The course consists of instruction in the essential principles of tonal music, which includes fundamental concepts of rhythm, melody, and harmony.
Music theory is the principal foundation for musical understanding and musicianship.
It consists of the elements that underlie all music, and provides the tools for integrating musical elements into an entire range of musical experience, including listening, performing, composing, and interpreting. The purpose of the course is to teach for musical understanding so that the musician will learn to recognize, perceive, organize, and develop concepts about musical relationships. Students must have proficient reading skill in both bass and treble clefs. A diagnostic placement test is given on the first day of the semester. A. Principles to be learned include notation of pitch and rhythm, recognition of rhythmic patterns, meters, tonality, cadences, scales, intervals, triads, and elementary four-part writing.