Monthly Archives: August 2011

Jazz for Your Students! – guest post by Adam Bendorf

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Alberti Publishing has recently launched an on-line store where you can instantly download and print hundreds of piano pieces! (You might recognize the publishing company from their first book, the attractive and colorful The Right Notes student assignment book.) Company President, Adam Bendorf shares about some of their musical selections and a special discount code in the following guest post:

JAZZ FOR YOUR STUDENTS!
by Adam Bendorf

Looking for a great way to spice up your students’ repertoire this fall?  Look no further!  Gina Pruitt’s jazz series for students is now available through Alberti Publishing’s online store.  All books are in downloadable PDF format.

Check out the great jazz titles:


Jazzmania Fun tunes in classic jazz styles (Intermediate / Advanced)


Rockin’ Roundup Western-themed jazz pieces (Intermediate)


Goin’ Gospel Sacred tunes in the Gospel style.  (Intermediate)


Halloween Hurrah Spooky jazz tunes in minor keys (Elementary / Intermediate)

Use discount code GPA20 and receive 20% off during the month of August!

ABOUT GINA PRUITT
Gina Pruitt is a piano professor, private teacher, and composer.  A frequent presenter at piano workshops, Gina’s compositions receive high praise for their wit, creativity, and pedagogical value.  Gina is classically trained, having received her Master’s degree in piano performance from the University of Texas; she also participated in the Doctoral program at USC. Jazz mentors include recording artists Milcho Leviev and Charlie Shoemake.

Alberti Publishing is our newest advertiser here on Music Matters Blog and we are grateful for their support of the online music education community! If you are interested in finding out more about how you can promote your company, event, or product, just send me an e-mail and I’ll let you know about our advertising packages.

Review and Giveaway of In Search of Composer DVDs by Seventh Art Productions

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Several weeks ago, I shared a few things I gleaned from the magazine, Listen. After the particularly interesting article with documentarian, Phil Grabsky, I was eager to get my hands on DVDs of In Search of Beethoven and In Search of Mozart. Seventh Art Productions graciously sent me a couple copies for review and I am thoroughly impressed!

The films are a collection of interviews with historians and musicians, commentary on the times in which the composer lived, and incredible live excerpts of of performances of the composer’s works by leading symphonies and musicians from around the world! What I loved most was getting to travel progressively with the composer through his life and gain a better understanding of the chronological order of his compositions and the events and experiences that inspired each one.

The films are very professional and insightful and last approximately two hours.  The In Search of Beethoven film comes with a bonus disc of special features, including deleted scenes, an interview the director, and complete movements. These would make a marvelous addition to the library of every music lover, teacher, professor, and student!

Seventh Art Productions is generously offering one of each DVD as a giveaway to Music Matters Blog readers! Just leave a comment below to be entered in a drawing to win one of these excellent films. The winner will be drawn using a random number generator at noon (CST) on Thursday, August 18.

Monday Mailbag – Teaching Note Recognition

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I need some new ideas for the same old problem…teaching note recognition. I am so tired of students asking, ” is it ‘every good boy does fine’ or ‘good boys deserve fudge always’? What works for you?

I have several Monday Mailbag questions dealing with teaching note recognition in my inbox right now, so I thought it would be a good topic to hit before we all start back up for the fall. Here are some of my favorite resources:

Notes in the Fast Lane – these wonderful worksheets by Susan Paradis have become a staple in my studio. If you haven’t used them yet, do yourself and your students a favor and print off the whole set, make several copies, stick them in sheet protectors, and start using them!

5 for Fun! – this booklet that I put together has a section of games devoted to note identification. I use these all the time in my studio to make the process more fun for my students, especially those who really struggle in this area.

Across the C’s – this unique approach to reading notes in different octaves and familiarizing the student with intervallic reading has done wonders for some of my students. It’s an easy concept to grasp, and even the young ones feel such a sense of accomplishment in being able to play notes all over the keyboard.

