The reason for Hitchhiker’s Guide to Music Theory is to help young musicians and listeners.  By young I mean anyone under 99.  I have always tried to teach the fundamentals of music theory exactly the same way for everyone and anyone who is interested. 

This Guide will help you become a better composer.  Or, if you are not a “composerly” type of person (yet), it will help you become a better singer, instrumentalist, and listener. 

It will help you identify the plethora of sonorities and components in all music, guided by the four parameters: Pitch, Rhythm, Dynamics, and Timbre. 

You will learn all of the symbols involved with staff notation, and you will notate your own melodies, harmonies, and complete musical thoughts.

By composing your own Étude in each chapter, you will gain knowledge of the keyboard, your own singing voice, and any instrument or sample you want to use for the orchestration of your music.  It is obvious that my approach involves learning by doing.

Furthermore, all of the Études are meant to be repeated as many times as the student finds it useful. 

We will also consider musical structure and how to describe musical form.  We will talk about how any piece of music can be described in terms of the four parameters (Pitch, Rhythm, Dynamics, Timbre).  Any piece of music can be conceptualized as a proportional division of time.  Repetition schemes are heard.  Dramatic or subtle changes in the musical texture are heard and felt.  This is music theory: the understanding of individual components of the music, and how they all relate to each other.  How does the music unfold in time?

By considering these things we will also listen to many great excerpts from composers ranging from the Renaissance to our current day.  We will focus on the influence of Common Practice Period Tonal Harmony on music of the past and contemporary music. 

It is my opinion that all composers are music theorists and all music theorists are composers.  I have felt that way since I first tried to write four-part harmony.

Thank you for joining in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to Music Theory!

Jeffrey Kowalkowski, composer/music theorist

Contributors

Carrie Biolo is a percussionist, improviser, and educator who lives in Northern Michigan.

Amnon Wolman is a composer, improviser, and professor who lives in Israel.

Herbert Brün was a composer and educator who lived in Illinois after emigrating from Berlin.

Alan Stout was a composer and educator who lived in Chicago.

Victoria Gabrielsen and Ana Marquin are Violists in Chicago, working with El Sistema.

Cliff Colnot is a conductor, composer, arranger, producer, and educator in Chicago.

Frederic Rzewski is a pianist, composer, and professor who lives in Brussels.

Kurt Westerberg is a composer and educator who lives in Chicago.