Peer Review

Basic Music Theory on the WWW

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Overall Rating:

Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

Ease of Use:

Overview:: The site provides textual/visual descriptions of important fundamental theory
concepts.
Type of Material:: Lecture-style visual/text presentation.
Recommended Uses:: Site would be useful in supplementing definitions of basic theory terms. The
presentation on intervals included an engaging song for teaching common
intervals.
Technical Requirements:: Standard web browser.
Identify Major Learning Goals:: The very basics of music theory are explained and most often presented with
musical notation. The material in not necessarily a progression of content but
can be used well as a reference for review.
Target Student Population:: High School students, Adult beginners, and college students.
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: The material is generally very basic but does expand into areas where some
theory background would be advantageous.

Rating:
Strengths:: The presentation on intervals included an engaging song for teaching common
intervals. The background information is engaging and provides a nice
supplement to any theory text.
Concerns:: The site deals only with the most basic theory terms. Some concepts are
incomplete (example - scales) and higher level definitions are quite vague
(example - chord = set of notes which sound satisfactory together).

Rating:
Strengths:: The author has collected some nice graphic examples and helpful background
information.
Concerns:: The organization of the site is not very clear. Layers of hyperlinks make it
difficult to remember where one is in the overall sequence of material.

Rating:
Strengths:: Overall, the site is easy to navigate.
Concerns:: There are times that a student might wonder where they are and how to get back a
couple pages. Backing up is not always obvious.

Audio examples for most key concepts are lacking.

Other Issues and Comments:: A useful site with a couple of hidden gems (example--the interval song), but
lacking of audio examples. There is good depth to the material presented, but
the site is limited to only a few concepts (notation, rhythm, intervals).
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