structure-wise) it a super-genre combining bits of rock, jazz and other stuff
- Classical - the biggest chapter here, as it's the main focus of all research and teaching (despite its unpopularity according to streaming stats)
- Jazz
- Barbershop
- Movies
- Video games
- Bach chorales
- Other genres like R&B, country, dance electronic, gospel
- Western regional traditions (eg. Latin)
Non-Western music languages are different families. As they were developed all over the globe, they don't share many common features.
The families are (roughly speaking):
- Maqam languages
- Southeast Asian percussive languages
- Balkan languages
- many other traditions
Broad overview on non-Western languages
- Composition
- Listening guides
- Ear training
- Orchestration
- Maps of genres
- Visualizations
- Research
- YouTube channels and podcasts
- Sociology of music
- Alternative notations
- Piano
- LLMs for music theory
- Sound design
- Digital composition
- Mixing
- Microtonal experiments
- Notable instruments
- Institute of Sonology: One-Year Course
Real-time feed of new resources
Do you know how to enroll in a music theory program after a computer science BSc (without a completed formal music degree)? Please, let me know: cxielamiko@gmail.com, t.me/vitalypavlenko (asking for myself)