9 Questions to know before taking Drum Lessons at Los Angeles Music Teachers

Do I have to own a drum set to take drum lessons?
No. Many students start learning on a rubber practice pad and a pair of sticks. We recommend starting children at the age of five or six on keyboard/piano for a year or two and adults can start at any age. Then they have a huge head-start when they transition to Drum at the age of seven and it usually goes very smoothly for them.
Do I have to bring sticks to my first lesson?
No. Your teacher will have a pair you can borrow for the first lesson. Your teacher will suggest a pair of sticks that are the correct size for you based on music style, experience, etc. Then you can pick up a pair at a music store and bring them to future lessons.
Should I learn on an acoustic or electric drum kit?
If you are a beginner it doesn't really matter. There are some advantages to each. The cost is similar between electric and acoustic drums. You can wear headphones with electric drums and you can put rubber pads (silencers) on acoustic drums to bring the volume down. Please speak with your drum teacher about which drum set is right for you, your lifestyle and budget. You can always call our school office and someone will be happy to help you as with the brands and models as well.
What age is best to start learning to play drums?
Adults can start anytime! Students as young as five can learn to play but it is usually best if they wait until the age of seven to take drum lessons. Many people call us and say "my child plays pots and pans all the time and he is four years old. We want to get him into drum lessons." There is a big difference in having fun pounding away on pots, pans or even your desk if you are an adult and having your teacher give you certain patterns and songs to work on over and over until they are correct. Children under six and under generally don't have the attention span to take drum lessons. Instead, start them on keyboard until the age of seven and then switch them to drums if you really want to give them the best chance at success. Of course there are exceptions so please call us if you think your child is ready for drum lessons!
Do I have to bring my drum set to each lesson?
No. We have drum kits at our school for you to use at your lessons. However, you should bring your sticks (after the first lesson) and any books or other materials your teacher has you working on from week to week.
Do you teach snare drum and other percussion instruments?
Yes. Please call us for details as there are many different percussion instruments out there and various teachers at our many schools teach specific percussion instruments.
Do I have to know how to read music to play drums?
No. Your teacher will introduce you to drum music as you learn to play. Drum music notation is different than music notation for other instruments and is much easier to learn!
Are their performance opportunities for drummers at Los Angeles Music Teachers?
No. We are currently in an expansion in the school so we are just taking on private lessons, so we do not have any school concerts/performances, but any parent that would like to hear the students progress and want their child to have a performance to practice and prepare for, we can definitely set that up for you for we would like our students to grow and have something to work towards. We can set the drummers to perform a solo.
What kind of drums do you recommend for a beginner?
I would recommend contacting your teacher, there are many brands and models for basic and electric drum sets. Our teacher will give you the best advice on instruments you can purchase that will be excellent for you to start with.
Check out the Los Angeles Music Teachers page to learn more about drum lessons!
Contact us  or call us at 818-902-1233 or 
​email: rick@losangelesmusicteachers.com

Guidelines for not making rookie mistakes when you  start cello instruction near Burbank in Los Angeles

First of all let me congratulate you on deciding to learn the cello! It’s a beautifully versatile instrument and you will not regret choosing it. Similar to the vocal range, it has been a favorite for centuries. In order to be successful, you need to know the pitfalls to avoid. If you follow these guidelines, you will be motivated to keep pushing through.​

It’s easy to be disappointed when you're taking beginner cello classes near Burbank. This is why it’s crucial for you to use this blog as a model. This way, you won’t waste precious time and energy into the wrong resources. Following is a list of things you should definitely do in order to be the best novice cello student close to Burbank:

*Choose an instrument that is the right size. Cellos come in various sizes, and it is imperative that they are proportionate to the pupil. It’s much more crucial for the cello to be the right size than to get an expensive one. For optimal guidance, ask your instructor or your local instrument shop.

*Learn how to properly tune the cello. Don’t underestimate how important it is to learn this right away! You will probably need to tune it every day because of changes in temperature and humidity, and beginner instruments need more frequent tuning anyway. There are a number of free tuning apps you can install on your phone that make pitch checking a quick and easy start to your practice. If you don’t tune the cello every day when you are starting out, you won’t get used to the correct pitches and your intonation will greatly suffer. Remember, it is much harder to break bad habits than it is to form good ones. Make sure your tuner is set to 440 frequency and always go from the A to the C strings.

