All entering graduate students are required to take a diagnostic examination in music theory before being allowed to enroll in music theory courses at the graduate level. The examination, which is administered one or two days before the beginning of each term, includes but is not limited to the following.
Special emphasis is placed on the music of the common-practice era.
In preparation for the examination students may wish to review one or more standard undergraduate textbooks. We recommend the following. Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1989. This is the textbook used in the first four semesters of the core music theory sequence at the University of Alabama, and is the one we most strongly recommend. Other texts that cover essentially the same material include Allen Forte's Tonal Harmony in Theory and Practice and Robert Gauldin's Harmonic Practice in Tonal Music .