Berklee College of Music

• 1. Introduction

  ›

  Berklee College of Music got its name from a twelve-year-old boy. In 1954, founder Lawrence Berk renamed his growing school after his son, Lee Eliot Berk. The new name was meant to reflect how far its teaching had already expanded.

  Before that renaming, the school was called Schillinger House. Lawrence Berk, a pianist, composer, arranger and MIT graduate, had quit a job at Raytheon to open it in Boston's Back Bay. Its lessons centered on the Schillinger System of harmony and composition, a method developed by Joseph Schillinger, with whom Berk himself had studied. Almost every other music school of that era taught only classical repertoire. Berk's school instead trained musicians for jazz, radio, theater, television and dance.

  That small, unconventional experiment eventually produced a staggering record. Berklee alumni have won 310 Grammy Awards between them, more than alumni from any other college in the world. They have also collected 108 Latin Grammy Awards, 34 Emmy Awards, 7 Tony Awards, 8 Academy Awards and 3 Saturn Awards.

  How does a school built around a homemade harmony system, in a single Back Bay building, end up outproducing every conservatory on the planet? And how far would its classrooms eventually stretch beyond Boston?

• 2. Musicians As Teachers

  ›

  Trumpeter Herb Pomeroy joined the Berklee faculty in 1956 and stayed until his retirement in 1996. Founder Lawrence Berk preferred hiring practitioners over academics, and he generally chose working musicians as faculty. Drummer Alan Dawson and saxophonist Charlie Mariano both joined the faculty in 1957. Reed player John LaPorta began teaching in 1962. That hiring philosophy still holds today, even though new hires now carry heavier academic credentials. Performers such as Mick Goodrick, Pat Metheny and Arif Mardin have taught there over the years. So have Aydin Esen, Hal Crook, Joe Lovano and Danilo Perez.

  Japanese pianist Toshiko Akiyoshi arrived at the school in 1956, part of a wave of international students drawn to Berklee in the mid-1950s. Arif Mardin, who would later win multiple Grammy Awards as a producer, traveled from Turkey to study there in 1958.

  In 1957, Berklee began releasing Jazz in the Classroom, a series of LP recordings of student work paired with printed scores. The series ran until 1980, preserving early recordings by students who went on to notable jazz careers. Among them were Gary Burton, John Abercrombie, John Scofield, Ernie Watts, Alan Broadbent and Sadao Watanabe. Later releases also became teaching material for students in the school's newer majors, music engineering and production, and music business and management.

  When Berklee awarded its first bachelor of music degrees in 1966, the graduates included Alf Clausen, Stephen Gould and Michael Rendish. Gould went on to teach film scoring at Berklee himself, and later directed the Educational Leadership PhD program at Lesley University.

• 3. Curriculum Firsts

  ›

  The school renamed itself Berklee College of Music in 1970. A year later, it awarded its first honorary doctorate, to Duke Ellington. Vibraphonist Gary Burton joined the faculty in 1971 and helped bring jazz-rock fusion firmly into the curriculum. As Dean of Curriculum from 1985 to 1996, Burton went on to develop new majors, including music synthesis and songwriting.

  In 1962, Berklee introduced the first college-level instrumental major for guitar, starting with just nine students. Guitarist Jack Petersen, whom Berk discovered through the Stan Kenton Band Clinics, was invited to design and chair that curriculum. The guitar major eventually grew into the largest instrumental major at the college. Trombonist Phil Wilson joined the faculty in 1965, and his student ensemble, the Dues Band, pulled contemporary popular music into the ensemble curriculum. Later, as the Rainbow Band, that same ensemble performed world music and jazz fusions.

  In 1969, Berklee added courses in rock and popular music, the first offered at the college level anywhere. That same year brought the first college course in jingle writing. More firsts followed. Berklee launched the first electric bass guitar major in 1973 and the first jazz-rock ensemble class in 1974. In 1980, it introduced the world's first undergraduate degree program in film scoring.