*Learn the correct way to rosin your bow. If it is not applied evenly, you will have gaps in your sound. The right amount is also very important because the bow will slide off the string if there is too little rosin and will have way too much grip if you put too much on. You will soon learn the right amount that helps your bowing be effortless.

*Have your cello set up by a professional luthier for optimal sound.

*Be patient during practice. You definitely don’t want to get an injury or learn bad habits. Have your teacher help you develop practice methods that focus both your physical and mental energies. This way, you will progress in a consistent way and will stay motivated.

I hope you enjoyed and learned a lot from this blog! Next up I will tell you about the “don’ts”. For more information, please visit us at http://www.losangelesmusicteachers.com

Music lessons for children aged 7 and up. We are offering lessons for piano, saxophone, violin, and many other instruments. Our music teachers teach rock, blues, metal, country and classical music lessons. Beginner students can get to work on chords, simple songs, melodies, music theory, and tabs reading. We try to make each lesson joyful to learn. All the theory and technical concepts are divided into small parts and end in something fun. No matter if you want to learn your favorite guitar riff or learn to play your favorite song, you are welcome to bring your CDs or iPod to the class to learn it from the teachers.
If you are wondering who we are and what we do, in this blog we will cover all the aspects of our website and give you an overview of what we do. You will also learn a lot about our mission like why we founded this company and how you can benefit as a musician by choosing us as your music teachers.

Who We Are
We, Rick and Manoela are two professional and accomplished teachers and performers in the LA area who combined their expertise to form Los Angeles Music Teachers. In our long careers, we have taught for so many music schools but we were unable to produce the results we wanted due to the restrictions. It was the need of the hour to form a business that could overcome all the weaknesses of the competitors and offer something that could really provide benefits to the young students.

Our Mission
We believe that it is not necessary for a music school to have a complicated website that could confuse the student right in the very beginning. This is the reason why we made a website that is easy to navigate and provides all the information in the best way possible. Secondly, being music teachers, we want to offer lessons that are tailored to your needs and goals. Being musicians, we know that no two musicians are same and they cannot be taught in the same way.
It is one of our mantras to offer special discounts to our students. You can pay all your fees in advance either for a month or a year, whatever you are comfortable with. However, customer satisfaction is our main priority and if you are not satisfied with your first lesson, you can claim your full fee back. We won’t ask you any questions.
As we mentioned earlier that we like to offer discounts to our students, our referral scheme is something we take pride in. Just refer a friend to us and get a full month of free classes as a reward. We never impose our teaching plan on our students. We teach you what you are interested in learning; which is the beauty of our classes. No matter if it is a specific song or a riff, our experienced teachers will teach it to you. This is why we brag that it is a fun learning with us.

Hopefully, this post is enough to answer all your queries and introducing ourselves to you. If you still have any further questions, please call us now at (818)902-1233, or leave your question in the contact form. We will answer you as quickly as possible. Hope you have a good time reading, we look forward to hearing from you. ​

In the musical family, the strings are the most versatile group. Listen to your favorite movie score and you will probably notice the most beautiful parts, other than individual instrument solos, are string passages. The power of an orchestra string section is unsurpassed.

So no wonder your child wants to start lessons on a string instrument in Los Angeles! Violin is the most popular of the strings, but is it the best choice? As a violinist myself, I do not recommend it as a first instrument. It is one of the hardest, if not the most, to play in general, which means starting on it is also an extreme challenge. It takes a year or two just to develop a decent sound, let alone any more advanced techniques and being comfortable enough to play music by ear or a handful of pieces that led you to want to play it in the first place.

The viola is simply a bigger version of the violin, and as such presents many of the same challenges, even if on a somewhat smaller scale. Due to its sheer size, the bass is not recommended for small children, and even though there are small sizes to start out with, it is still an awkward instrument to get around because of the amount of arm movement and shifting needed to get to different notes and strings. The cello is the winner in the category simply because it combines the best of both worlds; it is able to provide a bass line for any ensemble it’s part of while also being able to hold its own as a solo melodic voice.

