September Studio of the Month – Jim Beaver’s School of Music

SH: Tell us about your studio.

Jim Beaver’s School of Music, located in beautiful Hendersonville, NC
offers private and group classes for: Classic/Acoustic/Electric Guitar,
Bass Guitar, Piano, Voice, Percussion and Drum Set, Ukulele, Dulcimer,
Flute, Recorder, and strings instrument repair and maintenance.

www.jimbeavermusic.com

SH: What is your experience, and the style you teach?

Our studio is staffed with instructors from all walks of musical life, from
classically trained academics to weekend warriors. Our philosophy around
here is simple: Music Lessons: tailored to YOU! Classical to Contemporary,
we are your one stop shop for music lessons. In a given day, student may be
learning Bach Corals in one studio while across the hall learning Stevie
Ray Vaughn guitar licks.

We believe that folks work hard for their money, and we provide a service
to them. While there is balance with this, we believe in meeting students’
needs and desires, while putting our goals second. That being said,
sometimes a student doesn’t understand why they need to learn certain
skills or genres. Our job is to equip them to achieve THEIR goals, while
giving them a balanced musical education. We go out of our way to
communicate to them in word or deed, that they are the most important
person in the room. Initially, we determine the expectations and goals of
each student, and design a curriculum around that. This approach has
worked well for us. Often, when enrolling a new student, we find they are
transplants from other teachers in the area who have been forced to conform
to the material and teaching methods of that teacher. Obviously you can’t
just let a student “run the show,” but we do our best to meet them in the
middle.

Without our students, there would simply be no JBSOM. The heartbeat of our
school is becoming much more than simple music teachers to these students. We
want to become their mentors, on and off the stage. In today’s society,
students desperately need role models they can count on. We teach music,
but we hope that the students receive much more than that.

SH: Tell us a little bit about your music studio.

Founded in 2001, we’ve served several hundred music students in the Western
North Carolina area. In fact, many of our students have gone on to study
at the collegiate level, and perform professionally. We offer recitals
annually for our students to perform and show the fruits of their labor. One
of our most popular programs is called “ROCK BAND.” In this program,
students are placed into bands, where they choose a name, and help select
cover and original material to learn and perform for the community monthly.

SH: How do you manage your studio?

Our studio runs year round, offering private and group lesson enrollment
packages in 30min, 45min, 60min weekly, and 60min bi-monthly.

Because life happens, we have built in allowances for rescheduling lessons.
It is important to us that students and parents know we will do what we can
to accommodate them, within certain parameters.

Studio Helper is paramount in the management of JBSOM. With so many
teachers and students coming and going, I can’t imagine a more efficient
way to manage the business side of things. From billing to scheduling, we
simply cannot function without it.

Our staff is trained to use the software for everything to scheduling
make-up lessons and collecting tuition, to the practice logs provided
through Studio Helper.

SH: What are your plans for the future?

We have just recently moved into a new facility, and have added two new
instructors to our staff. We look forward to broadening our instrument
lesson offerings, while continuing to be the cutting edge School of Music
in our area. Our Rock Band program has performances scheduled through the
end of 2013, and we are excited to see what this year will bring! We plan
to open several schools following our model in the coming years!