Custom-designed flashcards – a fast, fun way to give students exactly  which notes you want them to work on. You can keep adding until they have a whole set of their own special custom drawn flashcards! They love it! In fact, here’s a quick snapshot of Emily with her special set of flash cards stored safely in the pocket of her overalls:

I use these in the lessons and also send them home with the student with ideas for games they can play on their own. Reinforcement is so essential to fully master note recognition. Also, I almost always incorporate them playing the corresponding key on the piano, not just saying the name. It takes significant effort for some students to grasp the concept that each line or space represents a particular key on the piano.

Those are the tried and true approaches I use with my students, but I would sure love to add some new ideas for the year ahead. Is there anything you have found particularly helpful in teaching note recognition to students? Any new resources you’ve come across lately? Do tell!

Remember, if you have a question you’d like to contribute to next week’s Monday Mailbag, leave it in the comments below or send me an e-mail sometime this week with Monday Mailbag in the subject line!

Thinking Way Ahead!

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It’s summer. We’ve had over thirty days of 100+ degree weather. And I have the travel bug! It’s so much fun to research and plan trips, so I just couldn’t resist getting a head start on travel plans for next year’s MTNA conference in New York City! Is anyone else making plans to attend?

One of the things I mentioned in the Frugal Tips for Travelers post I wrote following this year’s conference was: “Decide early to attend so that you can benefit from the early bird registration discount. Plus, you can start keeping your eyes open now for great deals instead of scrambling at the last minute to pull everything together.”

As I was searching around for lodging options, I came across a fabulous site – airbnb.com! This is a relatively new operation, but there are already almost 18,000 rentals available in 190 countries…including many right in New York City. :-) Each place that’s available is an actual residence of a real person. Isn’t that cool? For years, I’ve been doing the ground work on my own to track down hosts in destinations, but this site takes all the work out of it – and opens up the possibilities to include all sorts of unique homes and apartments. Of course, you have to pay (whereas I usually found people who were willing to host me at no cost), but many of the places rent for very reasonable rates, certainly less than you often pay for a hotel room. I was able to find an adorable place just a few blocks from Central Park for less than $200/night!

In addition to lodging, now is also the time to be booking transportation and setting up your schedule for the year to allow time off to attend the conference. For quite a few years I only took off the week of the conference as my spring break. But in my area the spring break for the school district always seems to fall the week prior to the conference. So, this past year I went ahead and took off both weeks and it worked marvelously! The students are able to keep up with their playing just fine for two weeks, and taking the week off beats having a scattered schedule due to all the students who are out of town or forget to show up for their lesson when they are on spring break. :-)

I know there are lots of other things I need to be doing to plan for the start of the fall semester – which is just around the corner – but for now I’m having too much fun doing trip planning!

Selling a Piano Studio as a Business

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A while back I was contacted by another teacher requesting input on the protocol for selling her piano studio. Since I’ve never been in the position of buying or selling a business, I had to tell her that I didn’t have a clue! However, after getting some additional counsel and going through the process herself, Suzanne Karpinski graciously agreed to write a guest post about her experiences. I think what she has to share is valuable for any of us to consider should we ever be in the position of needing to buy or sell a studio. So, without further ado, here is a special guest post:

Selling a Piano Studio as a Business
by Suzanne Karpinski

Running a piano studio is just like running any other small business: you have clients, provide a service, collect payments, and if you are in more competitive markets such as larger cities, you must also advertise. Your personality, temperament, skills and time are your product, so in order to continue to teach, you must generate a positive image and reputation in order to continue to thrive. This is a process that can take several years, much work and advertising dollars to achieve. So if the time comes for you as a teacher to move on from your business, what should you do with that investment?

This was a question that I recently had to address as am getting ready to make a huge cross-country move to begin my MFA degree on the east coast. I cared deeply about my students, so first and foremost, I wanted to ensure that the teacher who took over for me could maintain the standards and quality of instruction for my students that they had received from me. Here it is also important to recognize that this is also a business transaction.

