Music is full of phenomena which make up the construction of various styles and philosophical intentions of pieces when composed. So, why is it not at all possible to find parallels between the aural phenomena of music composition and the visual phenomena of typographic design, just to break away from the monotony of Bauhaus or Basel or the pragmatics imposed by the typography guilds, wordsmiths and rhetoricians, especially since the individual letter from any alphabet is pretty much the same as the individual tone when struck on the piano or strummed on the violin. 

Different from Japanese calligraphy, in which the writing master captures the visual or emotional experience in nature with an expressive brush stroke, western letterforms are extremely neutral and therefore any of the most classical typefaces can be attached to any subject matter – personal, intimate expressions or emotional, poetic and literary but also at the same time attached to industrial, technical, commercial, political, as well scientific or philosophical matter. The same type font can be rendered useful to represent a fragrance like Chanel or an automobile like a Volkswagen.

If one were to open up typography to the rigor, history and wealth of musical theory, because one can immediately acknowledge the value of a Gregorian chant, a Mongolian folksong or an artistic articulation of improvisation in jazz, then the question of style could only be answered in terms of its integrity, depth of understanding of contents and contexts and concern for using the appropriate materials for expression. The question of style – is it Swiss or Madison Avenue – immediately falls by the wayside, when one is allowed to consider the wealth in ethnic musical expression. That alone would free up everybody.

Straight from the encyclopedia: Music theory considers melody, rhythm, counterpoint, harmony, form, tonal systems, scales, tuning, intervals, consonance, dissonance, durational proportions, the acoustics of pitch systems, composition, performance, orchestration, ornamentation, improvisation, electronic sound production, etc