  The string department broadened its curriculum in 1981 to include styles well beyond classical music. Berklee introduced the world's first college-level music synthesis major in 1986, followed by the world's first college songwriting major in 1987. A hand-percussion major, another college first, arrived in 1988. Bass chair Rich Appleman pushed this pattern further, pioneering bass education at a time when most conservatories offered only a double bass major. In 2004, a dedicated hip-hop course entered the curriculum as well. Mandolin and banjo were accepted as principal instruments for the first time in 2006.

  In 2005, the college began publishing the Music Business Journal, a periodical covering the music industry that continues today.

• 4. By The Numbers

  ›

  Fewer than 50 students enrolled in Berklee's earliest classes, a number that swelled past 500 within just a few years. Many of the earliest students were working professional musicians, and many others were World War II veterans funded through the G.I. Bill. By 1970, total enrollment had reached 1,000 students, 80 of them from outside the United States. Between 1968 and 1969, the number of women enrolled jumped from 11 to 44.

  By the 2021-2022 academic year, total enrollment stood at 7,943, split between 7,177 undergraduates and 766 graduate students. Among undergraduates, 42 percent were female and 58 percent male; among graduate students, the split was 46 percent female and 54 percent male. Of the full student body, 73 identified as transgender or gender diverse. Students from 97 countries outside the United States made up about a quarter of the student population. China, Canada, India, Brazil and Colombia were the top five countries of origin. That same year, 1,895 students took courses through Berklee Online. The share of international students had already climbed steadily, reaching 24.2 percent of enrollment by 2010 and later passing 28 percent.

  For the 2017-2018 school year, Berklee College of Music in Boston admitted 33.8 percent of applicants. The Boston Conservatory admitted 38 percent that year, and Berklee Online admitted 66 percent. From 2014 to 2017, Berklee reported acceptance rates ranging from 28 to 36 percent. Starting in fall 2018, the admissions office began counting only paid applications, rather than every partial application as before. Admission itself hinges on a live audition, an interview and the applicant's academic record. Entering students may choose among fall, spring or summer semesters. Fall deadlines fall on November 1 for early action and January 15 for regular action, with July 1 for spring and December 1 for summer. Starting in 2014, some applicants have been able to audition online using high-speed internet technology.

  By 2016, the college's student retention rate had climbed above 80 percent, and by 2015 its graduation rate had passed 60 percent.

• 5. Building Boston

  ›

  Berklee moved out of its original building in 1966, relocating to the larger 1140 Boylston Street, once known as the Hotel Bostonian. In 1972, the college bought the Fenway Theatre and the adjoining Sherry Biltmore Hotel at 150 Massachusetts Avenue. The theatre reopened in 1976 as the 1,227-seat Berklee Performance Center. The former hotel added classrooms, practice rooms and residence halls, plus a library later renamed the Stan Getz Library and Media Center in 1998.

  The Berklee Learning Center opened at 150 Massachusetts Avenue in 1993, billed as the world's largest networked computer learning facility for music education. The Genko Uchida Center at 921 Boylston Street opened in 1997. It houses admissions, financial aid, the registrar, and the 200-seat David Friend Recital Hall. At 939 Boylston Street, Café 939 bills itself as the nation's only student-run, all-ages nightclub, hosting student performers alongside touring acts.

  Berklee's campus eventually spread across 25 buildings, mostly near the intersection of Boylston Street and Massachusetts Avenue. Those buildings held 40 recording studios, 5 film and video scoring and editing facilities, and 9 music synthesis facilities. In 2007, the college launched the Berklee Internet Radio Network, a five-channel, commercial-free station broadcasting from studios on campus. A new Liberal Arts building at 7 Haviland Street was dedicated in 2010. It houses the Liberal Arts, Music Therapy and Music Business departments, along with the Africana Studies program.

