CONGRATS TO ALL CONCERTINA & BIG SHOW PERFORMERS!
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FATHER'S DAY - JUNE 17 (OPEN)
JULY 2-8 CLOSED FOR SUMMER BREAK
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SESSION SCHEDULE (FOR GROUP CLASSES):
SUMMER #1: JUNE 3rd to JULY 14th
SUMMER #2: JULY 21st to AUGUST 18th
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We are so proud of all of the students that got up on stage at one of the 5 events earlier this month. Between 4 Concertinas here at the studio & one "Big Show" at the Bothwell Arts Center, we had almost 200 performers!
CONGRATS TO THE RAFFLE GRAND PRIZE WINNERS:
Sam DeCosta - 6 months of FREE lessons
Sanaya Marker - iPad mini
The Spring Concert was our first attempt at this format of Concertinas & one Big Show, and we think the experiment was a success, although it could of course use some fine tuning.
In the meantime, we have plenty of news & announcements to share with you, so please read on, friends!
- Summer Sessions Start Next Week!
- Travelling for Summer? Know Your Options
- Big Show & Concertina Photos & Videos Are Here
- Win a $30 Denica's Gift Card
- Discount Ultrasonic Instrument Cleaning
- Student of the Month: Tanisha Deka
- Teacher Feature: Pete Egan, Punk Rock to Cruise Ships
- Dead & Company (John Mayer & members of the Grateful Dead)
- Songwriting Club: Write a Song About BIKES (and get a free book from our retail store)
- Congratulations to 28 Student Anniversaries This Month!
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SUMMER SESSIONS START NEXT WEEK!
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SESSION #1:
6/6 to 7/12
SESSION #2:
7/17 to 8/16
Family Music Time,
Ages 0-5 ($75/$55 siblings): Tuesdays @ 11am (no class 6/5), Wednesdays @ 11am, Thursdays @10am
A Sound Experience
, Ages 3.5-6 ($96/$72 siblings): Wednesdays @ 6:30pm
Make More Music (Playing in a Group)
, Ages 7+ ($120/$160 non-students): Email for schedule/placement.
To enroll in Summer Session 1 or 2, please respond to this email, or call us at 925-456-3460. You may also register & pay online:
CLICK HERE
for Meet Music or
CLICK HERE
for Make More Music.
LOOKING FOR SUMMER-ONLY OPTIONS?
Bands/groups are forming based around
YOUR
travel arrangements! It's true.
We saw so many excited, proud performers (and parents) at the Big Show, & Concertinas! Now that the seed is planted, let's see just how our music-makers can grow (with the proper nurturing, of course).
If your child/children are interested in being part of a group for the summer, please email us (you can just hit reply from this email) with your schedule/availability for the summer. We're having a blast match-making here by setting up students with others of similar ages & experience, so please do not hesitate to reach out to us if you have any interest at all.
OPEN TO STUDENTS ON VOICE OR ANY INSTRUMENT, AGES 7+
NEW BANDS FORMING WITH XAVIER, TIM G, ADAM & OTHER INSTRUCTORS!
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ARE YOU STOPPING LESSONS FOR SUMMER?
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Before you cancel, please consider your options!
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Here's what we recommend:
Gone for 1-4 weeks?
Keep your time & regular payment schedule. We'll do make-ups. It's easier to find times in the summer schedule than usual, since others are on vacation as well & since makeups can often begin at earlier times.
Gone for 5+ weeks?
Rather than quit altogether & have to search for a new spot in the schedule in the Fall (which is a VERY risky choice), you can have the peace of mind of coming back to your same time with your same teacher if you simply place a deposit. Your deposit amount will be equal to the # of weeks you'll be missing (i.e., 6 weeks gone requires a deposit of 1.5 tuition payments)
Not sure when or if you'll be returning?
Without knowing approximately when you'll be back, we cannot simply hold your space on the schedule (and we cannot accurately calculate your deposit amount). In this case, please give the standard 30 days cancellation notice & contact us for scheduling/availability when you're ready.
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SPRING CONCERT PHOTOS & VIDEOS
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What a day! Please share the memories & make your friends jealous.
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WIN A $30 Denica's Gift Card
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The Spring Concert was an experiment in many ways, especially this time around. We are constantly trying to improve the concert experience, but we can't do so unless we have some feedback. Please help us out by letting us know your thoughts!
As a token of our appreciation, all who fill out the survey will be entered into a drawing to win a $30 gift card to Denica's!
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DISCOUNT ULTRASONIC CLEANING
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When was the last time you had a good cleaning?
SPECIAL DEAL:
25% off for students enrolled in private lessons!
