Schillinger System of Musical Composition

The Schillinger System of Musical Composition, named after Joseph Schillinger (1895–1943) is a method of musical composition based on mathematical processes. It comprises theories of rhythm, harmony, melody, counterpoint, form, and semantics (emotional meaning, as in movie music).

It offers a systematic and non-genre specific approach to music analysis and composition, a descriptive rather than prescriptive grammar of music. The Schillinger System might have served as a road map for many later developments in music theory and composition. Instead, it languished in relative obscurity.

Schillinger was a professor at The New School in New York City and taught such celebrated musicians as George Gershwin, Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, and a host of Hollywood and Broadway composers.

Schillinger's celebrity status made him suspect, and his ideas were treated with skepticism. He died early from stomach cancer. He did not finish work on the texts he hoped would advance his theories in the realm of academia. His widow and biographer, Frances Schillinger, hired editors to complete and publish a text. They pulled together his unfinished monograph with parts of his correspondence courses. Despite its length, it presents only a partial exposition of the system. For example, Schillinger's theory of counterpoint covers only two-part counterpoint. It is marred by a wildly uneven tone, at times neutral and objective, at times vehement and polemical. Critics almost universally panned the work. His method remained difficult and obscure for the uninitiated.

His flamboyant manner based on extreme assertions is evident in his writings: "These procedures were performed crudely by even well reputed composers. For example L. Van Beethoven…"

Later, in The Theory of Melody, Beethoven is taken to task over the construction of the opening melody of his Pathétique Sonata.

Schillinger's System of Musical Composition is an attempt to create a comprehensive and definitive treatise on music and number. This has the disadvantage of resulting in a treatise of great length and elaborate nomenclature. By revealing principles of the organization of sound through scientific analysis, Schillinger hoped to free the composer from the shackles of tradition. Although the system is forward-looking, couched in an apparently modern form, it also clarifies traditional music theory by debunking misconceptions from the past. He was clear that his methods allowed any style of composition to be undertaken more effectively.

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