Overview of Music Theories

Abstract

The title of this chapter states Music Theories in the plural and not the singular Music Theory or Theory of Music. Probably no single theory will ever cover the enormous richness ofmusic in the world, although there have been promising endeavors to extract certain principles common to most. This is a boon and a bane at the same time: a bane, because all attempts at reducing music to a single set of rules have failed so far to satisfy adherents of universally valid systems; a boon, since it relieves music lovers from the potential danger of the dreaded reduction ofmusic to amere systemof rules, devoid of all mysticism cherished by many. Even putting aside all aspects of the subjective, this state of affairs promises new vistas for future musical activity, since the reservoir of new and modified theories for generating new music seems inexhaustible.