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In the recording studio, I’ve always relied on a producer to be my extra set of ears and coach--listening to my playing as it sounds to the microphone and giving me objective feedback, encouragement and challenge. Since recording is a process I greatly enjoy, I also like being in the role of producer to help artists realize their vision in the studio. Recently, I had the privilege and pleasure of working in the studio as producer for pianist Frederic Chiu. Frederic is a consummate artist--not only a virtuoso pianist, but a visionary who thinks about and hears music on a profound level. When Frederic first told me about this project, I was captivated by his vision. It was soon apparent to me how and where this recording should take place. Manifold Recording studio is wonderfully aligned with Frederic’s vision for “Hymns and Dervishes.”  Photo: Mark Manring http://manring.net/ One interesting aspect of these sessions was the fact that they were streamed live online for fans, friends, and colleagues to experience the recording process and be introduced to this unique music. Manifold owner Michael Tiemann created an optimal Ustream setup, switching cameras between Frederic at the piano in the studio room, to the control room where we listened to the recorded takes. The streams are archived here -- you can view them on YouTube and see what was broadcast during the sessions. During breaks, Frederic was even able to respond to some viewer questions and comments during the two days the stream was live. The opportunity to perform or to teach live online is growing daily. Whether a glimpse into a world-class recording studio/session, taking music lessons online or hearing a concert, live music is happening within our grasp constantly. Have you had experiences performing or teaching live online? Please share! Pianist, recording artist, educator and entrepreneur—Philip Amalong is VP of Community and Content of the ZOEN (Zenph Online Education Network).
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If you’re like me, in a traditional lesson you or your student write in a physical notebook to spell out the assignment and items of focus for the practice period before the next lesson. With an online lesson, you won’t have this physical notebook. I recommend using Google Docs. Google docs are a great tool for keeping a running notebook for your students. The historical record of your notes, assessment of the lesson and outline of practice goals is always available for reference and progress tracking, and the student can add their practice log and notes to the doc, creating a running journal.
Basics of Google Docs 1. Select Drive at the top of your Google menu:  2. Create>Document  This will make an untitled document that you can name by student and time period (e.g. July 2012) or initiative (Solo and Ensemble Preparation) in the document list:  3. You can create a folder (Create>Folder) for each of your students and keep their running document or a series of documents in the folder. 4. Share the document with your student: the blue Share button at the top right of the page allows you to enter a student or student’s parent email address to share the document. Only you and those with whom you share the document will see it.  5. The student can keep a simple practice journal by adding notes with with the Comment feature (similar to Microsoft Word).
 Google Drive contains free tools that facilitate communication and collaboration between lessons. You may find many creative ways to use the different tools beyond the docs. Have some cool things you’ve done with Google Drive? Please share and add your comments below! Pianist, recording artist, educator and entrepreneur—Philip Amalong is VP of Community and Content for the ZOEN (Zenph Online Education Network).
What do lawyers, ice cream shops, chiropractors, car dealers, candy stores, financial services professionals, insurance brokers, real estate agents, satellite radio, software applications and a host of other assorted products and services have in common? They all offer free trials, samples, or consultations. A session of their time for free (or many sessions in the case of a real estate agent,) a sample of the product, a test drive, an opportunity to experience the therapy... Music teacher's thoughts on this vary widely. Typically, their reasons for not offering free trial lessons are that the student is "window shopping" or that a free lesson "devalues" their lesson experience. Consider: Window shopping: The student may very well be looking for the teacher who is the best fit and sampling multiple teachers. From our perspective as teachers, we have a strong personal connection to our work and want students who we think are a good fit. Devalue Lessons?: If the teacher communicates their fees clearly upfront, the lesson value becomes evident in the free trial lesson, not devalued. "But my time is too valuable!" That's exactly the point. If you're a music teacher, consider that a twenty or thirty minute free session with a prospective student serves multiple purposes, while obligating neither party:
So think about it--you're worth it. If you want more students and a fulfilling teaching experience by teaching students who you want to teach, consider offering free samples. This is especially true if the delivery medium is unfamiliar and you're working in the still uncharted territory of live online webcam lessons. I'll bet the lawyers and chiropractors and finance people wish they had a relationship with their clients that allowed them to navigate a world of beauty and craft with the depth of music. Ask the next one that you have as a student. Also, ask them about the efficacy of free. What are your thoughts and experiences with trial lessons? Please share! About the Author: Pianist, recording artist, educator and entrepreneur—Philip Amalong is VP of Community and Content for the ZOEN (Zenph Online Education Network).
