A few months ago, I got a call from a long-time buddy and fabulous keyboard player, Erik Bennett.
Erik and I have worked together many times, both in-studio and live, over the last 20+ years. Most recently, Kenny Aronoff, Ben Sesar, and I all provided drum tracks for Atlanta-based indie artist Gage Kay (listen below)
Erik and his wife have been running a music school in Buford, Georgia for around 20 years. Recently, they’ve moved to an incredible 13,000 square foot facility and have made the leap into a an amazing expansion of their business. In that expansion, they have hired an amazing roster of teachers to cover just about every instrument you can think of.
So, when he asked me to come in as their resident drum instructor, I didn’t have to think twice about my answer.
When I built Secret Cove Studios (and built a drum lesson room here), I made the decision to dramatically decrease my private student load. For the last 16 years, the majority of students I continued to teach have been either 1) professional drummers looking to ‘level up’ certain abilities, 2) non-pro’s looking to develop the skills needed to become a working professional, or 3) drumset enthusiasts who are incredibly dedicated students of the instrument.
In this new environment, I’m putting myself back into a situation where students will have a whole cornucopia of reasons why they are learning drums. Along with that, these new students will require whole other set of methods I’ll need to develop to teaching such a diverse selection of up-and-coming drummers. A lot of the curriculum that I am developing for these new types of students will undoubtedly end up finding its way to my Drum Corner teaching site as video courses over the coming year.
For this blog post, I thought that I would include a couple of photos of the new teaching space I’m starting to develop and let you follow our progress over the next month as we transform this room into an awesome drum teaching environment.
So, the room I’m starting with has incredibly high ceilings and has tons of space to work with. Those two pictures don’t really do it justice, but the drumset in the second picture gives your some idea of how much room I’ve got to work with. I foresee enough room to add an electronic drumset, a computer desk (with an iMac and printer), some studio monitors, and an area for hand technique & snare drum / rudimental training.
I’d really like to put a marimba or some other sort of keyboard percussion in should he start to cultivate those kinds of students. [Donations of used marimbas or vibes would be greatly appreciated. ;-)]
If you’re interested in private drum lessons or know someone that is, feel free to contact the school at their website (BufordAcademyOfMusic.com) or call (404) 791-3645 to set up your first lesson!
I am super excited to begin this new chapter in my life as a drum educator. Over the last 25+ years, I have had the opportunity to teach well over a thousand fabulous students and look forward to see how many more people we can bring into the ‘Global Fraternal Order Of Drummers’!!