Music Theory for Songwriters (May 2025)

Taught by Laura Jean Anderson.

In this course, you will learn the basic tools of music theory useful for expanding your own songwriting palette. We will listen and analyze songs to better recognize and label specific types of melodic and harmonic motion so we can integrate what we love about other songs into our own songwriting. We will explore and deepen our understanding of how chords and chord progressions work, ways to play in and out of a key, and how to add color to your chord progressions through chord extensions. All of this to increase the clarity in which you're able to communicate with other musicians and get you closer to making the music you want to make.

Topics covered:

• The Musical Alphabet
• Scale Degrees
• Roman Numeral Analysis
• Chord Tones
• Triads
• Borrowed Chords
• Secondary Dominants

Prerequisites:

This is an entry level course. However, it will be helpful to be comfortable playing a few basic chords on any instrument of your choice.

–––––––––––

Eight (8) 75-minute classes, twice a week. Limited enrollment.

Taught in a live, interactive classroom setting on Zoom 

Classes are recorded and sent out after class. You do not have to be able to attend every class live to sign up.

Class Dates (Pacific Time):

• Tuesday, April 29, 2025 at 8:00 AM - 9:15 AM
• Saturday, May 3, 2025 at 8:00 AM - 9:15 AM
• Tuesday, May 6, 2025 at 8:00 AM - 9:15 AM
• Saturday, May 10, 2025 at 8:00 AM - 9:15 AM
• Tuesday, May 13, 2025 at 8:00 AM - 9:15 AM
• Saturday, May 17, 2025 at 8:00 AM - 9:15 AM
• Tuesday, May 20, 2025 at 8:00 AM - 9:15 AM
• Saturday, May 24, 2025 at 8:00 AM - 9:15 AM

Sign up with a friend and you’ll both receive a 20% discount! clicking here.

If after the first two classes you feel the course is not a good fit for any reason, you are welcome to a refund on the rest of the course classes.

–––––––––––

Laura Jean Anderson, born in Olympia, Washington and now residing in Brooklyn, is a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, producer & music educator. She has garnered support from NPR, Bernie Sanders, Rolling Stone, Noisey, Salon, Fader, KCRW amongst others, proclaiming her music as a “Timeless sound…a mysterious conception that sounds as it’s from another era.”