The Berklee College of Music

Date: May 04 2013
Major: Music - Composition/Theory (This Major's Salary over time)
Berklee could be such an interesting environment to study music in if it weren't for one thing: the students. The faculty (for the most part) are fantastic. In my two semesters here I have had a bunch of teachers who are really invested in music and their students. The programs and courses are also good, or have the potential to be good. The problem is that Berklee has awful standards when it comes to selecting who gets in. I understand that its a school that focuses on popular music, and thusly a lot of students aren't going to be familiar with music theory and whatnot, but that shouldnt mean they should be allowed to "learn at their own pace" or whatever. This is music school at the collegiate level. If you want to write songs and play in a band or whatever, then do it yourself. Newsflash: IT'S NOT THAT HARD TO WRITE/PLAY POP MUSIC. Certainly not hard enough to warrant spending $50,000 a year to learn how to do it. My point is, the students are (by and large) uncreative and, quite frankly, moronic. And as if that wasn't bad enough, the school basically encourages their lazy, overly-dependent behavior by stretching out course material that could be covered in one semester into two. I wanted to come to Berklee because I thought it wouldn't just focus on classical music; that I would be able to explore all kinds of music in my studying. But instead I discovered that their primary focus seems to be distilling pop and jazz to their shallowest forms. My advice: if you have a lot of experience as a classical musician and want to expand your horizons (as I did) its probably more worth your while to find another place. This is not a place for real creativity. If you're a jazzer, you'll probably like it here, in spite of its faults. If you play/write creative popular music, STAY AWAY.