Music Textbooks (Theory and Composition)

[kghayesh]

I don't study music at a music college or a conservatoire. But, I definitely love to be educated in music theory and all other music subjects to a level of education comparable to that of college students.

I decided to buy some books and try and work on my own. I am planning to do ABRSM theory grades 6-8, but I want to pursue it more than that.

I heard that concerning Harmony, the bible is the book called 'Tonal Harmony' by Kostka. It has a workbook and a CD. Are those necessary or The book can do the job without them ?? I want to get the most out of it but without paying much 

I don't know any good books about composition, so can anybody tell me any ideas?? I need something that gives me guidelines, but deep ones and that explains how everything came from not just give me the solution. It would be better if it contained something about composition styles through the ages.

Thanks

[jonslaughter]

I'm not sure if kostka-payne is the bible but it does have the audio cd's and the workbooks.  It definately will help you if you have no theory experence and is good to have around if you don't mind shelling out the big bucks for it(I payed 120+(not sure if the workbook was included in that price) at the university book store. There are better books out there much cheaper though.  You can find some out of print books too that are very good for a few dollars.  No one book seems to be the holy grail of harmony. You'll find things in each one that is not discussed in all the rest.  I like Piston's Harmony along with Goetschuis' Harmony.  I do have Schoenbergs Harmony but its a bit hard to read through all his ramblings(although you should read through them if you have the book).   

Its entirely up to you though.  There are to many harmony books to count and every one will probably help some.   Maybe if you shop around and get you one thats relatively cheap, i.e., not kostka,  and read through it you'll have some idea and might then want to invest in kostka.  The audio for kostka is ok as it has all the excerpts except the most basic. i.e., if you have no clue what a V7-I cadence sounds like they will not have it on the CD in its most basic rudiments. They will have real world musical examples of it but not a stripped down version.  If you have a piano you can go and play what they show and hear it though and that is pretty much what you have to do because else it will be hard to know what to listen for in the audio examples. i.e., they might give you an excerp from some piece by Mozart that uses a neapolitan progression but if you have no idea what it sounds like then you might not be able to tell. They will, ofcourse, give a printed example of the most basic idea but you will have to go play it yourself to understand it and know what to look for(sometimes you don't have to if its obvious but other times it might not be that easy).

Anyways...

[soliloquy]

I'm pretty sure Walter Piston's book "Harmony" is considered the standard starting point for music theory after learning the basics.  Some books you might check out, in this order:


Norton Programmed Texts in Music Theory
Norton Basic Harmonic Progressions
Piston Harmony
Piston Counterpoint
Fux Study of Counterpoint
Rimsky-Korsakov Principles of Orchestration
Mann The Study of Fugue
Brindle Musical Composition
Brindle Serial Composition
Hindemith The Craft of Musical Composition Part 1
Hindemith The Craft of Musical Composition Part 2
Persichetti 20th Century Harmony
Cadwallader Analysis of Tonal Music
Cope New Music Composition
Xenakis Formalized Music
Steeb The Nonlinear Workbook
Haggstrom Finite Markov Chains and Algorithmic Applications


You'll also probably want to get a couple CD's and/or books on Relative Pitch, Solfeg and perfect pitch training, and if you're going to get into composition you'll probably want some stuff on modern instrument techniques and a course on notation.