FOR A CUSTOM ESTIMATE TO CLEAN YOUR BRASS OR WOODWIND INSTRUMENT, RESPOND TO THIS EMAIL, OR CALL THE OFFICE AT 925-456-3460 & ASK FOR ADAM
WHAT IS ULTRASONIC CLEANING?
Ironically, we clean brass instruments using “sound waves”. The Ultrasonic cleaner delivers these “sound waves” into a cleaning solution, by means of a series of transducers mounted to the side of a tank. The sound travels throughout the tank and creates waves of compression and expansion in the liquid. This compression and expansion is so dramatic that the liquid molecules are ripped apart, creating microscopic bubbles. The bubbles are very small and exist for only a split second. The bubbles contain a partial vacuum while they exist. As the pressure around the bubbles becomes greater, the fluid around the bubble rushes in, collapsing the bubble very rapidly. This violent collapse, combined with the liquid jets velocity, provides a very intense cleaning/scrubbing action in a concentrated area. This scrubbing action exists throughout the entire cleaning bath. Utilizing application-specific detergents, it can get your horn cleaner than with any other approach.
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Congrats to Tanisha for earning the Student of the Month honor! She will receive not only priceless glory & endless bragging rights, but also gift certificates to Music Time Academy & Livermore Cinemas.
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Instrument:
Voice
Teacher:
Nick LW
Age:
13
School:
Mendenhall Middle School
Grade:
7th
Student Since:
October 2017
Hobbies (besides practicing):
Astrophotography, reading science fiction
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Did you catch Tanisha at the "Big Show" singing Listen to Your Heart? Her strong, confident vocals soared across the Bothwell with striking maturity and dynamics for any vocalist (let alone a 7th grader), although after her rendition of Taylor Swift's "Back to December" at the Winter Concert, we would not expect anything less from her performance.
And to top it off, Tanisha not only delivers vocals in English, but also sings songs from an entirely different culture - Assamese. She recently performed in a community event at ICC Milpitas, in addition to her performances at Music Time Concerts.
Keep up the hard work and progress, Tanisha! It's our honor to award you Student of the Month, which we have a feeling is only the beginning of many more musical accomplishments to come!
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Pete Egan
From grade school punk rock bands to cruise ships, a musical journey with Pete Egan.
We are thrilled to have Pete Egan back to multiple teaching days here. Earlier this month, I caught up with him to talk about the many twists and turns along his musical path, which has (thus far) taken him from his home in Upstate New York to California...and all around the Caribbean!
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How did you first get started in music?
I took piano lessons early on, in 2nd or 3rd grade. My grandparents had a piano, so whenever we were there I would just play. I think I liked doing that more than having a conversation with them!
Did you participate in any music at school?
Well you couldn’t do piano in concert band, so I had to choose something else. Since the marimbas & xylophone have the same notes and layout as piano, I had an advantage, so I chose percussion. I was in concert band for all of high school. I was also in the jazz band and I did marching band on snare drum for one semester.
What group did you like playing with most?
I didn’t really like classical, I always preferred jazz. One of the reasons I left my earlier teacher was because he was a classical guy and I wanted to try something else. The piano teacher I had from 6th grade on was a jazz guy, so he was always just giving me more lead sheets and tunes, like Gershwin songs that had been rearranged for Jazz. He is the one that taught me like 90% of what I know! We’d do the tunes and he’s say, “take a couple chorus’ on this!”
What is it that you enjoy about playing Jazz?
I just like the spontaneity of it. I like being able to improvise. I like being able to take something and interpret it i my own way rather than read it 100% verbatim.
How were you involved with music outside of school?
As a kid, I went to punk rock shows at a few different venues. My friends would put on these shows and they would play, then eventually I would get to play
How did you get into punk rock? Was that popular?
I started with with Green Day, who was definitely popular, then went backwards into the 80s and hardcore stuff. I had friends that were doing the same thing, so we started a band in 7th until 9th or 10th grade. It was my brother on guitar and another friend. We just wanted to record! We wanted to document what we were doing before we even rehearsed it!
Let’s hear more about this process! How did yo record? And what did you play?
The recordings are bad. We had a 4-track, Tascam “Porta-studio” that we asked our parents to get for us for a joint Christmas present one year. We only had 2 microphones, so the 4 tracks were one for drums and one for guitar, then one left for vocals and sometimes piano.
We could write songs, so we did that as much as possible. It was fun, but just not good. Really sloppy recordings. It was just like, putting chords together. It was, “this is 3 chords, let’s call it a song.” Then, “let’s do these 3 chords & we’ll put them in a different order!” and there’s another song! We had a lot to learn.
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After your punk rock days, where did your musical path take you?