In every specialty practice where clients are involved, it is common for the sale of the business to include the selling of the client list and the businesses’ “good will”. This is a term used to denote what was previously mentioned – your reputation. Yes, it has monetary value in the business world! People will pay for the guarantee of a quality product – you in this case. Therefore, it is highly advantageous for the purchaser, in this case the incoming teacher, to have that reputation already established for him or her. (This is yet another reason for carefully choosing the new teacher who will be purchasing your studio.) The client list represents all the time and effort you put into establishing that reputation, and any teacher worth her salt should be compensated for that effort.

In this instance, both I and the teacher taking over my studio needed to reach an agreement about what this “good will” was worth. Very tricky indeed. We looked at the incoming teacher’s advertising costs and calculated how many advertising dollars it typically required to see one student sign up with her studio and stay for at least 3 months. This was done by looking at the ratio of students to dollars spent. In this instance, we calculated that each student was worth about $50 a month in advertising. In normal business practice, a client is typically valued at what their worth is over the course of a full business year. We decided that in fairness, 6 months was likely more appropriate given the typical commitment of an average student in our area was 3-6 months. The final agreement said that for every student that signed with the new teacher, that teacher would pay the seller (me, in this case) $50 for every month they remained with the teacher, for a maximum of 6 months. Partial months would be pro-rated. Additional clauses that are typical of sale of business documents were also chosen to be included, such as a non-indemnity clause and an arbitration clause, which protect the buyer and seller from any potential disagreements later on.

At the end of the day, my students are sad to see me go, but excited that they’ve got a new teacher that they feel comfortable with. Parents are satisfied that they will continue to receive quality instruction. The new teacher is relieved to have spent her advertising budget on a new roster of dedicated, continuing students. And I, the outgoing teacher, can depart with a clear conscience and compensation for all of my hard work!

Monday Mailbag – Quest for Capital Questions

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I’m trying to decide on a theme for the year and I’m still unsure about how Quest for Capital works.  Could you give me a little more info on how you invest in a particular stock? I guess I don’t know how stocks work myself!

I’ve been getting quite a few questions about this Quest for Capital practice incentive theme lately, so I thought it might be helpful to share a little bit more about how the process works.  Here are the guidelines that are included in the front of each student assignment book:

  • Every student will receive $12 of studio cash at the first lesson of the year.
  • Studio Stock prices will start at $2/share.
  • Each week, the Studio Stock prices will fluctuate according to the following criteria:
    *  Stock with the most shares purchased = share price doubles.
    *  Stock with the least shares purchased = share price decreases by half (with no share ever falling below $1).
    *  Stocks with the middle number of shares purchased = share price remains the same.
  • Each week, the student may purchase up to as many shares as he can afford. The number of shares purchased will be reflected on the Stock Options sheets. The student must complete as many of the stock options as he purchases for each Studio Stock (e.g. If a student purchases 3 Improvisation Stocks and 1 Listening Stock, he must complete 3 of the Improvisation Stock Options and 1 of the Listening Stock Options).
  • A Stock Prospectus is available in the studio for each Studio Stock. The Stock Prospectus provides the necessary resources to enable the student to complete the Stock Option requirements.
  • If a student does not complete the selected number of Stock Options, he will lose the money invested in that Studio Stock.
  • Each week, the student may sell up to as many shares as he has accumulated in any given Studio Stock at the current share price.
  • Throughout the year there will be special investment opportunities that will be made available to students for a limited time in order to give them a chance to earn additional capital.
  • Studio cash is the only currency permitted for the buying and selling of Studio Stocks.

Here’s a glimpse of what it looks like “in action” in the studio:

This is a pretty involved theme, but students of all ages can be a part of it. And it has been one of the most motivating themes we’ve ever done in our studio. There’s nothing like giving the students an opportunity to be creative and then make real money from their projects! :-)

Remember, if you have a question you’d like to contribute to next week’s Monday Mailbag, leave it in the comments below or send me an e-mail sometime this week with Monday Mailbag in the subject line!