The Elements of Music: Melody, Rhythm, & HarmonyHardcover, 15 November 2008

This groundbreaking book presents the elements of music in a way that is pedagogically clear and comprehensible, by building upon simple principles of proportion and relationship. These in turn are corresponded to language as musical metaphor. This, in combination with novel graphics and symbols, carries the reader to a basic understanding of melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic principles, as well as Western musical notation. A great primer on music theory for the novice or professional, as well as an invaluable resource for composers and students, it includes the following:

• A rich unfolding of metaphors and illustrations to elucidate a notoriously impenetrable and abstract subject.
• The properties of the overtone series and how it influences harmonic and melodic thought.
• A discussion of epigrams and dialectics exploring how meaning is carried through time.
• Rhythm and meter as the marking of time and the organization of it into self-similar structures.
• From the circle of fifths to intervals, triads, and later seventh chords and extensions.
• How major/minor key tonality and modulation occur, and how they differ from music based upon drones or other types of scales.
• How form and structure reflect the relationship of humans to time and emotional states.
• A wealth of scales, rhythmic patterns, and notation references in the appendices.