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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Getting Started With Music Theory by Michigan State University

4.5
stars
731 ratings

About the Course

This course is a brief introduction to the elements of music theory for those with little or no music theory experience. We will explore pitch, rhythm, meter, notation, scales, keys, key signatures, meter signatures, triads, seventh chords, and basic harmony. If you listen to music or play music by ear, and you want to know more about how music is organized and notated, this course is for you. By the end of the course, you should know all major and minor keys, how to read and write in treble and bass clef using standard meters and rhythmic values, and how to notate and harmonize a simple melody. This course can serve as a stand-alone basic music theory course, or it can be a springboard to more advanced theory and composition courses. Your instructor is Bruce Taggart, Associate Professor of Music Theory at Michigan State University, in the College of Music, where he has taught undergraduate and graduate music theory since 1996....

Top reviews

WV

Aug 20, 2020

Course was quite tough , eventually I had given up on this course, but consistency made me learn and I went through rigorous learning in finding the chords and middle C notes. Yes I made it in the end

CM

Jul 22, 2020

Fantastic lectures and very easy-to-understand, hard to master lessons. This course will leave you with a much deeper understanding of music if you are a beginner to music theory like I am.

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176 - 200 of 269 Reviews for Getting Started With Music Theory

By Dijana M

Jan 4, 2020

Great course!

By Francisco J T M

Nov 8, 2020

Excelente!!!

By Saran S

May 26, 2020

Good course

By Sofia F L

Feb 19, 2023

Excellent!

By tunji a

Feb 7, 2023

Excellent!

By Jing Z

Oct 18, 2020

very good!

By Heather R

Jul 1, 2020

Wonderful!

By Noriko T

May 3, 2020

Thank you.

By aswan z

Dec 26, 2017

amazing!!!

By Juan G J

Apr 2, 2023

Excelent!

By JESUS A R C

Oct 8, 2020

EXCELENTE

By Peter A

Jul 22, 2020

Excellent

By Barış Ş

Sep 13, 2020

perfect.

By JAVIER R A

Aug 15, 2023

Perfect

By Md T I R T

May 7, 2020

Great

By Hai y

Jun 8, 2018

TQ

By Christopher M S

Jun 19, 2020

G

By BARSHA B

Jan 29, 2021

First of all, Kudos to Professor Taggart for explaining everything to the best of his ability. However, I have to say that stating this course to be of beginner level is not apt at all. One must have had some exposure to music theory and sheet notation to get along well with the course. I know Indian Classical and wanted to learn Western Music to draw similarities. It is why I took this course. Although I did learn quite a bit, I am more confused than learned. But I do feel that it is a great course for someone who had learnt music at some point of their life and wants to refresh their knowledge. But I wouldn't recommend it to an absolute beginner.

By Bill A

Jun 15, 2020

Overall, a very good course. One technical issue, one programmatic - technically, several of the inline questions (e.g., Metric Notation in Practice, the question would appear asking to identify time signatures with the answers, yet the pop-up covered/blocked the notation, making it difficult to answer correctly); programmatically - the feedback on the quizzes was lacking, the incorrect answers were only marked incorrect, without feedback. Even after multiple attempts and continuing to get the same question incorrect, actual feedback would be beneficial, as in a college course, because something is clearly being missed.

By See X H

Dec 9, 2021

I found this course really useful for me, it was quite concise and there were not a lot of unnecessary or redundant information like some courses tend to do. I took theory tests before but have forgotten all of them so this was good to refine my memory. Though, I'm not sure how this would be for beginners. If I wasn't already a pianist being able to read music I think I would not have understood anything. I think there should have been more explanations on this, especially for people unfamiliar with using the piano as a reference.

By Christine P

Dec 8, 2020

Loved the course. Loved the opportunity, during this pandemic, to apply myself to something I had never learned even after 30+ years in the music business. I need more, more of everything here! It was fast paced, and I missed a deadline, because of the crazy election and losing 2 close friends (musicians) that we were unable to grieve. I happen to be one of the local go-to's when people need consoling, so I lost time there. But, overall .. GREAT OPPORTUNITY! THANK YOU, Cousin Brucie (affectionately)!

Christine

By Gustavo S

Jun 15, 2020

Parte da transcrição não parece correta e a maneira como os exercícios estão ativando nas lições está bagunçada, fazendo com que precisemos voltar a lição para conferir alguma imagem a que o exercício se refere. As imagens talvez pudessem ser mais didáticas de maneira que pudessemos acompanhar melhor o raciocínio do professor nas lições, já que alguns alunos podem não conseguir atingir a capacidade pretendida por ele logo ao longo do curso e então não ter em certos dados fluidos na mente sempre.

By Christopher G

Apr 24, 2020

Really good introduction to music theory. First week is difficult for those that are semi tone deaf (like me). Really doesn't explain how to hear for certain patterns in music. Rest of the course is really informative. As someone who has played piano their whole life, the topics covered were easy to follow and easy to apply to my own playing. Highly Recommend!

By Scott B

Mar 19, 2021

Instructor explains concepts well. On thing that could be improved is maybe having more readings or something else to practice the concepts. The in-video questions are quite helpful to learn but I found some concepts I still needed more practice. Overall I enjoyed this course and I would recommend it to any musicians looking to up their theory knowledge.