Major: Music Theory and Composition
How do melody, harmony, and rhythm come together to make a piece of music pleasing to the ear? What’s the difference between a symphony and a sonata? As a student of music theory and composition, you’ll learn the language of music.
Your classes will involve a lot of ear training, which sharpens your listening skills. You’ll learn to write down chords and melodies as you hear them, analyze the structure of musical pieces, and compose your own music. The study of music theory and composition will also improve your skills as a performing musician.
Students of music theory and composition learn how music is put together and what makes it pleasing to the ear. Classes cover such topics as melody, harmony, form, improvisation, and computer skills.
“I think what I've learned the most is to break from tradition. ”
Erika, senior, composition and electronic music, Mills College
Are You Ready To...?
- Listen to lots of live and recorded music
- Identify chords by both sight and ear
- Learn to recognize pieces of music by ear
- Speak and write about different kinds of music intelligently
- Spend long hours practicing your instrument and rehearsing
- Learn how to use computer applications to write down music
It Helps to Be...
A good writer who is creative and works well with others. It also helps to be able to take criticism well, especially if your focus is composition. You’ll work closely with a master teacher, whose constructive criticism will help you improve your work.
College Checklist
- Is the program accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music?
- Visiting campus? Is there enough room for everyone to practice and rehearse? Are there good acoustics? If you’re interested in digital or electronic music, make sure there’s up-to-date equipment.
- Will you have the chance to see your own compositions performed by student groups?
- Are there opportunities to study non-Western music?
- What kinds of internships or summer programs are open to students?
Did You Know?
- In his own lifetime, Johann Sebastian Bach was best known as a church organist and choir director -- not a composer.
Course Spotlight
Even if you’re an instrumentalist, not a vocalist, you’ll practice sight-singing in your ear training classes. Sight-singing is the ability to sing a piece of music by reading it off the page. Solfege, a sight-singing method, assigns syllables to the notes of a scale. The syllables most often used for the notes of a major scale are Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Ti, and Do, which you may remember from the movie classic The Sound of Music.
