Music Theory

Before you can become an amazing songwriter, player or producer, you need to first master the mechanics of contemporary music. The Music Theory Specialist Program, developed by Berklee Professor Emeritus Paul Schmeling, provides the knowledge and concepts, from fundamental to advanced, to prepare you for any musical endeavor or opportunity.

You’ll start by learning the basics –reading and writing musical notation; using scales, intervals, and chords; playing notes on a piano keyboard, and writing a melody. You’ll learn how pitch, rhythm, scales, intervals, chords, and harmony flow together to make a song work, and study basic ear training techniques that are designed to help you identify what you are hearing in the music you listen to every day.

Continuing on from the fundamental knowledge presented in Music Theory 101, Music Theory 201 covers more complex chords, progressions, and rhythms that will further your understanding of the elements of contemporary music. You'll learn why chords move from one to another the way they do, and study the more sophisticated rhythms that happen in pop music and jazz, including rhythmic anticipation and syncopations. Through ear training exercises, musical examples, and personalized feedback from your instructor, you'll be able to analyze, read, write, and listen more effectively, as well as understand the fundamental knowledge essential to the beginning studies of harmony. Class topics include: advanced notation issues; diatonic triads and seventh chords in both major and harmonic minor; the use of melodic and harmonic tension, the II-V-I chord progression; and culminates in a discussion of augmented harmonies and pentatonic scales.

You’ll finish up the program by gaining a professional command of music theory in Music Theory 301. The curriculum in this advanced course provides a level of music theory that practically removes all barriers between you and the music you want to create. You’ll master pentatonic and modal melodies, as well as anticipations and articulations that will give your music the necessary sound and "character" to fit into any contemporary music style. You'll explore harmony related topics such as natural/melodic, minor, and slash chords, which will help you to select the appropriate harmonic tensions to add color, character, and sophistication to your music. You'll also master triplets, swing eighths, and sixteenth notes in double time feel, and study topics related to improvisation and melody including chord scales, avoid notes, approach notes, and modal and pentatonic scales.

The skills you learn in the Music Theory Specialist Program will provide you with the structure you need to turn your musical impulses into concise information that you can share with anyone. You’ll leave the program with a concrete musical foundation in rhythm, chords, scales, and progressions, and the musical tools ready at your disposal to create your next music project with ease.