The Master of Music in Contemporary Performance with a concentration in production is designed to give advanced instrumentalists and vocalists of any style the confidence and skills in performance and production technology to take their careers to the next level.
It is distinctly contemporary in its content and approach, and embraces the principal musical movements of our time, allowing students to master their own style while discovering others. Students develop a strong artistic identity through frequent performance opportunities, private instruction, ensembles, and studio recordings. Throughout the program, students become adept at pre-production, recording, and mixing processes through ample firsthand experience in state-of-the-art studios—ready to meet the unique demands facing the artist of tomorrow.
100+ original songs recorded
45+ clinics and workshops
30+ live concert opportunities
100+ gigs outside of school
Students work with master musicians in a variety of genres such as flamenco, Afro-Cuban, contemporary jazz, electronic music, neo-soul, and more. Through applied lessons, ensembles, master classes, and course work, students deepen their understanding of the harmonic and stylistic practices associated with their chosen area of performance.
Students also learn to master the technological and entrepreneurial skills that are essential for the contemporary performer. Through the study of music business and recorded production, students develop strategies for producing and marketing their performance projects. Students’ projects may take a variety of forms: a recording project, a concert, a lecture/demonstration, a grant proposal, a website marketing plan, or another option of students’ devising. This program is distinctly contemporary in its content and approach, and embraces the principal musical movements of our time.
Program Highlights
Contemporary Approach
The program is style-independent and is open to advanced performers from a wide variety of genres and styles, such as jazz, Latin, world music, pop, rock, classical, electronic and fusion, among others. Through hands-on playing and recording experience, you'll expand your musical horizons and learn to work with diverse and dynamic musicians.
Production Technology
Students spend ample time on pre-production, recording and mixing processes in our state-of-the-art recording studios and scoring stage designed by the Walters-Storyk Design Group. By the end of the program, you'll feel confident in any studio setting.
Live and Recorded Performance
Through private instruction, ensembles, the performance forum, and frequent performance opportunities, students work with faculty and visiting artists to develop their artistic identity to shine on stage or in the studio.
Culminating Experience
The culminating experience is the final project that students present at the end of the program and is related to their career direction. Through the culminating experience, students make a creative contribution to and/or define and solve a problem that exists in the profession. Working in close consultation with their advisor, the performer’s culminating experience will fall into one of three categories—a creative work, a practical project, or a research project—and may take a variety of forms such as a recording project, a concert, a lecture/demonstration, a grant proposal, a website marketing plan, a video lesson series, or another option of students’ devising. All projects include supporting materials that may take a variety of forms: a student might build a website to promote a recording, for example, or draft a grant proposal for a public performance of their music, using a recording project to supplement the grant proposal application. Students are required to meet with their advisors on a regular basis to assess their progress. The final project must be defended before a faculty committee chaired by the student's advisor.
Graduation Requirements
On-campus graduate programs are designed to be completed in three semesters of full-time study or one full academic year—a consecutive fall, spring, and summer. The full-time summer term is six-to-seven weeks in length directly following the spring semester.
All students are expected to be in residence for the entire program (three academic terms). Furthermore, all candidates seeking to graduate must earn a minimum letter grade of B- in each course counting towards a degree requirement, attain a minimum GPA of 3.00, and complete all course work, the culminating experience, and other graduation requirements.
Program Details
What Will I Learn?
When students complete the Master of Music in Contemporary Performance (Production Concentration), they'll have the ability to:
synthesize the harmonic and stylistic practices associated with their chosen area of performance;
synthesize the skills required of performers in a variety of contemporary music settings;
perform music in contemporary musical styles;
create and improvise music;
develop strategies for producing and marketing their performance projects;
synthesize their artistic identity, vision, and intent in performance work; and
apply technology to recording and distributing music.
Entrance Requirements
We are looking for highly skilled and creative instrumentalists and vocalists from all styles of contemporary music who wish to develop their performance career further while also immersing themselves in the recorded production process and experience.
Ideal candidates will:
Enter the program with a very advanced level of instrumental or vocal technique and musical skill;
Desire to expand their experience through further exploration of familiar and new styles including fusions of genres;
Be deeply motivated to learn and apply strategies for recorded music production (including the preproduction, recording, and mixing processes) to their craft, with a focus on artistic identity and intent; and
Demonstrate a strong interest in learning and applying new performance technology, electroacoustic instruments, and video into their live and recorded performances.
Curriculum and Courses
The master of music program at Berklee College of Music is designed to be completed in three semesters of study–or one full academic year: fall, spring, and summer semesters. There is an optional internship that takes place the fall after graduation for those who want to do an internship through Berklee for credit.
