A personal tutor · Cue-Queue

The situation

Priya plays guitar by ear and has always wondered why a minor chord sounds sad. She asked an assistant once and got a dense, correct paragraph she could not follow. She doesn’t want a better paragraph. She wants to actually understand it, an evening at a time, over a few weeks.

An assistant is a good tutor for one evening. A course is many evenings, and a new chat doesn’t know what the last one taught, how it was explained, or what she asked along the way.

One question becomes a course

You: I asked why minor chords sound sad and got a paragraph about frequency ratios and “roughness”. I understood maybe half. Can you teach me this properly?

Assistant: Gladly. Where are you starting from? Do you read music, or know words like “interval”?

You: I play guitar by ear. No theory at all.

Assistant: And how do you like to learn: pictures, sound, the maths?

You: Let me hear it. Then show me. Keep the maths out of it, and no quizzes.

Assistant: Then we start with what sound physically is and build up, with something to play in every lesson. Seven modules, ending at your question. The parts of that paragraph you didn’t follow are on the map too, each tied to the lesson that explains it. Start with how sound travels?

Her question is where the course is heading, and every part of the answer she didn’t follow becomes a stop along the way. How she likes to learn is said once: hear it, then see it, no maths, no quizzes. From then on, every lesson is taught that way.

Lessons you can hear

You: So why do some notes sound good together?

Assistant: Play these two. Each note is a steady swing of the air, and your ear gets both swings added together. Their speeds are 5 to 4, so the combined shape repeats every four swings. Now press “Two close notes”: the repeat gets very slow, and you’ll hear it.

Two notes, added

A · 220 swings a second

C♯ · 275 swings a second, a major third up

Both together: what reaches your ear

The shape repeats every 4 swings of A, then starts again.

Module 2 · Two notes at once

Keep going: the octave and the fifth, side by side
Go deeper: why “two close notes” wobble
Next topic → Module 3: one string, many tones

Most lessons come with something to play with: sliders, buttons, the actual sound. Each one is kept with the course, so the waves from week one are still there in week five, one press away. Under every answer come the next moves, named: keep going, go deeper into something, or move on. Priya presses one, and the lesson goes on.

A new chat, in another assistant

Nine days later, on her phone, in a different assistant

You: Where were we with the harmony course?

Assistant: Module 3: why one guitar string plays many tones at once. You’d just seen the string vibrating in halves and thirds. Your question about why two close notes wobble is still open; module 4 answers it. Pick up from the overtones?

You: Yes. But why does my guitar sound so different from a flute playing the same note?

Assistant: Same overtones, in different amounts. I’ve added it as a side trip from module 3, so the course stays where it is. Here’s a string and a flute, side by side…

Every lesson is recorded as it happens: what was covered, how it was explained, what she asked. So any chat picks up in two lines, in whichever assistant she opens. Tangents are welcome. Each one becomes a side trip off the course, and the course is still there when she comes back.

It learns how you learn

The first lesson on loudness didn’t land: too many numbers. The tutor taught it again with a ladder of sounds she could hear getting louder, and that worked. Both are written down, and that is how every lesson after it has been taught.

How she wants to be taught

Hear it first, then see it, then the words.
Explain every music word before using it.
No maths unless she asks. No quizzes.

What worked

A guitar string vibrating in halves and thirds, for overtones.
A ladder of sounds, each twice as loud, for loudness (second try).

What didn’t

Loudness as numbers on a scale: too abstract. Taught again.

None of it belongs to one course. When Priya wants to learn how a synthesizer works next, her tutor already knows her.

The whole course, on one page

When she asks how far she has got, her assistant opens the course:

Module 3: one string, many tones

Next: why each overtone is a whole number of loops. Three questions are waiting for later modules.

9lessons covered

2side trips

3open questions

4visuals to play

The course

Module 1 · What sound isCovered
Pressure waves, pitch and loudness
Module 2 · Two notes at onceCovered
Adding waves, simple ratios
- Side trip: why headphones sound inside your headFrom module 2 · covered
Module 3 · One string, many tonesYou are here
Last time: the string vibrating in halves and thirds, all at once.
ContinueGo deeperRedo
- Side trip: a guitar and a flute on the same noteStarted today, from module 3
Module 4 · Why close notes wobbleNext
Answers two of your open questions
Module 5 · Why simple ratios sound smooth
Module 6 · Scales, and why a piano is slightly out of tune
Module 7 · Major and minorYour question
Why does a minor chord sound sad?

Open questions

What is “roughness”?Open
From the answer you started with · module 4 explains it
Why do two close notes seem to wobble?Open
Asked in module 2 · module 4 answers it
Is a piano really out of tune?Open
Asked in module 2 · module 6 answers it

Visuals from the lessons

How sound travelsModule 1
Pitch goes by doublingModule 1
Two notes, addedModule 2
One string, many tonesModule 3

Every button hands the request back to her assistant, which teaches it. Any visual opens again with a press. The page is the course: where she is, what she has seen, what is still open, and the question it is all leading to.