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Music Theory-Or Music Practice?

exists today between practical music experience and music theory can be illustrated by a statement often repeated by those who are no longer in the theory classroom: "O, please don't ask me any theory questions; it's been so long since I've studied it." A close look at this confession and a few of its implications clearly reveals that something is amiss. Was this situation caused by poor theoretical training? The answer is yes if the material studied was so inapplicable to the general practice of music that, with little or no musical penalty, one is able to forget it. The relationship between music theory and music practice reveals a disturbing polarity in the approach to music training. While theory courses usually require the student to deal with music severely limited in a historical and stylistic sense, the other music courses deal with music representing a cross section of all types. The situation is detrimental to the training of a musician: music theory and music practice should clarify, complement, and reinforce each other. Theory should prepare the serious musician to deal successfully with his musical experiences outside the confines of the theory classroom. If it fails to do that, it fails its primary purpose. While many other subjects have tried to keep up with the recent expansion of knowledge, the teaching of music theory has responded relatively slowly. In the midtwentieth century, ancient treatises still dictate large portions of the content of theory courses, and outdated speculations are still presented as eternal truths. Even in some of the more famous and respected musical institutions one can still see evidence of irrelevant content and methodstheory courses of little value to the performing musician. Highly restricted study can be justified in graduate school, but not on the high school and undergraduate levels. Unfortunately, many teachers and students do not realize how restricted some of their courses really are. To predicate the greater portion of a course upon the study