Total Credits: 36/37 with optional internship
Total ECTS: 60
Learn more here for an overview of the class schedule for graduate programs.*
The course is a project-based, experiential learning exercise that will arm students with powerful tools and strategies in music production. Artist identity, vision and intention will provide direction for a recording project that will give students first-hand experience in the preproduction, recording and mixing process. Recording sessions will take place in a variety of venues, from professional recording studios with a large-format console, to project studios, to home recording set ups. Students explore the ways that the recording process can best serve their own professional and artistic goals, while collaborating with musicians and engineers.
In this seminar and performance-based course, students learn interdisciplinary approaches to music-making and develop practical materials useful for a profession as a performer. Students also explore various concepts of aesthetics, with a focus on developing their own aesthetic philosophy and artistic identity. Students perform and analyze their own music projects; they learn to evaluate and critique each other; and they learn to respond to feedback and advice. Students collaborate with classmates, guest lecturers and visiting artists from a variety of diverse styles and backgrounds: performers, producers and educators, among others. They synthesize rhythmic, melodic, and harmonic vocabulary from a variety of musical styles.
The private lesson at the master’s level focuses on developing the student’s artistry. An additional emphasis is the evolution of the student as a musician. Students study jazz etudes with a broad representation of various styles within the wider jazz idiom. This may include sub-genres, such as Latin jazz, blues, bebop, Afro-Cuban jazz, etc. Studies include exercises and song study as students develop agility and stylistic acumen, while also building instrumental skill. Students master advanced studies in stylistic components, such as jazz vocabulary in improvisation, phrasing, and the study of great artists. Students also study harmonic and stylistic practices. This work culminates in the development of a marketable recording, an online presence, and the establishment of the student as a well-rounded artist.
This course enables students to enhance their ensemble-playing skills, deepen their knowledge of a particular style and its associated repertory, and develop their individual performance identities. Students develop their ability to create and perform music in a particular style. Working under the direction of a senior faculty member, students complete exercises that enhance their intonation, articulation, and improvisational skills in an ensemble context. Students learn to maintain stylistic integrity by developing their awareness of the melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic practices associated with a particular repertory.
In the digital age, musicians need to be innovative in the way they promote, distribute and monetize the product of their creation. Even if talent is still a critical aspect that will determine the artist’s ability to succeed, building a sustainable career now requires a wide set of skills including an acute understanding of how business works. In this course, artists are developing business-related skills that will be fundamental in their career. Students learn about the economics of creative industries; they learn to analyze emerging trends in music business and come to understand how these trends apply to their own artistic work; and they learn to apply important business skills to foster their own careers.
PS-622 continues the learning that began in PS-619 Masters Performance Forum: Production. In this seminar and performance-based course, students learn interdisciplinary approaches to music-making and develop practical materials useful for a profession as a performer. Students also explore various concepts of aesthetics, with a focus on developing their own aesthetic philosophy and artistic identity. Students perform and analyze their own music projects; they learn to evaluate and critique each other; and they learn to respond to feedback and advice. Students collaborate with classmates, guest lecturers and visiting artists from a variety of diverse styles and backgrounds: performers, producers and educators, among others. They synthesize rhythmic, melodic, and harmonic vocabulary from a variety of musical styles.
This course provides a structured approach to the many aspects of record production. Through project-based, experiential learning exercises, designed to arm students with powerful tools and strategies in music production, this course enables students to create a recording that may serve as an essential piece of their culminating experience. Students gain first-hand experience in the preproduction, recording and mixing process. Recording sessions take place in a variety of venues, from professional recording studios with a large-format console, to project studios, to home recording set ups. Students further explore how the recording process best serves their individual artistic and professional goals, as they collaborate with musicians, technologists, and stakeholders involved in developing material for record company release.
This second semester private lesson at the master’s level continues the work begun in the first semester. There is continued focus on developing the student’s artistry. An additional emphasis is the evolution of the student as a musician. Students study jazz etudes with a broad representation of various styles within the wider jazz idiom. This may include sub-genres, such as Latin jazz, blues, bebop, Afro-Cuban jazz, etc. Studies include exercises and song study as students develop agility and stylistic acumen, while also building instrumental skill. Students master advanced studies in stylistic components, such as jazz vocabulary in improvisation, phrasing, and the study of great artists. Students also study harmonic and stylistic practices. This work culminates in the development of a marketable recording, an online presence, and the establishment of the student as a well-rounded artist.