  In early 2011, Berklee announced plans for three new buildings along Massachusetts Avenue. The first, a 16-story mixed-use building at 160 Massachusetts Avenue, opened in February 2014. It added 370 dorm rooms, a two-story cafeteria, a performance center and 14,000 square feet of recording studios. Boston Globe architecture critic Robert Campbell called it, in his words, a very good building. The building went on to win the American Institute of Architects' 2015 Housing Award, one of the ten best residential projects of the year. A second building is planned atop the existing structure at 130-136 Massachusetts Avenue, adding about 450 student beds and a performance center inside a 24-story tower. A third, at 161-171 Massachusetts Avenue, is planned to hold more academic and administrative space.

  That same expansion drive crossed the Atlantic in 2012, when Berklee opened a campus in Valencia, Spain.

• 6. Beyond Boston

  ›

  Berklee's Valencia campus is housed inside the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía, the final structure built for architect Santiago Calatrava's City of Arts and Sciences complex. There, the college runs clinics, workshops and seminars in performance, flamenco, film scoring, music business, technology and production, and education. Valencia also hosts a two-week summer performance program, shorter than the five-week version held in Boston.

  In 1993, Berklee partnered with select music schools worldwide to form the Berklee International Network. BerkleeNYC, the college's New York campus, is housed in the Power Station studios in Hell's Kitchen. It offers a one-year, three-semester Master of Arts in Creative Technology.

  In 2002, the college said it became the first to offer online undergraduate degrees. The following year, it began teaching classes through Berkleemusic.com under Dave Kusek, later renamed Berklee Online. In October 2013, Berklee Online started accepting applications for a 120-credit Bachelor of Professional Studies in Music Production and in Music Business. In November 2014, it added three more majors: Electronic Music Production and Sound Design, Music Composition for Film, TV and Games, and Interdisciplinary Music Studies. Guitar, Songwriting, and Songwriting and Producing Music followed later, and graduate degrees arrived in 2018 in music production and music business. From 2005 to 2012, the University Professional Continuing Education Association gave Berklee Online its Best Online College Course Award. Since it began, Berklee Online has taught more than 30,000 students from 144 countries. Former Berklee Online students include members of Nine Inch Nails and Dave Matthews Band's Stefan Lessard. They also include Karmin's Amy Heidemann, Sugarland's Annie Clements, Brandon Bush and Thad Beatty, and members of Train.

  In June 2015, the governing boards of Berklee College of Music and the Boston Conservatory approved a proposed merger. They confirmed the merger on the 19th of January 2016, and signed the agreement the next day. Berklee College of Music was renamed simply Berklee, while the Boston Conservatory became the Boston Conservatory at Berklee.

  Lawrence Berk stepped down as president in 1979, and the board appointed his son, Lee Eliot Berk, to succeed him. Lee Eliot Berk stepped down in 2004, and Roger H. Brown was installed as the college's third president. On the 22nd of October 2020, Berklee named Erica Muhl as president-elect as Brown announced his retirement. Muhl had previously served at the University of Southern California. There she was dean and founding executive director of the Jimmy Iovine and Andre Young Academy for Arts, Technology and the Business of Innovation. David Bogen served as interim president from 2023 to 2024, and Jim Lucchese took over in 2025.

  For the fall semester of 2020, Berklee taught its classes remotely because of the COVID-19 pandemic, before moving to a hybrid model in spring 2021. In 2025, Berklee joined remixers Ben Zakharenko and Dayvin in producing a theme for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, representing the Boston area.

  The very next year, in 2017, Berklee faced a very different kind of scrutiny. Not every chapter of its growth had been triumphant.

• 7. A Reckoning

  ›

  In November 2017, The Boston Globe reported that a culture of sexual harassment existed on Berklee's campus. At least three male professors had been allowed to quietly leave the school in 2008 after student reports of sexual misconduct with teachers. College administrators responded with a statement saying Berklee had rigorous policies and procedures in place to handle harassment claims.

  On the 13th of November 2017, students staged a silent protest and class walkout over the allegations. That same day, president Roger Brown addressed more than 1,200 students, apologized to those affected, and pledged, as he put it, to root out abusive behavior. He also said the school had terminated eleven faculty members over the preceding thirteen years for sexual harassment and sexual assault.

  The college has since described concrete steps taken in response: new training courses, a dedicated working group, and an effort to diversify its leadership.