In music

performance A performance is an act of staging or presenting a play, concert, or other form of entertainment. It is also defined as the action or process of carrying out or accomplishing an action, task, or function. Management science In the work place ...

and

education Education is a purposeful activity directed at achieving certain aims, such as transmitting knowledge or fostering skills and character traits. These aims may include the development of understanding, rationality, kindness, and honesty. Va ...

, the Berklee method is the

music theory Music theory is the study of the practices and possibilities of music. ''The Oxford Companion to Music'' describes three interrelated uses of the term "music theory". The first is the "rudiments", that are needed to understand music notation (ke ...

, terminology, and practice taught at

Berklee College of Music Berklee College of Music is a private music college in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known for the study of jazz and modern American music, it also offers college-level cours ...

, the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. The "Berklee method" was founded by

Lawrence Berk Lawrence Berk (December 10, 1908 – December 22, 1995) was the founder of Berklee College of Music, a pianist, composer and arranger, and educator. Berk oversaw the growth of the modest Schillinger House music school into the Berklee College of Mu ...

after study with

Joseph Schillinger Joseph Moiseyevich Schillinger (Russian: Иосиф Моисеевич Шиллингер, (other sources: ) – 23 March 1943) was a composer, music theorist, and composition teacher who originated the Schillinger System of Musical Composition ...

regarding the latter's "elaborate

system A system is a group of Interaction, interacting or interrelated elements that act according to a set of rules to form a unified whole. A system, surrounded and influenced by its environment (systems), environment, is described by its boundaries, ...

of composition that employed mathematical

permutation In mathematics, a permutation of a set is, loosely speaking, an arrangement of its members into a sequence or linear order, or if the set is already ordered, a rearrangement of its elements. The word "permutation" also refers to the act or proc ...

and combination process to generate

rhythm Rhythm (from Greek , ''rhythmos'', "any regular recurring motion, symmetry") generally means a " movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions". This general meaning of regular recu ...

harmonies In music, harmony is the process by which individual sounds are joined together or composed into whole units or compositions. Often, the term harmony refers to simultaneously occurring frequencies, pitches ( tones, notes), or chords. However, ...

, and

melodies A melody (from Greek language, Greek μελῳδία, ''melōidía'', "singing, chanting"), also tune, voice or line, is a Linearity#Music, linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most liter ...

". Later, attempting to codify

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

and

popular music Popular music is music with wide appeal that is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. These forms and styles can be enjoyed and performed by people with little or no musical training.Popular Music. (2015). ''Fun ...

practice, the Berklee method often differs from

common practice In European art music, the common-practice period is the era of the tonal system. Most of its features persisted from the mid-Baroque period through the Classical and Romantic periods, roughly from 1650 to 1900. There was much stylistic evolutio ...

harmony and

voice-leading Voice leading (or part writing) is the linear progression of individual melodic lines (voices or parts) and their interaction with one another to create harmonies, typically in accordance with the principles of common-practice harmony and counter ...

rules or guidelines. For example, ''Berklee Music Theory - Book 2'' recommends the following

accompaniment Accompaniment is the musical part which provides the rhythmic and/or harmonic support for the melody or main themes of a song or instrumental piece. There are many different styles and types of accompaniment in different genres and styles ...

for a given

lead sheet A lead sheet or fake sheet is a form of musical notation that specifies the essential elements of a popular song: the melody, lyrics and harmony. The melody is written in modern Western music notation, the lyric is written as text below the ...

,Schmeling, Paul (2006). ''Berklee Music Theory - Book 2'', p.34. . while common practice theory would advise against or rule out the progression on the basis of all the chords being sevenths and thus

dissonant In music, consonance and dissonance are categorizations of simultaneous or successive Sound, sounds. Within the Western tradition, some listeners associate consonance with sweetness, pleasantness, and acceptability, and dissonance with harshness ...

The following remarks from

Branford Marsalis Branford Marsalis (born August 26, 1960) is an American saxophonist The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed inst ...

may illustrate how Berklee also differs from traditional jazz: "Berklee has its own system of doing things, the Berklee way, the Berklee method. They basically say that when you write things that are theoretically against the Berklee method, then they're incorrect. Even if they sound great. Musically they sound great, but theoretically it's wrong, so it's wrong. Which is not the purpose of music. Music theories are just theories."David Andrew Ake (2002). ''Jazz Cultures'', p.144. .

Sources

Jazz music education {{music-education-stub

See also

Sources