You’ve made the leap. Perhaps you’re already teaching your music lessons online (Skype lessons?) or you’ve decided that it’s for you and you’re ready to go. You’ve got your webcam set up and optimized, your studio is looking great, your Internet speed is screaming. Now what? The title of this post sounds like it may be about how to price your lessons. My intention, however, is for it to be a consideration of how you spend your time and what your priorities are. Unless you’re simply transferring your physical teaching to online, you need students. Your online teaching studio lives in the virtual world, so despite the “viral” nature of that world, you’re probably not going to be getting student referrals from fellow teachers, through your friends and family network, your Yellow Pages ad or even, believe it or not, from your website. It’s a massive space--full of possibility, but also chock full of great ways to waste your money and valuable time! You absolutely should have a website, write a blog, frequent the websites rich with music teaching information and resources. But don’t rely on your website to attract significant traffic that will convert into online music students--this doesn’t happen without a large investment of time and money. Professional marketers make a daily habit of studying the ever-changing and latest SEO (Search Engine Optimization), writing and buying effective digital marketing ads, understanding the analytics of search behavior, and optimizing, optimizing optimizing--sometimes many times each day. Additionally, you’ll want to have great resources for your online teaching--a robust solution for delivering the video/audio, tools that enhance the online learning experience, resources for best practices and a community of professionals who understand and support what you’re doing. Skype is a tool best used for weekend cross-country family get togethers, when all the throttling and inconsistency can be tolerated. You’re a professional though, and you can’t tolerate this for the learning that you want your students to achieve. My suggestion: focus on what you makes you special and valuable: teaching music! Trolling the Internet and spending hours posting on listservs for answers, dealing with the trial and error of various software solutions, trying various marketing gimmicks...is this really what you want to spend your time doing? So, you may ask, where does this leave me? How do I find these online students? How do I keep up with the state of the art in delivering online lessons? I’ve outlined a number of tips here, and will continue this series by sharing specific ideas and solutions about how you can build the best online teaching studio that connects you with the students who are the best fit for you.
Matt Brechbiel, guitarist and teacher, partner at Falls River Music in Raleigh NC offers some insights on his personal journey, his perspective on music students and teaching today, and the future of live online lessons.
1) Please tell us a little about your musical and teaching background. My background is a little different from a traditional music teacher’s background, in the respect that I was completely self-taught. I figured it all out by painstakingly listening to albums, over and over. It all changed one day when I saw this kid who was trying to play a song but was going about it all wrong. I could see his frustration because it just didn’t sound right to him. I asked him if I could show him how to play it. He was ecstatic with the results, so I showed him a few more songs that could be played using the same chords as the first. He looked at me and told me that he had learned more from me in 10 minutes than what he had learned from his guitar teacher in 6 months of lessons. Ding Ding Ding! My inner entrepreneur bell went off. I started teaching lessons out of my parent's house along with a friend of mine and we offered hour lessons (½ hour lessons with each of us). Within one year we had 35 students a week with more calling daily. We quickly outgrew my parents’ house, so I went to a local music store and made an arrangement teaching for them. By the next year I was teaching 53 people a week. Remember, this was all before every home owned a computer (wow, I’m dating myself). What made my teaching approach different than the traditional teacher’s was that I didn’t base my curriculum on typical music books. I customized every lesson to the individual student. I used the songs they liked and wanted to learn as the basis for the music theory. I got them playing first, and they were learning the theory along the way. This approach is more prevalent now, with the popularity of video-sharing and guitar tab sites, but back then, it was totally different. People seemed to like my non-traditional approach and luckily, via word-of-mouth, my student base kept growing. In 1999, I was offered the opportunity to work on Wall Street, utilizing the other passion in my life which is technology. I am a total computer geek! While I wasn’t teaching private lessons every week, I took the time that I spent commuting on the train to write my lesson plans and overall approach for teaching guitar. That became a successful e-book called Vital Guitar Theory Vol. 1 (available on Amazon). Wall Street was a great opportunity and my experience in the tech world was irreplaceable. However, after 9/11 and the subsequent market crash, the company I was working for went under and I found myself trying to re-invent myself, utilizing all my knowledge, work experience and, most importantly, my God-given talent as a musician. Today, I teach out of Falls River Music in Raleigh, NC. I now teach acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bass guitar, music production, recording, live music, and songwriting. In fact, one of my students (who happens to be 13 years old) just won the 2012 Carolina Music Awards in the Youth Category. She was nominated for the songs we wrote and recorded during her weekly ½ hour lessons. So, it all comes down to music and technology, two of my favorite things. And with an added dose of entrepreneurship I've managed to teach people how they can coexist together! 