Medford musician Emily O’Brien is offering a series of five online Sunday workshops titled “Practical Music Theory: Nuts and Bolts for Everyday Musicians.” O’Brien, who specializes in playing the record, will go over common nuts and bolts topics that will help you learn your music faster and sight read more easily, recognize how your part fits into the context of an ensemble piece, and gain a more detailed understanding of music you hear.

Today’s opening session is on musical intervals, which are the basic building blocks of any melody. Emily will go over what they’re called and how to remember them, and how they relate to each other. Practice exercises will go over hearing and recognizing common and less common intervals; reproducing specific intervals on your instrument; and identifying and reproducing unexpected intervals when they occur in pieces. These practice exercises are also an excellent basis for creating technical exercises of your own as needed.

Cost is $18 for this workshop; the full series of five workshops (February 7 to March 7) may be purchased for $80. Register on O’Brien’s website: https://www.emilysdomain.org/Recorderland/online-workshops/