This course enables students to enhance their ensemble-playing skills, deepen their knowledge of a particular style and its associated repertory, and develop their individual performance identities. Students develop their ability to create and perform music in a particular style. Working under the direction of a senior faculty member, students complete exercises that enhance their intonation, articulation, and improvisational skills in an ensemble context. Students learn to maintain stylistic integrity by developing their awareness of the melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic practices associated with a particular repertory.
Students participate in a diverse array of professional development experiences to facilitate their career success. These experiences may occur throughout the school year as well as during the Professional Development Week at the beginning of spring semester. These experiences assist students in refining their career goals and focus and in developing a career plan. Students also assess their professional skills, remediate gaps, enhance their professional profile, and sharpen their job search skills. More importantly, students strengthen their skills in career exploration and career resilience.
Working in close consultation with their advisor throughout the academic year, students develop a unique project. This may be an artistic production or performance or a project that involves research. Research is understood here in its broadest sense, involving also artistic research. Artistic research may take many different forms, such as exploring the capabilities of an instrument in order to introduce it to unfamiliar audiences; joining different musical styles to create a new musical fusion; developing interdisciplinary performance projects that bring together literature, visual arts, sciences, poetry, jazz and/or folk; or exploring connections between language and music. Students are encouraged to be as creative and as collaborative as possible in the design of their projects. In addition, students must have a performance based outcome, such as a recording or recital. This could be accompanied with video recordings and booklet projects. Students projects will also require various supporting materials. Those supporting materials may take a variety of forms: a student might build a website to promote a recording, for example, or draft a grant proposal for a public performance of his/her music, using a recording project to supplement the grant proposal application. Students are expected to meet with their advisors on a weekly basis to assess their progress. The final project must be defended before a faculty committee chaired by the student’s advisor.
This third semester private lesson at the master’s level continues the work of the previous lessons. There is continued focus on developing the student’s artistry. An additional emphasis is the evolution of the student as a musician. Students study jazz etudes with a broad representation of various styles within the wider jazz idiom. This may include sub-genres, such as Latin jazz, blues, bebop, Afro-Cuban jazz, etc. Studies include exercises and song study as students develop agility and stylistic acumen, while also building instrumental skill. Students master advanced studies in stylistic components, such as jazz vocabulary in improvisation, phrasing, and the study of great artists. Students also study harmonic and stylistic practices. This work culminates in the development of a marketable recording, an online presence, and the establishment of the student as a well-rounded artist.
This course enables students to enhance their ensemble-playing skills, deepen their knowledge of a particular style and its associated repertory, and develop their individual performance identities. Students develop their ability to create and perform music in a particular style. Working under the direction of a senior faculty member, students complete exercises that enhance their intonation, articulation, and improvisational skills in an ensemble context. Students learn to maintain stylistic integrity by developing their awareness of the melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic practices associated with a particular repertory.
Students work closely with their faculty advisor to conceive and develop their culminating experience—a practical, creative, or research project enabling the student to make a contribution to his/her field of study and to develop their academic and career goals. Meetings between the student and advisor begin during the first week of the first semester (or during orientation) and continue until the final week of the program. Students present ideas, receive feedback, advice, support, suggestions, guidance and more from their advisors as they design and execute their culminating experiences and plan their academic and professional careers. Advisors guide students in meeting the various deadlines and milestones required as students complete their culminating experience, prepare for graduation and prepare for their careers.
This course provides students an opportunity to integrate professional and academic experience through internships. The internship site must be approved by the student’s faculty advisor and/or the program director and must provide a learning experience that enables the student to meet academic and/or career goals. Through the internship, students apply theories learned in their graduate studies and explore aspects of the music, entertainment, and/or other industry as appropriate. Students who opt-in to the graduate internship program must complete their internship in order to graduate.
Please note: Students are responsible for securing their own internships. The internship must be secured prior to course registration. Students must complete approximately 100-300 hours during the internship. International students in F-1 status must obtain authorization on their Form I-20 from their International Student Advisor prior to beginning an internship.
This course enables students to deepen their knowledge of rhythm, focusing on the study and practice of rhythms from different world cultures, while also analyzing their essence and synthesizing them within their own musical vocabulary for performance and composition. Working under the direction of a senior faculty member, students enhance their sense of rhythm, interpretative skills, and improvisational skills in a practical environment that involves composition, transcription, listening, improvisation, and playing music. Through listening, transcribing and analysing different rhythmic cells, students will be able to expand their musical language and creative skills by developing their ability to understand complex rhythms and apply them to their own music. Students learn to maintain stylistic integrity by developing their domain over rhythmic practices which involve the coordination of body and mind to integrate rhythm in a much deeper way.