2) What is your experience with teaching live online lessons? What do you think are the benefits for teachers? For students? What are the potential and future of online lessons? The challenges? Sometime in 2005 or 2006, my wife had to participate in a webinar for work. As I watched it with her, that inner bell of mine went off. I thought that with a little bit of tweaking I could use this tool to be able to teach guitar and increase my student base. It was a pretty involved setup using a video camera, a separate mixer and computer for all the audio, some PowerPoint slides, etc., but in no time I was up and teaching guitar via web conferencing software. I took advantage of the time difference and in the morning taught lessons to people who were in Europe, then in the evening to students living in the USA. The only trouble I encountered was that I was great with technology and teaching, but I was an absolute beginner in the world of online advertising. For this reason, I know that teaching networks and solutions like the ZOEN will be amazing for teachers. Like every other musician in the world, I don’t have a huge marketing budget to work with. If the marketing and billing aspect is taken care of by The ZOEN, much like how it is done in traditional music schools and teaching studios, the teachers can concentrate on the students and teaching. For students (and parents), the convenience of live online music lessons is probably the best feature. In a world of trying to juggle multiple schedules, being able to have lessons in your own home means a lot to the busy household. The time factor is also great because sites like The ZOEN have teachers everywhere. The teaching schedule can be a lot more flexible. For example, if you’re an adult student who can only squeeze in a lesson later in the evening after you’ve put the kids to bed, you’re sure to find a teacher to accommodate you. The possibilities are endless, especially with all the technology that is coming down the pike. The only challenge for teachers that I foresee is getting over the difference of not having the student physically in the room with you. I think it would only take a few lessons to overcome any difficulty in teaching remotely. I would suggest that for the first couple of lessons to teach a current student—someone you are already familiar with. This will allow you to get used to the new platform. 3) Do you think that the massive glut of video learning content is a challenge to live lessons or complimentary to them? I love all the videos and guitar tabs that are available, I really do. I wish they were around when I was learning. With that being said, you get what you pay for. There is no lesson that can give you instant feedback or advice like a live lesson. I can’t count the amount of students who have come to me after having tried, unsuccessfully, to learn solely via pre-recorded video lessons. They may know how to play a song or two, but their technique is non-existent. "Again, I always get the comment, "I wish I had taken lessons first because I’ve learned more in this half hour than in all the hours spent online.” Again, I always get the comment, "I wish I had taken lessons first because I’ve learned more in this half hour than in all the hours spent online.” I had one adult student who had been teaching himself using only online videos. When I asked him about barre chords he said he had tried for months but just couldn't play them. I asked him to show me. He tried to play a chord, but it came out all muted. I said to him, "Move your left elbow about two inches out." Boom! Out came the chords. He looked at me and said, “Are you kidding me? That’s all it took?" It was something you would never get from just watching a video. 4) When a prospective online student comes to you, what is your approach? Exactly the same approach I would use if I were teaching them in my studio. I ask them what they want to learn. This allows me to get to know them then dive right into the learning process. I get them to play ASAP—the rest will fall right into place. If they’re an adult and just want to learn songs to relieve stress, then let’s do it. If they’re a younger student, we can use more traditional methods and books to get them ready to further their music education. 5) What are some trends you are noticing among students today? Younger students are very internet-minded and tech-savvy. They know that anything they want to know or learn about is available for them on the internet, including how to play guitar, piano, etc. They will constantly test you and question things just because they saw a video of someone else doing it a different way. They are bombarded with information and really are in need of someone to help them sort through all of it and figure it all out. "...get on the train now because if not, you’re going to be sitting by yourself at the station." 6) What advice do you have for teachers entering the world of online teaching? My advice is simple: get on the train now because if not, you’re going to be sitting by yourself at the station. As people get more and more comfortable with using the internet for communications and videoconferencing (thank you, Skype), their hunger for learning will only become greater. They will look outside of their hometown teachers. Now people who live in remote parts of the world can learn and teach music. All that is needed is an internet connection. Set your own hours and, with a facilitator of live online music lessons like the ZOEN, taking care of marketing and billing is an absolute no-brainer. The possibilities for music instruction are endless. Actually, it’s not so new… “Skype music lessons” have been around for years and many teachers have been very successful in delivering live lessons over the Internet. But there remain many questions surrounding this vast uncharted territory: “How do I find new online students? I’ve never done this—how does it work? What are the benefits? Is it effective? How do I get started?”…
When I started teaching online college courses in 2002, I was viewed as either a heretic or a quirky pioneer, and online teaching and learning was considered merely a pragmatic or novel delivery method. This has changed dramatically, with most colleges and universities across the world now having a solid roster of online offerings. Enterprises such as edX, Udacity and Coursera are launching with regularity, making online learning a hot and growing field. Live online interactive learning is still the exception—most online models are asynchronous. In the area of live music lessons (and language and coaching) however, many teachers have moved to the Internet, some converting their entire traditional studio practices to online. Some music teachers look askance at these music-teaching heretics, others simply recognize that it’s not for them. But a significant number are curious if not intensely interested. The benefits for both the teaching studio and for the learning outcomes are numerous. As I talk with teachers around the country, many are clearly recognizing and capitalizing on the opportunities that online lessons offer. I look forward to sharing my experiences, best practices, equipment and software recommendations, and stories of successful online teaching and learning that I gather from my interaction with great music teachers around the country. |
AuthorObserver of the world of music, performance, learning and technology. Performer, Producer, Recording Artist, VP Community and Content-Zenph Inc. Categories
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Philip Amalong | Pianist, Recording Artist, Educator, VP-The ZOEN
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