Ok some might see this as a rant (and they would not be wholly wrong)...

The more I learn about standard notation the more I realise that it is unnecessarily obscure and makes learning so much harder. For example doesn't the whole idea of Myxolydian augmented 5th sound so complex and confusing, frightening even, it must put off so many learners.

I am sitting here looking at the chord symbol A7b9. How many altered notes are there? My first reaction would be to say one a b9? Well, what I have not said, is that this chord appears as the second chord in a 1,6,2,5.

The key thought is that the 6th mode in a 1,6,2,5. is an A minor not A Major, so the 3rd of the chord is altered - not just the 9th as indicated.
Converting to Roman numerals does no good, the chord simply becomes VI7b9, Nashville is no better.

I sort of knew this before, but I have been trying to sight read chords on the piano, and it is plain that one must discern the structure, before one reads - making the whole process harder.

There is so much like this in music making our life harder for no good reason - do re mi fa sol .... but what of a minor third in this system? No word at all, much less for a #4.

Why not a notation system that actually tells us what we need, in an obvious way!

frown

Z


Last edited by ZeroZero; 01/16/15 08:52 AM.
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