I hate it when theory gets in the way of making music. The most profound thing (to me) my teacher in harmony class ever said was "Theory always came after the fact. First people started making music. They learned that some things sound good while others don't. It's usually not till much later that people start to analyze it and write it down." Completely paraphrased as it was years ago now.

I was way more theory based when I was young and learned my instrument, sometimes I feel I'm still too analytical. I really wish it was more in my nature to listen rather than analyze. When you really listen and react i when the magic happens.

I started out taking classical piano lessons when I was nine years old. I hated learning to read notes and all that theory crap! My piano teacher told my mom that she didn't know what to do with me because sometimes I was playing by ear more so than reading. When I started playing other instruments I was glad I stuck it out. The only reason I have gotten some sessions was because you had to read the dots.
Don't get me wrong! Probably 75 to 80 perc cent of my financial gains in music has been playing by ear. But by learning the theory it made me quicker on my feet and got me tons of studio gigs.
I teach now as well and I always teach the theory along with the playing. I agree about the magic but if you didn't know how to be analytical in a given situation you couldn't anticipate what was going to happen so you can respond correctly. GEEZ, I sound like my teacher!!!!
 

Sanderxpander
I hate it when theory gets in the way of making music. The most profound thing (to me) my teacher in harmony class ever said was "Theory always came after the fact. First people started making music. They learned that some things sound good while others don't. It's usually not till much later that people start to analyze it and write it down." Completely paraphrased as it was years ago now.

I was way more theory based when I was young and learned my instrument, sometimes I feel I'm still too analytical. I really wish it was more in my nature to listen rather than analyze. When you really listen and react i when the magic happens.

When I explained to my local keyboard shop owner that I had never had a music lesson, I didn't use the correct fingering on the keyboard he said 'theory can get in the way of creativity'.
 
I like the way I play,I know what the sound is going to be before I play the note, I feel at one with the instrument and with the craft and that matters more to me than being able to read music or know any theory.
 
You can use mathematics to describe art and music but I would rather just leave both to my emotions.

I spent the first 15 years of my musical "career" without a lick of theory aside from a few scales I cobbled together from songs I had learned. Throughout those 15 years I toured all over the place and was the main songwriter for many many bands. Then I suffered some serious injuries that laid me up for a good long time and I decided to write down MY personal theory using nothing but a pen and some graph paper. Then I borrowed a very stale and traditional university book on theory from my GF at the time (well I still have it so I guess I stole it... lol) and went about digesting it all and compared it to my own charts. All of it synced up perfectly. I kept digging and came up with a system to solve every scale and triad for all 12 keys and started practicing them in an ordered, linear fashion that worked for my wacky OCD mind until my fingers could keep up with the theory. It ended up turning into a 20 minute workout type scenario which I then challenged myself to speed up until I got the whole sequence down to 12 minutes.
 
However that was all based on Ionian and real life called me away. In the past year I have applied the same method to the Harmonic and Melodic minor modes and intend to become just as proficient with them.
 
Pretty much all twelve tone based music can be baked down to those three patterns. Everything else is just adding, taking away and rearranging those patterns. That's where the creativity lies.
 
However I completely agree with the sentiment you don't need theory to make music... but from where I sit, it certainly doesn't hurt.
 
PS: I absolutely loathe notation and can't sight read for crap but given enough time I can read notation. Really gotta work on that.

I'm glad I learned theory, but it's too easy to rely on it and think you're "doing it right" because of the theory. When, in the end, it's about how it sounds.
Sight reading can be an art if done well, especially if done well enough that you can have an idea of the dynamics and flow of a piece mere seconds before you have to play th notes for the first time. I'm ok-ish but like most jazz/pop guys not too great on left hand reading (I play piano btw). But apart from prima vista stuff, and perhaps situations where you want someone else to play something you can't do yourself, notation is basically a compromise - you use it because you can't remember well enough or it's too hard or too slow to do by ear. Both of which are in the end ridiculous reasons if you consider what the point of your job is.

I mean, I use all these things, and they make me better at what I do. But sometimes I think, if I could start over, and had more talent in my ears, and spent more time just listening and playing...

I agree that theory can be useful to find new avenues to explore.

I use theory mainly to communicate my ideas to other players.  If I write parts for orchestral pieces then rather than sit with each and every player and explain the part to them I can hand them sheet music and say, "Here's the idea.  If you hear or feel something that sounds better then go for it.