Björk did the music theory world a huge favor by writing a pop hit entirely in Locrian mode, since it’s really hard to find a good real-world example of it otherwise. You don’t see too many melodies written entirely, or even partially, in Locrian mode. It’s not a friendly scale. That mostly has to do with its …
Category Archives: Composition
Musical Simples: Once In A Lifetime
“Once In A Lifetime” is a simple but remarkable tune based on a simple but remarkable scale: the major pentatonic. Like its cousin the minor pentatonic scale, major pentatonic is found in just about every world musical culture. It’s also incredibly ancient. In Werner Herzog’s documentary Cave Of Forgotten Dreams, a paleontologist plays an unmistakeable …
Musical Simples: Superstition
If you had to explain funk to a visitor from outer space, Stevie Wonder’s “Superstition” would be a great place to start. Aside from the refrains at the end of each verse, the entire tune consists of variations on a single two-bar clavinet riff on the E-flat minor pentatonic scale. The scale might have a …
Here’s what’s cooking with the NYU MusEDLab
I’m a proud member of the NYU Music Experience Design Lab, a research group that crosses the disciplines of music education, technology, and design. Here’s an overview of our many ongoing projects.
Hit Me Baby
The most appalling song that appears on Mad Men is over the closing credits of the fifth season episode “Mystery Date.” It is not Carole King and Gerry Goffin’s finest work. It’s easy to cluck your tongue at 1962. They were so primitive back then! Surely we’re doing better now. Right? Well…
User interface case study: Patterning
The folks at Olympia Noise Co recently came out with a new circular drum machine for iOS called Patterning, and it’s pretty fabulous. The app’s futuristic look jumps right out at you: flat-colored geometric shapes with zero adornment, in the spirit of Propellerhead Figure. There’s nothing on the screen that doesn’t function in some way. It’s a …
Musical Necker cubes
The simplest and most effective optical illusion ever is the Necker cube. Which side is in front? The answer is both and neither. Very Zen. In the process of gathering musical simples, I found a P-Funk loop with a similar effect. It’s a keyboard lick from “Do That Stuff” from The Clones Of Dr Funkenstein.
Steve Reich’s Clapping Music: The Game
The Steve Reich Clapping Music app turns a minimalist classical work into a rhythm game. This is a cool idea, but even better, the app is also fun, addictive and SUPER HARD. When’s the last time you heard something related to classical music described as “fun” and “addicting”?
Musical simples
The NYU Music Experience Design Lab is putting together a new online music theory resource, and I’m writing a lot of the materials. We want to keep everything grounded in real-life musical practice. To that end, we’ve been gathering musical simples: phrases, riffs, and earworms that beginners can learn easily. My criteria for a good …
Pedagogical remixing with Splice
My newest music student is a gentleman named Rob Precht. As is increasingly the case with people I teach privately, Rob lives many time zones away, and he and I have never met face to face. Instead, we’ve been conducting lessons via a combination of Skype and Splice. It’s the first really practical remote music …