In this course, students explore the musical concepts of melody, rhythm, harmony and form as applied to the principles and techniques of writing and arranging for the rhythm section (drums, bass, guitar, keyboards, basic percussion) and a lead-line in a solo instrument, two horns (trumpet, alto or tenor sax) or voice. Students learn about the conceptualization process of combining individual components to create a musically satisfying arrangement. Students also learn various contemporary musical styles and the musical concepts that comprise them, including writing from the bottom up (groove-driven) and top down (working with a melody in a lead instrument or voice). Students will complete writing assignments that incorporate combinations of acoustic, electronic, and/or MIDI instruments.
In this course, students will strengthen their command of rhythm and tonal, modal, and chromatic melody and harmony through singing, movement, recognition, dictation, and transcription. They will survey and experience a variety of ear training techniques and practices drawn from a variety of traditions, including Western classical music, jazz and blues, and West African and Indian musical cultures. Students will explore applications of ear training skills to vocal and instrumental performance including improvisation, interpretation, ensemble rehearsal, and music teaching. Each week's classes will include singing and dictation practice, rhythmic performance and movement, guided dictation and recognition activities, and discussion of methods, problems and solutions. Notated and recorded music examples used in class will come from a variety of styles, genres, cultures, and eras. Students complete ten singing and rhythm performance practice assignments, ten online and CD dictation and recognition practice assignments, two transcription projects, and two multitrack home recording projects.
This course is a study of the pervasive harmonic language and techniques of popular American song. The goal of this course is to foster an understanding of the harmonic ideas that have carried American music through the latter half of the last century, and to discover harmonic alternatives to the traditional tonal systems that pervade American popular music of this time. Students come to understand the contextual relationship between melody and harmony through observation of different song forms from different styles of popular music, including show tunes, jazz standards, blues, rock/pop/R&B, and through-composed works in the jazz idiom. Harmonic options, both diatonic and otherwise, will be observed through study of the scale(s) that relate to the chord/tonality of the moment.
In this course, students explore different topics in improvisation in various musical styles, including rock, pop, blues, and more. Students will explore the melodic styles and content of improvised solos through history, listening, ear training, shared student transcriptions and analyses, practice assignments, and creative performance projects. Students increase their knowledge of the musical choices, issues, and possibilities they face as improvisers. They learn the historical context of their own original work. Students will improve their musical ear and the connections among their musical imagination (inner hearing), aural perception, musical notation, and instrumental performance. They will develop their skills in transcription and analysis, with the goal of gaining a greater command of musical materials for use in their own music. They will experience ways in which the work of improvisers in the past can inspire their contemporary creative work in the present.
Through this course, advanced instrumentalists and vocalists learn effective teaching and clinical skills. Students learn to analyze group and individual skills; structure lessons, clinics, and rehearsals; and assess student progress. Students also model teaching scenarios with peers and engage in active professor-moderated feedback. As they apply models of music instruction, students explore educational philosophies, objectives and methods. Students master principles of educational psychology, models of music pedagogy, and various teaching techniques, with special emphasis on jazz pedagogy (jazz harmony, improvisation, jazz styles, etc.). Throughout the course, students explore motivational concepts, lesson planning, technology-based instruction, administrative organization, the student/instructor relationship, and mentorship. Students also learn strategies for working with diverse groups. This course is highly recommended for students who would like to transfer their performance skills into applied teaching knowledge using basic pedagogy principles.
In this class, student performers will gain skills in composition for a variety of genres through analysis and composition assignments. They will learn new methodologies in composition, cultivate their creativity, broaden their global knowledge as well as their musical perspective of music, and obtain a richer palette of musical tools and devices. Throughout the course, students will create their own works, developing composition skills through writing, playing, listening, analyzing, transcribing, arranging, reading, and improvising. Topics of exploration include: melodic construction, rhythm, melodic and rhythmic counterpoint, as well as the use of non-musical sources as inspiration for composing.
This course provides students with working knowledge and basic skills on a secondary instrument. Students work on technique, repertoire, and sound while gaining a better understanding of how to write, arrange, and produce for this instrument in various musical settings.
Principles of Music Research introduces the tools of music scholarship, including reference and research materials in both book and electronic forms. Students develop the skills, attitudes, and understanding to research and write about music by learning how to approach various types of scholarly study within music and by increasing their proficiency with music library resources. Projects and assignments will be tailored to the individual needs of the student working towards his/her culminating experience or thesis project. Students learn advanced information seeking, assembling a literature review, evaluating current research, writing and documenting sources professionally and ethically, distinguishing primary and secondary research, and finding and applying for funding sources. Students taking this course should have the ability to recognize, identify, and define an informational need; seek basic information in a strategic way; locate and access basic information; and evaluate information sources for essential levels of quality and relevance.
