Foundations of Music

Many students begin learning scales, chords and songs before understanding the ideas they're built on. As a result, music theory often feels like a collection of rules to memorize instead of a system that makes sense.

Foundations of Music starts at the beginning. It explains how the 12 notes are organized, how intervals measure the distance between notes, and how those intervals are used to build scales. Once these relationships become clear, topics like chords, harmony and key signatures become much easier to understand.

Rather than presenting music theory as a collection of disconnected facts, this book shows how the different concepts relate to one another. Whether you're learning guitar, another instrument, or simply want to understand music theory, it gives you the foundation that makes everything else easier to learn.

Inside you will learn:

• The musical alphabet and the 12-note system
• Sharps, flats and enharmonic notes
• The chromatic scale
• Semitones, whole tones and intervals
• Interval names and qualities
• An interval reference chart
• Recognizing intervals by ear using familiar melodies
• How scales are constructed
• The Major scale
• Scale degrees

If you've ever wondered why there are twelve notes, why some notes have two names, or why the Major scale follows a specific pattern, this book answers those questions by starting where music theory begins.