After high school, I went to Suny Ferdonia for Sound Engineering. It was the most interesting music degree. The Sound Recording Technology program is pretty comprehensive: 4 semesters of written theory & oral theory, 4 semesters of applied musicianship, which is singing melodies & being able to conduct. There was acoustics and electronics also, because we had to know the physics behind the sound itself. It was a Bachelor’s of Science degree. I also did a lot of accompanying for singers and instrumentalists and the Ferdonia jazz ensemble while I was there.
I graduated in May, and then a month later I was here in California! Some friends and I had a van and we just threw all of our stuff in it. We had one place to stay in Kansas City and then just found cheap hotels the other days. It took us about 5 days to get out here. One friend had a small place in not the nicest neighborhood, so we stayed there at first while we looked for work.
When you came to California, what were you doing, musically? How did you find gigs and other people to play with?
I sometimes used Craigslist to get gigs, but mostly I used to go to the live music jams that happen every week in Oakland and Berkeley, like Legionnaire or the Layover on Wednesdays, and Starry Plough on Thursdays.
My only two active bands right now are Top Secret, a Top 40’s cover band and a Reggae band that’s still deciding on a name. Previously there was Evergreen Dub (Reggae & Rock), Treehouse Orchestra (Indie Rock with lots of extra horns and strings), and Alligator West (New Orleans funk).
I understand that one of the gigs you ended up eventually taking was playing music at sea?
Yes, in 2012 to 2014 I worked on a cruise ship.
Can you tell us a little about your experience as a cruise ship musician?
It was a lot of playing of pop music, maybe a little bit of jazz. On an average day, you're only performing 3 to 4 hours of music, sometimes less. There’s usually a lot of downtime, but there are also about 300 different places to drink on a cruise ship, so there's really always something going on.
I did different contracts, some 5 or 6 months and some for only 3-4 weeks, just filling in for someone else. I had a lot of 1 week cruises to the Caribbean islands, Mexico, the Bahamas, Jamaica. That’s about 2 sea days and 3 Ports of Call, then another sea day going back. It’s nice to see a lot of other countries and enjoy the sun! What they do now is hire a whole band all at once, and have them rehearse in Florida for 2 weeks or longer before you get on the boat. So in theory, you should sound pretty tight.
What are some things you enjoyed most about the job, or some advice that you have for anyone considering auditioning for a cruise ship gig?
You can really learn a lot! You also have to know a lot of music very quickly, so it helps to read music.
One of the best things is that you can play with really interesting players from all around the world. You might get lucky and play with a bass player from Panama that happens to be insanely good at Afro Cuban music.
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Mixolydian Level - 5 Years of Lessons
Neeka Zavaregh
Gabby Tabaracci
Bennett Kuempel
Lydian Level - 4 years of Lessons
Teague Ricke
Abigail Lentz
Janeen Buggs
Phrygian Level - 3 Years of Lessons
Ava Kerr
Kevin Le
Nathaniel Mue
Cedar Simpson
Sienna Simpson
Nick Sneddon
Dorian Level - 2 Years of Lessons
Reese Dahlheim
Leila Grigoropoulos
Nicolas Grigoropoulos
Bhaumik Misra
Arya Sawant
Cheri Velzy
Ionian Level - 1 Year of Lessons
Grady Castro
Christiana Eddleman
Luke Eddleman
Violet Lynam
Jessica Owens
Vaishali Purushothaman
Melanie Ramos
Elliot Stafford
Maxwell Stafford
Alexis Wasemg
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FREE
BOOK*
JUST FOR ENTERING!
Limit one free book per person per month, limit of $25 retail value. No special orders, must be currently in stock. Does not include manuscript paper.
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This month's topic:
BIKES
If your song is chosen as the winner, you'll get to choose the topic for next month! How fun?! Now let's get to writing! Go on now, git.
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Accepted formats include: video, audio, lyrics or written/sheet music. Submissions will be accepted until the next newsletter.
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FEATURED CONCERT
Who:
Dead & Company
Where:
Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View
When:
Monday, July 2nd &
Tuesday July 3rd
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Grateful Dead offshoot and bona fide supergroup Dead & Company comes to Shoreline Amphitheatre on Monday 2nd July 2018 for a two-night run, raising the spirit of the 'Dead! The band, which is fronted by Grammy Award-winning singer, songwriter and guitarist John Mayer, has gone from strength to strength since its formation three years ago and it's easy to see why! Come get groovy with Dead and Company!