Any beautiful violin melody can be easily transposed to cello, and it is a much more comfortable position than the violin. You are sitting down and the way you place your hand on the instrument feels a lot more natural. Moreover, because of the thickness of the strings, it does not sound nearly as scratchy as its soprano counterpart.

I hope I was able to shed a little bit of light on the different members of the string family and helped you make your decision. As always, we are here to help! If you have any questions, do not hesitate to give us a call! For more information, please visit our website at http://www.losangelesmusicteachers.com or give us a call at (818) 902-1233.

Are you thinking of learning how to play the guitar? When learning something new, you must start from the beginning. The guitar is a wonderful instrument to play as it can help you improve your memory and concentration. 

When it comes to learning how to play guitar, you might need an expert help. Many beginners give up learning to play guitar after some time because it is frustrating. Learning a new skill is never easy, you will have to work hard to master it. 

However, with our help, you can learn how to play the guitar without any hassle. In this article, we have listed the things that every guitar player must learn. Have a look!

Know Everything About the Guitar

The first thing you must learn is the guitar anatomy. It is crucial for you to know what the components are and what they do. There is no need to hurry, you should take your time to get familiar with everything, from head to bridge. 

There are different types of guitar; you must understand how every part works. This is to make learning how to play guitar easy. If you don’t know which string is the A string, it will be challenging to learn how to play guitar. 

So, to successfully learn how to play guitar, you must get to know every part of the guitar. 

Holding the Guitar Correctly

In order to play the guitar easily, you must hold it properly. Though many people think there is no rocket science, it can be difficult for someone who has never held a guitar before. To be able to produce the best quality sound, you must hold it correctly. Your left hand must be on the neck of the guitar while the other hand must be over the sound hole. 

In case you are left-handed, there are two solutions. You can flip the guitar without restringing or you can reverse the strings. This means you will have to position your right hand on the neck. You can try playing guitar in both ways and choose the one that you are comfortable with. 

Tuning the Guitar

Tuning the guitar is a crucial step in ensuring the best sound quality. If you don’t know how to tune the guitar, you will have a challenging time learning how to play it. Your guitar can fall out of tune because of regular playing, environment, and temperature. Playing a tuned-out guitar will produce an off-key sound.

Since the strings do not fall out of tune at the same rate, you must know which string to tune. So, it is crucial to know how to tune your guitar. 

It is suggested to get a tuner; you can even use online guitar tuners. If you don’t have a tuner or a phone, you can use the 5th fret technique. 

Restring the Guitar

The strings of your guitar will lose their shine when you play it regularly. It means that you need to change the strings. Knowing how to replace the strings is a great skill for a guitarist. So, how do you when to restring your guitar. You will know when the strings will be discolored, or the sound will be off or flat. By restringing your guitar, you can make sure the sound produced is of excellent quality. 

Not all the strings are made equal, you can ask the professional at the local shop to help you choose the right string for you. 

Holding a Pick

If you are wondering what a pick is, then you are the right place. A pick is a small plastic that is used for strumming the strings. Though you will not be using it every time you play the guitar, learning how to hold a pick is a vital skill. You must hold the pick in between the tip of your thumb and first finger. Once you get to know how to play, you can figure out your own style.

There are several types of picks available on the market, from thick to thin. In the beginning, it is advised to start with a thinner pick. Since it is made of plastic and is small, it is recommended to get many picks. It will not cost you a lot as they are inexpensive.

Reading Chords and Tabs

Many people think reading tabs and chords is difficult. This is a misconception; it is very simple. When learning how to play the guitar, it is recommended to start with simple songs. To make it easy to play chords, you can start with songs such as Bad Moon Rising. Moreover, it is better to start learning with a cover. This will help you get familiar with reading the chords and help in practicing transitioning between chords. 

Playing Open Chords

In open chords, not all the strings are pressed down. One of the first skills the guitarist will learn is playing open chords. You must start with a basic open chord such as G and strum the string to ensure you hear a clear chord. After you have successfully learned a single open chord, you can move on to the second open chord. This will help you practice transitioning between the chords. 

