On 8/14/06, David Powers cyborgk@gmail.com wrote:
I recommend "The Jazz Piano Book" by Mark Levine. Even though it's a piano book, it is really as much an applied theory book. I read this about 15 years ago, and it was great in presenting material I already knew in a logical, concise way, and also in presenting some interesting new material.
I've heard of this. That reminds me, one book I did learn a lot from was Arnold Schoenberg's 'Theory of Harmony'. He talks about some of the same things, but references Beethoven, Mahler, Wagner, and Bach at times. He does not talk about Serialism or atonal music, it's strictly based on his research of tonal music before he got into those things. A lot of the extended chords we associate with jazz were used, albeit differently, by guys like Debussy and Schoenberg before anyone tried to put them in jazz. Some jazz of the last 50 years is great, btw, but jazz before then was great too!