Three years ago, Grateful Dead members Bob Weir, Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann got together with Grammy Award-winner and Grateful Dead fanatic John Mayer, fellow Grammy-winner and virtuoso bassist Oteil Burbridge and RatDog keyboard player Jeff Chimenti, and out of nowhere Dead and Company was born. After a hugely positive response to their 2015 concert in Madison Square Garden, the Grateful Dead offshoot have continued to build momentum, developing a full tour, which continues throughout 2018.
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Every Thursday:
Tim G (guitar) at Tiki Tom's in Walnut Creek
Every Thursday:
Michael Solomon at Live Oak Lodge # 61 in Oakland
Friday, June 1st
The UnOriginals (Tim & Xavier) at Retro Junkie, Walnut Creek
Saturday, June 2nd
Room for Dream (Nick L at The Legionnaire Saloon in Oakland
Lost Dog Found (Adam) at Lagunitas Brewing Company in Petaluma
Wednesday, June 6th
Lost Dog Found (Adam) at Courthouse Square in Santa Rosa
Friday, June 8th
The UnOriginals at Meenar, Danville
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Roaring Donkey in Petaluma
Saturday, June 9th
Fast & Vengefully (Tim & Belinda) at Johnny Foley’s SF
Sunday, June 10th
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Elephant in the Room in Healdsburg
Tuesday, June 12th
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Torch Club in Sacramento
Wednesday, June 13th
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Flynn's Cabaret in Felton
Thursday, June 14th
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Lagunitas in Petaluma
Thursday June 14th
Room for Dream (Luna & Nick LW ) at Red Hat in Concord
Friday, June 15th
The UnOriginals (Tim & Xavier) at Maggie Mcgarry’s in San Francisco
Sunday, June 17th
West Grand Blvd (Anna, Adam & Mike) at Belmont Concert Series at Twin Pines Art Center
Muncie (Anna & Mike) at Ivy Room in Albany
Thursday, June 21st:
Otto & the Moaners (Anna) at Big Easy in Petaluma
Friday, June 1st
The UnOriginals (Tim & Xavier) at Retro Junkie, Walnut Creek
Saturday, June 2nd
Lost Dog Found (Adam) at Lagunitas Brewing Company in Petaluma
Wednesday, June 6th
Lost Dog Found (Adam) at Courthouse Square in Santa Rosa
Friday, June 8th
The UnOriginals at Meenar, Danville
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Roaring Donkey in Petaluma
Saturday, June 9th
Fast & Vengefully (Tim & Belinda) at Johnny Foley’s SF
Sunday, June 10th
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Elephant in the Room in Healdsburg
Tuesday, June 12th
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Torch Club in Sacramento
Wednesday, June 13th
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Flynn's Cabaret in Felton
Thursday, June 14th
TV Mike & the Scarecrowes (Anna) at Lagunitas in Petaluma
Friday, June 15th
The UnOriginals (Tim & Xavier) at Maggie Mcgarry’s in San Francisco
Sunday, June 17th
West Grand Blvd (Anna, Adam & Mike) at Belmont Concert Series at Twin Pines Art Center
Muncie (Anna & Mike) at Ivy Room in Albany
Thursday, June 21st:
Otto & the Moaners (Anna) at Big Easy in Petaluma
Friday, June 22nd
Gringa (Luna) at Off the Grid, Fort Mason in San Francisco
Otto & the Moaners (Anna) at Berryessa Brewing Company
Saturday, June 23rd
Otto & the Moaners (Anna) at Smiley's in Bolinas
Sunday, June 24th
Otto & the Moaners (Anna) at Terrapin Crossroads in San Rafael
Friday, June 29th
The UnOriginals (Tim & Xavier) at Johnny Foleys SF
Saturday June 30th
Mama Foxxy (Judy & Anna) at Vinnie's Bar & Grill in Concord
Friday, July 6th
The UnOriginals (Tim & Xavier) at Retro Junkie, Walnut Creek 9-11pm
Tory & the Teasers (Anna) at Starry Plough in Berkeley
Lost Dog Found (Adam) at Courthouse Square Concert Series in Redwood City
Saturday, July 7th
The UnOriginals (Tim & Xavier) at Maggie Mcgarry’s, San Francisco
Friday, September 14th
Gringa (Luna) at Off the Grid, Fort Mason in San Francisco
CHECK OUT SOME LOCAL BANDS FEATURING MUSIC TIME STAFF:
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From the Music Time Academy Administrative Staff:
Anna, Monica, Mike & Adam
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For every new private lessons student that you refer to Music Time Academy, enjoy a 25% discount from your monthly tuition! REFER 4 STUDENTS & GET A FREE MONTH OF LESSONS!
*Offer does not apply to immediate family members or to prior students re-enrolling.25% discount applies to tuition rate for one student only.
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