Music Production

Effective: Fall 2021
Certificate of Achievement Program Map
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This program map from the 2024-2025 catalog year represents one possible pathway to complete this program. Your pathway may vary depending on your transfer plans and also previous college credit, including AP Test scores, concurrent enrollment courses and high school articulated courses.

I'm ready to get started. What do I do next?

  1. Review this program map to get an overview of the required courses
  2. Meet with a counselor to develop your customized student education plan www.chabotcollege.edu/counseling
  3. Use DegreeWorks, an online student education planning tool, to track your progress toward graduation www.chabotcollege.edu / admissions / degreeworks
Program Description

The Certificate of Achievement in Music Production is designed for musicians and songwriters who want to develop their creative skills while learning how to use current technologies to make music. This is a hands-on certificate program in which students will be constantly required to make sounds, create music and work on their craft. Housed in the state-of-the-art Chabot College recording studio & technology lab, this program offers a streamlined, efficient pathway for emerging musicians to establish a solid foundation of technical and aesthetic knowledge to begin working in the largely freelance and project-based creative music industry.


What can I do with this major?

Career opportunities for which this program would provide include, but are not limited to: music producer/composer, sound design, game audio, audio for visual media and performing musician from which labor market research shows is undersupply with an annual gap of about 589 students in the Bay region and 134 students in the East Bay Sub-Region. Career opportunities are largely freelance or project-based.


Learning and Career Pathway
  • Arts and Design

Icon Key

Critical Course = Critical Course Prerequisite for other courses = Prerequisite for Other Courses Prerequisite Required = Prerequisite Required Required for Major = Required for Major GE = General Education

Semester 1

4 units

MURT 20
Introduction to Music Technology

3 units
Critical Course Prerequisite for other courses Required for Major
Fundamentals of digital audio manipulation, recording and production within industry-standard digital audio workstation software. Focus on essential functionality and technical proficiency within audio platforms such as Avid ProTools and Ableton LIVE. Introduction to MIDI sequencing, digital signal processing and audio editing.
Course Details:
  • Transfers to CSU
    • Terms Offered: Fall, Spring

    Guitar, Piano or Jazz Piano (choose one)

    1 unit
    Required for Major

    MUSA 20A
    Guitar I

    1 unit
    Required for Major
    Students will be led through a one-semester course to introduce them to the guitar. The course will be split into several units that cover various aspects of understanding the instrument and the music that can be created with it. Students will learn using a combination of folk and classic approaches to playing technique, utilizing basic scales and chords in first position, and music notation. Students will also be led through a routine of tuning their guitars, warming-up, group instruction, and independent group practicing and playing.
    Course Details:
    1. Strongly Recommended: MUSL 6
    or

    MUSA 21A
    Piano I

    1 unit
    Required for Major
    Beginning piano. Contemporary and classic approaches to playing piano using basic scales, chords and music notation.
    Course Details:
    1. Strongly Recommended: MUSL 6
    or

    MUSA 22A
    Jazz Piano and Musicianship I

    1 unit
    Required for Major
    Voicings, chords, and guidelines for improvisation in the contemporary styles of the jazz pianist. Post bop-era, through modern to avant-garde piano playing in the jazz idiom.
    Course Details:
    1. Strongly Recommended: MUSL 6

    Semester 2

    6 units

    MURT 22A
    Electronic Music I

    3 units
    Prerequisite for other courses Prerequisite Required Required for Major
    This intermediate course cover the fundamentals of electronic music production and MIDI sequencing. Principles of synthesis, survey of electronic music instruments and their development, MIDI sequencing, drum machines, beat making, and multitrack electronic music production will be studied.
    Course Details:
    1. Prerequisite: MURT 20
  • Transfers to CSU
    • Terms Offered: Spring, Fall

    MUSL 28
    Musical Structure & Songwriting

    3 units
    Required for Major
    Study of contemporary rock and popular music theory with a songwriting implementation. Common chord progressions, harmonic development, song forms, lyric structure and analysis, orchestration, history and analysis of studio recording effects on important popular music styles of the mid to late 20th Century.
    Course Details:
    1. Strongly Recommended: MUSL 6

    Semester 3

    3 units

    MURT 22B
    Electronic Music II

    3 units
    Prerequisite Required Required for Major
    Advanced electronic music production. Projects will include audio for film and video, theatrical productions, video games, advertisements, sound effects and sound installations.
    Course Details:
    1. Prerequisite: MURT 22A
    Terms Offered: Fall, Spring

    Semester 4

    3 units

    MURT 31
    Sound Design

    3 units
    Prerequisite Required Required for Major
    Introduction to Sound Design and Audio Post-Production for Multimedia. Includes creating and editing Sound Effects, ADR, Foley, Music, and Ambience, for multiple visual mediums such as Film, TV, Video Gaming, Theatre, and Dance. Emphasis on computer assisted production using Digital Audio Workstations and sound design techniques using industry-standard equipment.
    Course Details:
    1. Prerequisite: MURT 20
    Terms Offered: Fall
    Total Units: 16 units
    This program map is not a guarantee of course availability or financial aid applicability.