Learn how to craft melodies and chord progressions like professional musicians, and discover an intuitive and deep understanding of how music works.
Written in an easy-to-understand music format that emphasizes chord and melody function.
If you don’t read sheet music, you’re out of luck. Also, sheet music really isn’t great for teaching how music works.
Rich audiovisual animations that play along as you learn.
No sound. No video.
Popular Artists
Discover the tactics used by popular artists from the past and present. Together, we will dissect 324 popular songs and show you how the pros do it.
J. S. Bach
Song examples you probably aren’t interested in.
Learn and immediately practice concepts and tactics with our accompanying musical sketchpad, Hookpad.
No other music teaching book has anything like this.
Learn from 124 interactive exercises and 324 audiovisual examples from artists like The Beatles, Journey, Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, Adele, Coldplay, Billy Joel, Lady Gaga, Elton John, Maroon 5 and more!
Hey there. We're Chris Anderson, Ryan Miyakawa, and David Carlton - the founders of Hooktheory (left to right). We all have PhDs from UC Berkeley. Our shared passion for music and education led to the creation of Hooktheory in 2011. You can find out more about us and our story here.
Validated by over 30,000 hobby and pro musicians like you, the Hooktheory Book Series is the best selling how-to series for musicians around the world for a reason.