does music theory have rules a simple question without a straightforward answer if you're asking can i go down to the international library of music theory and check out a book that has all of the laws that govern music no you can't that book doesn't exist music theorists aren't some kind of congressional body that make musical laws although that's what some theories seem to think that we do music theorists are also not some sort of judiciary panel reviewing every piece of music for its legality although that's what some theorists seem to think that we do so are there rules kinda and those rules can be ranked on a range of rigidity [Music] so on the one side of the spectrum we have the unflinching rules these are largely immutable loopholes notwithstanding first there are the rules of limitations some highlights here include instruments don't have that note humans must breathe and fingers don't work that way we've also got the rules of physics some things are constant because the universe says so you can't decide that the second partial of your harmonic series is a major 9th less rigid than the rules of limitations and physics we have the rules of style certain musical styles aim to attain a certain aesthetic and they use rules to achieve it counterpoint has rules quite a few of them don't double the leading tone don't use a melodic tritone no parallel fifths ever those are bad these are commonly thrown around as rules of all of music but they're actually rules of one particular style but you can still break them js bach used at least 17 parallel fists over the course of his career no one is going to mark you off for breaking the rules of counterpoint on the other side of the spectrum we have the completely subjective this would include any set of emotional words like happy sad terrifying or vague descriptive words like bright warm muddy burgundy these are largely a matter of opinion to a particular listener what i call shrill you may call shimmering quite an unbelievable amount of factors go into your subjective feelings about music if i want to write a sad piece there are no rules that govern how i would go about doing that sadness is subjective to me as a person furthermore emotions as a color have an infinite number of shades but i can hear you saying a good number of people though would definitely agree that minor is sad and that is because it's a common convention and by convention i mean like a practice or a custom not like comic-con there are things that are so common it's like they're a rule but they're not like the order of the alphabet or the fact that maps point north there's no rule that says they have to be in that order in that orientation within music there are a few species of conventions as well even the idea of what makes a piece or a song good or bad is typically based on convention and that convention is largely dependent on time in history geographical location day of the week and probably the spotify algorithm first up we've got conventions of style or genre if i say rock band a certain number of instruments immediately comes to mind but there's no rule that says that those particular instruments have to be in rock band a banjo is not conventionally a rock band instrument it's conventionally a bluegrass instrument but there's no rule that a banjo can't be in a rock band it's just not conventional some things can become conventional if they happen enough for example it was not conventional for a trombone to be in a rock band but then ska happened and it's not just instrumentation chord progressions are largely the result of style conventions baroque chord sequences were more progressive they had a start and an end point they went from here to there modern chord sequences are largely made up of loops neither one is right or wrong neither one is a rule or breaking rule they're just conventions if i wanted to write a song that sounded baroque though i couldn't just use a whole bunch of jazz chords i would have to use baroque conventions in order to achieve my goal then you'll hear people saying things like this note wants to go here this chord wants to go there no it doesn't it's a note it's an animate it wants nothing it has no desires whatsoever what we actually mean by this is that this note tends to go here and so it's actually called a tendency tone the danger becomes when people try to enforce tendency tones as if they are rules does the leading tone typically resolve up to the tonic yes but does it have to no and going against that particular tendency can be refreshing and that's why it's really nice to know these conventions conventions create expectation and subverting expectation can create a memorable effect what we call things is also a convention all of our music terminology is made up and then commonly agreed upon it doesn't have to be called a major chord we could have called it anything that we want but we commonly agree that it's called a major chord if i just went around calling it a liberty gibbet chord i could do that but you would have no clue what i'm talking about so it's very convenient for us to have a common nomenclature with which we can communicate with each other but again naming is a convention and not a rule what we call things can change over the course of time what we call the notes for example has changed a number of times over the course of the years and i mean their actual note names not their soulmatization names because that's a can of worm we just don't have time to open and finally right in the middle of the spectrum we have the good ideas they're not rules of limitations they're also not conventions that they just happen because we like the way they sound these are really just nuggets of wisdom it's a good idea to not make your sopranos sing a sustained high c on a pianissimo if you want your oboes and flutes to be heard it's a good idea to not give them a middle c when the entire orchestra is playing together trombones have a sliding mechanism and so it's just a really good idea to not give them this particular passage there's no one stopping you from using a shrieking goat in your piece but i have found personally that their attendance habits are unreliable at best the point of this entire spectrum of course is that music theory has no rules in that sense and even when there are rules you can break them no one can tell you how to write your piece sometimes music theorists will try to grade music based on some imagined rubric even worse is when people try to discredit entire genres using music theory as a weapon to quote prove it but when music theory is functioning properly it examines every piece of music on its own terms music theory is a collection of analytical tools there's no hierarchy so the next time that someone tries to tell you that music has rules and you must follow them you can just show them this video and if you do decide to use a shrieking goat as a compositional device please send me a video i would love to see that thank you so much for watching this video if you're new to this channel i do videos on music theory music composition and music history so if you haven't already subscribe to this channel for more videos if you would like to be notified of when a new video has come out make sure to join my email list where i'll let you know about new video releases as well as other free musical resources and if you really like the work that i do and would like to support it and see more of it come join the community over on patreon thank you so much and i'll see you next time