It is suggested to keep on creating the library of chords until you can transition between key chords without any trouble. 

Playing in Rhythm

After learning a chord, many beginners, call over their friends to impress them with their newly learned guitar skills. It is then, they understand they don’t know how to play in rhythm. This is something every guitarist goes through. 

It is crucial to practice strumming the chords in rhythm. For this, you must use a metronome to strum in rhythm. Once you master strumming one chord in rhythm, you can try with two chords. 

Playing Power Chords

Power chords are used in rock music; it is two note chords. Power chords are dyads consisting of fifth notes and root. They are not minor or major because they don’t have the third. 

When playing power chords, you will only need two or three fingers on the frets. They are easy and fun to play. Since many songs are composed on power chords, there are many songs for you to cover.

Playing Guitar Songs

You can choose a song that is your favorite and learn to play it on guitar. This is an exciting and thrilling for new guitarists as it will be the first song they learn. 

Therefore, you need to be patient when learning new skills. You can’t learn to play guitar overnight, you have to practice regularly to master the guitar skill.

Los Angeles Music Teachers -  Call us at 818-902-1233 or email: rick@losangelesmusicteachers.com

The Birth of Jazz was somewhere around the 1910’s. The saxophone was patented in 1846 and by the 1850’s lots of saxophonists began to play the instrument in the European military bands because of the considerable volume it could produce compared to the other woodwind instruments. At the same time, classical musicians, picked up the new woodwind instrument and began to write for it and play it in a classical style.

One of the earliest classical pieces written for the saxophone was in 1860, called “Fantasie for Saxophone and Piano”, by Jules Demersseman, who was an early virtuoso on the instrument. It took a while for more serious classical composers to begin to use it in their works, but Debussy used the saxophone in 1901 and Ravel in 1903, which was several years before jazz was born.
Besides Adolphe Sax himself, there were a number of saxophone players who made the saxophone famous before jazz. For example, this is rare footage of a couple of saxophone virtuosos (Rudy Wiedoeft and Benny Krueger) who were playing saxophone in a Classical/Ragtime style. For anyone who has an interest in the beginning stages of the saxophone, this is guaranteed to make you smile!
https://youtu.be/Db9P-u1_2bE

Are you looking for the best flute teacher? Do you want to learn how to play the flute? There is no doubt that musical activity is great for both the human body and mind. It is an excellent type of cognitive exercise. There are several instruments that can help you develop lifelong skills. The flute is one of the most beneficial and easy to learn instruments. 

If you want to have a fun and new hobby that promotes wellness, you should give flute a try. Here are the few of the reasons for playing the flute. 

Promotes Sense Of Achievement

For a beginner flute player, the capability to have a clear tone or for holding a note for a few seconds call for celebration. This is because every improvement for the flute players is a huge achievement that both the teacher and student must be proud of. Moreover, as the time passes, players learn new things and become better. This means the achievements also becomes more challenging and bigger. 

Improves Your Math Skills

One of the reasons for playing the flute is that it helps in giving your math skills a boost. This is because when you learn the rhythm of various songs, you will be using your math skills and pattern. According to a study, children who learn to play an instrument are good at math. 

Gives Body Coordination A Boost

When you learn to play the flute you will be improving coordination. It is because learning flute requires hand-eye coordination. This is because the player will have to see the notes and convert it into finger patterns. The player must keep focusing on other tasks as well including dynamics and rhythm. 

Good Memory Capacity

There is no doubt that music can help you learn complex and new concepts. According to experts, listening to music and learning to play an instrument helps in enhancing your memory. Playing an instrument will help you increase the capacity of your memory. It will help you easily remember and retain it for longer periods. 

You Can Learn New Skills

For beginner flute players, it will be beneficial as it will help learn about time management and organization. In music, quality of practice is crucial rather than quantity. This is the reason why expert musicians plan, organize and prioritize the time. It is to ensure they get the best out of every session. 

Learn About Responsibility

Playing an instrument is a huge responsibility. This is because you will have to take proper care of the instrument. You will have to clean it, polish it after practice. The same goes with a flute; after every practice, you must clean it. Additionally, the flute players will be able to become more responsible as they will have to take out time for practice. 

