My Experience With MasterClass Music Courses
Greg Kocis My MasterClass Experience
On May 7, 2021, while New York City was still dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns, I enrolled in MasterClass for a one-year membership. With so much of life still disrupted at the time, I spent a significant amount of that period exploring the many courses available on the platform.
I took numerous music-related courses, including classes covering songwriting, music production, guitar, singing, jazz, electronic music, hip-hop, film scoring, performance, and other areas of music.
I don’t remember for certain whether I renewed my MasterClass membership for a second year, although I believe I probably did. During my time as a member, I also began making reviews and videos about some of the MasterClass courses on my YouTube channel. MasterClass eventually invited me to participate in its affiliate program, which allowed me to promote the courses I was reviewing.
Music Courses I’ve Taken
My MasterClass music courses have included:
- Metallica — Being a Band
- Alicia Keys — Songwriting and Producing
- Timbaland — Producing and Beatmaking
- St. Vincent — Creativity and Songwriting
- Herbie Hancock — Jazz
- Armin van Buuren — Dance Music
- Carlos Santana — Art and Soul of Guitar
- Hans Zimmer — Film Scoring
- Yo-Yo Ma — Music and Connection
- Nas — Hip-Hop Storytelling
- Christina Aguilera — Singing
- deadmau5 — Electronic Music Production
- Reba McEntire — Country Music
- Questlove — Music Curation and DJing
- Sheila E. — Drumming and Percussion
- Tom Morello — Electric Guitar
- Usher — The Art of Performance
What I Like About MasterClass
The biggest strength of MasterClass, in my experience, is access to the artists themselves.
You aren’t simply watching a generic instructor explain a subject. You’re getting the perspective, experiences, philosophies, and creative approaches of people who have actually worked at the highest levels of the music industry.
The music courses can be full of useful tips, tricks, ideas, and creative inspiration. Sometimes a single comment from an artist about how they approach a song, performance, instrument, or production can give me something to think about and apply to my own work.
I also like the variety.
I listen to all kinds of music, so I’m willing to take a course from an artist even if I’m not particularly familiar with their music. In fact, some of those courses can end up being the most inspiring because I’m being exposed to a completely different creative perspective.
And sometimes, you don’t need to analyze everything.
Watching something like Metallica — Being a Band can simply be fun. Not every educational experience has to feel like homework. Sometimes seeing how a successful band works together and hearing their stories is valuable—and entertaining—on its own.
The Difference Between Inspiration and Hands-On Training
There is one important distinction I’ve noticed after taking a lot of these courses.
MasterClass is excellent for inspiration, creative perspective, and learning from major artists, but I don’t consider it the strongest option for hands-on technical music production training.
A lot of the MasterClass courses are presented more like high-quality masterclasses or documentary-style lessons. You learn how the instructor thinks, how they approach their craft, and what they’ve learned throughout their career.
That’s different from sitting down in a DAW and following an instructor through an entire production from beginning to end.
For someone who wants to learn the technical, hands-on side of music production, I have personally found some of the dedicated production courses I’ve taken elsewhere to be more useful. Those courses tend to spend more time actually working through the process and showing you how things are done step by step.
So I wouldn’t necessarily look at MasterClass and a dedicated music-production training program as competitors. They serve somewhat different purposes.
Why I Still Enjoy the Music Courses
Even with that distinction, I think the MasterClass music courses are worth exploring if you’re interested in songwriting, music production, or simply learning more about how successful musicians think.
The biggest advantage is the breadth of perspectives.
You can go from Alicia Keys talking about songwriting and production to Timbaland discussing beats, Hans Zimmer discussing film scoring, Carlos Santana talking about guitar, Nas discussing hip-hop storytelling, or Herbie Hancock discussing jazz.
You’re essentially getting a collection of very different creative philosophies in one membership.
And because MasterClass includes courses outside of music as well, there’s another unexpected benefit: I actually enjoy some of the cooking courses as much as—or sometimes more than—the music courses.
That’s one of the cool things about having a MasterClass membership. You’re not limited to music. You can jump from songwriting to cooking, filmmaking, business, photography, or another subject whenever something catches your interest.
My Overall Take
My experience with MasterClass has been very positive, particularly as a source of creative inspiration and exposure to different ways of thinking about music.
If you’re looking for detailed, hands-on instruction in music production, I would personally look at dedicated music-production training as well. But if you want to hear directly from major artists and learn about their creative processes, careers, philosophies, and approaches to music, MasterClass is a unique resource.
For me, the value isn’t necessarily that every course is going to teach me a specific production technique that I can immediately use in Logic Pro.
Sometimes the value is simply hearing a great musician explain why they do what they do.
And sometimes the value is discovering an artist, style, or creative approach that I might never have explored otherwise.
That’s what makes the MasterClass music library interesting to me: it’s as much about inspiration and perspective as it is about instruction.