Musicademy - Services to Schools

Contemporary Music Tuition in Small Groups

Musicademy currently runs up to 50 courses per term in the following instruments:

Acoustic and Electric Guitar
Bass
Vocals
Keyboards
Drums
Music Production
DJ Skills

   

Classes are provided at beginners through to music college standard. Classes are located in schools, church halls and community centres. Current geography includes Watford, Rickmansworth, Chorleywood, High Wycombe and Guildford. We have previously also run courses in Hoddesdon and are very happy to supply demand across Hertfordshire.

Students are normally secondary school age (although we do have a few primary age groups) or adults. We try to group people in similar age groups. We are normally teaching about 250 students per term.

Teaching is carried out in small groups of between 3 and 10 students. A typical guitar class has 7 students. The course is divided into stages, each stage comprising a 10 week term. We have developed a comprehensive teaching framework for each instrument, all focussing on technical skills outworked in contemporary rock and pop music.

The prices are as follows - £125 + VAT (£146.88) for guitar and vocals, £145 + VAT (£170.38) for other courses due to the smaller nature of the classes. For this price students receive 10 lessons per term lasting an hour a week (1.25 hours for vocals and music production).

Musicademy normally handles all the contact with students, administration and finance. For schools this means a high quality tuition service is provided but with virtually no administration required.

In order to promote the courses in schools we normally recommend the following:

• Assemblies to each year group (vocals and guitar demonstrations and performances)
• An information leaflet provided to each student
• Word of mouth recommendation by music staff

We recognise the concern most schools have regarding peripatetic teachers and do our utmost not to tread on their toes in any way. We normally find that students taking our courses are complete beginners so are not moving away from another tutor. Alternatively our contemporary focus is not always reflected in the existing peripatetic teaching.

 

One Off Workshops, Band Skills and Masterclasses

We are able to provide a variety of one off workshops and masterclasses either as an extra curricular activity, for Arts Mark related learning opportunities or that meet the requirements of GCSE, A Level and BTEC courses. These could incorporate performance, composition or other syllabus criteria.

Workshops or intensive teaching sessions can be provided to advanced students on guitar, drums, vocals, keyboards or band skills.

Band skills can either be facilitated by one tutor, or we can provide a full band to work students with and perform songs created as part of a workshop.

Over a half day we can work with a band incorporating various instruments seeking to improve the overall performance as well as the musicality of the individuals.

Alternatively, following classic music college teaching practice, all the students in a class could learn a piece on various instruments which is then performed one after another in a live performance workshop with feedback throughout.

Vocals Workshops

Vocals workshops are accessible for novice singers as well as those with significant previous training and experience. Suitable as part of a GCSE or A Level teaching, the workshops can also be accessed by a whole year group as an extra curricular activity.

The workshops incorporate teaching on:

• Breathing exercises to improve the students’ singing
• Improving the posture for better delivery
• Exploration of the "chest" and "head" voice
• Exercising the chest voice by holding long notes
• Increasing power
• Lead and backing vocals
• Harmonisation

The students then go on to learn and perform a song – this could be a contemporary rock song (eg Coldplay), a classic pop song (eg I Say a Little Prayer), a spiritual (eg Oh Happy Day) or something considering a particular skills such as harmonisation (eg The Lion Sleeps Tonight)

As part of the workshop, the tutor is also available for performance, Q&A, discussion of the industry, training paths etc.

We have also previously tied these workshops in with Faith and Music days for the RE department as well as for Music and the Arts.

Studio Technician

Our studio technician (who also teaches our Music Production course) is available for a wide variety of studio work. We have a relationship with Rickmansworth School where we are able to hire their studio facilities in order that young musicians and bands can have their work recorded onto demo CD.

Drum Circles

Musicademy has a sister company called Drum Dynamics. A separate information pack is available. Drum Dynamics works in the corporate workplace as well as schools taking the concept of the African drum circle and applying concepts such as team work, listening skills, leadership etc. The information pack describes a wide range of activities and exercises but we can additionally introduce teaching which meets GCSE and other learning outcomes.

We recently worked with Year 10 students at Rickmansworth School at a music day providing three workshops for about 60 students each.

Primary Music Teaching

We have a number of primary school specialist music teachers who can provide all the National Curriculum music requirements for primary schools which have no music specialist.

Alternatively we could provide a regular drumming workshop for younger classes of children that could perhaps come within the Wider Opportunities framework.

Assemblies

We regularly carry out assemblies which serve to entertain students and promote our courses. We can also be available to carry out assemblies which combine contemporary music with a worship theme to suit the requirements of an assembly with a spiritual emphasis.