In the end, there are many music school teaching various instruments; however, not all of them are trustworthy.  The best music school is Los Angeles Music Teachers. We are always happy to teach students to play flute knowing we are helping them develop good qualities and skills. Hence, the flute is an extremely useful instrument that everyone should play.

rick@losangelesmusicteachers.com or call 818-902-1233

Unless this question is for a child under 10 years old I would not recommend wasting your money on lessons on a recorder type instrument. If you want to learn about the basics about reading notes and counting rhythms and a few other foundational aspects of music with some free lessons online, playing a recorder or some other basic 6 hole woodwind may make your beginning lessons with the tenor sax a little easier to comprehend. But having said that, if you know you want to play tenor sax then find a good teacher with good reviews and study the tenor sax. Saxophone is one of the easiest wind instruments to learn, (although it does take just as much time to “really play” it as any other instrument) but it’s an instrument that you can “have fun” on in a much shorter time then other wind instruments. If you want to start on an easier instrument than the tenor sax, I usually recommend the alto sax just because it’s easier to handle, get a decent sound and there’s more of them on the market, so you can usually find a little better deal on a used horn. Switching from alto to tenor is pretty easy once you get good on the alto, and if you buy a good used saxophone you can usually get most if not all all of your money back when you sell it.

Los Angeles Music Teachers - Call 818-902-1233 or email: rick@losangelesmusicteachers.com

I studied the clarinet after learning the saxophone and I think the main issue that is important to stress is the extra resistance that you get on the clarinet (even on the bass clarinet) which is partially due to the cylindrical bore (the sax is a conical bore and has a more loose embouchure and freer blowing airflow). Along with that, is that the saxophone fingerings are far the easiest and most logically designed of all the woodwinds. Also, because the clarinet over blows at an octave and a 5th it requires a whole 5th of awkward fingerings in the so called “throat” register which are not only difficult to master but also difficult to get a full sound like the rest of the instrument.

Los Angeles Music Teachers - Email: rick@losangelesmusicteachers.com or call: 818-902-1233

Without knowing your level of musical ability, I think that no matter what level you are, you can safely start with either or both of these two different approaches:

1. One way would be to play the progression using different inversions of the chords as you make smooth stepwise motion in your chord progression. IIf you don’t know how to do that, ask a competent keyboard player. Once you come up with some nice smooth and melodic connections of the chords the melodies will begin to be obvious to you immediately. You probably won’t hear the melody “all at once” but you will hear the basic skeleton and then the more you work with it you can then start to hear how to embellish it and come up with an interesting melody. Don’t think about the theory of what are the correct notes of each chord, just let your ear guide you and try to let it happen organically. The more you work with the progression the easier it will get to hear the notes that work naturally over the chords.

2. The other way would be to set some kind of rhythmic feel with the progression that you may already have in your head, and lay that down on a recorder or GarageBand. After you have a basic feel or groove laid down, you should then play it over and over and start to listen in your head for melodies that come naturally from the progression. Do this over and over and eventually you may even be able to hear the progression even without the recording. If you’re able to hear the whole thing at once in your head then just close your eyes and see if you can hear a melody. Just relax and put it in a loop in your head and eventually you can just start to sing little melodies that you come up with and at that point you’ll want to record them as your experimenting. The more you get the progression in your head the easier you will start to hear an organic melody, rather than just trying to peck something out on the piano or other instrument, it will usually get in the way as you stumble trying to find the notes. Instead, try letting your creative mind work without being distracted by the technique of the instrument. Using your voice in conjunction with your ear is always the most natural and musical way to create music.

There’s plenty of other ways to create melodies as well but in general, using your imagination rather than trying to try to play it on an instrument, even if you’re proficient on the instrument, it will tend to get in the way so try using your voice and record it so that you can go back and transcribe it. Your voice does not get in the way (except if you have absolutely no concept of pitch) and by using your voice you are in more direct connection with your creative mind. It’s a skill, but if you practice it on a daily basis you will start to develop your ability to come up with very musical melodies.

Los Angeles Music Teachers - rick@losangelesmusicteachers.com