Music Lessons and Marketing

In today's episode, I talk about the text every music school owner dreads: the one from a teacher saying they're moving on. The teacher shortage is real, but I don't think it's our biggest problem. The bigger problem is that in most music schools, students belong to their teachers instead of the school, and when a teacher leaves, the families can leave too.

Key ideas from this episode:

• Why teacher turnover is a design problem, not a people problem
• The difference between linear growth and leverage growth
• Three ways to make sure the value lives in your school, not in one person
• Why group programs create a stronger anchor than private lessons alone

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why losing one teacher can put 30 or 40 students at risk, and how to stop that from happening
• What a restaurant and its favorite waiter can teach you about your music school's biggest vulnerability
• The simple test that tells you whether you have a real curriculum or "a collection of freelancers"
• Why Kelly Bennett trains her group teachers for three months, not three days
• Why your best musician isn't always your best group teacher, and who to hire instead
• How to build a school that doesn't need you there every night

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

In today's episode, I sit down with Amie Nunez, who ran a rock school with her husband for about a decade before selling it to Ensemble. We talk about something most music school owners feel but rarely say out loud: the guilt that comes with making money. If you've ever paid everyone else first, skipped a rate increase because it felt greedy, or winced when someone said "must be nice" about your vacation, this conversation is for you.

Key ideas from this episode:

• Why so many of us carry the "tortured artist" mindset into our music schools
• What happens to your family and your business when you live off the leftovers
• How guilt turns into stress, and stress turns into burnout
• Why treating your school as an artistic expression can hold it back

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why paying yourself first forces better decisions about rates, staffing, and spending
• How to find a dependable monthly number for your own pay, even when revenue is seasonal
• The simple math for figuring out how many students it takes to get a task off your plate
• Why the gear you're proud of may matter more to your teachers than to your parents
• What Amie would do differently if she started her school over today
• How getting around other owners gives you the clarity you can't get on your own

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

In today's episode, I talk about something your teachers probably do hundreds of times a week without thinking twice: they stop the music. It looks like good teaching. But after a conversation with Kelly Bennett from Valencia School of Music, I'm starting to wonder if all that stopping and correcting takes away one of the most important skills a young musician can learn, which is how to recover from a mistake and keep going.

Key ideas from this episode:

• In a private lesson, it's start, stop, correct. In a band, time keeps moving, and that changes how kids learn.
• Making a mistake and recovering from one are two very different things, and we underestimate the second one.
• Kids naturally sync up with each other, often without a single word of instruction.
• Repetition through looping can do a lot of the teaching for you.
• Private lessons are valuable, but maybe they shouldn't be the default starting point for every child.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why a kid who gets lost in a band and jumps back in may be learning more than a kid who gets corrected in a lesson
• What happened when I put two beginner drummers in the same band (I expected a nightmare)
• How "the almighty loop" gets kids locked into the groove without the teacher saying anything
• A simple way to gamify repetition so kids beg to play the same four bars 17 times
• Six things your teachers can try before they stop the music
• A quick listening exercise you can do outside your lesson rooms this week that might change how you see your school

http://davesimonsmusic.com

In this episode, I break down why the group class pitch that makes perfect sense in your head falls flat the second it comes out of your mouth on a call. It's not your program. It's timing and messaging, and most schools get both wrong before they even realize it.

Key ideas covered:

• Why every parent already has a "movie" playing in their head before they call you
• Why explaining your group class too early kills the sale
• The exact questions that get a parent to reveal what they're really buying
• Why arguing for group classes is the fastest way to lose the sale entirely

In this episode, you'll learn:

• The one question to ask before you ever mention group classes on a call
• How to find the real emotional reason a parent is calling your school, not just the surface reason
• The single line that gets a parent to want your groups more than private lessons
• Why "does this sound like something your child would enjoy" beats "are you ready to sign up"
• How to remove risk from the decision without discounting your program
• The business math behind group classes that most owners never run

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

For years, I had one problem at my music school that drove me crazy. I could always tell which kids were most likely to quit, and it wasn't the ones who hated music. It was the ones who never got the chance to feel like a musician before they ran out of patience. In this episode, I break down why bands keep kids enrolled in a way private lessons never will, and why I built an entire program around putting total beginners in a band on day one.

A few of the ideas we dig into:

• Why bands create identity in a way private lessons simply can't
• The real reason kids quit lessons before they ever make it to a band
• How I redesigned songs so a total beginner could contribute in their first rehearsal
• Why "fun and engaging lessons" might be the wrong thing to be selling

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why the kids who need a band program the most are usually the ones who never make it there
• How to design a beginner band experience that doesn't require months of lessons first
• A simple songwriting shift that lets kids of very different skill levels play together successfully
• Why giving a child a sense of ownership over a song changes how attached they are to the program
• How a band program can quietly solve three different problems in your school at once
• Why your marketing might be undercutting your own private lessons without you realizing it

In today's episode, I sit down with Kelly Bennett, co-owner of Valencia School of Music in Westfield, New Jersey, to talk about something a lot of school owners get wrong about their youngest students. Kelly has been running her Kidzrock program since 2019, and right now she has around 40 kids enrolled with another 15 to 20 sitting on a waitlist. We dig into exactly how she built that, and honestly, about ten minutes into this conversation I was taking notes on my own program.

Here's what we cover:

• Why Kelly stopped selling music lessons and started selling something completely different
• The phone script her staff uses to redirect private lesson calls toward the right program
• Her "1000 eyes" approach to marketing without a big ad budget
• Why time never stops in a group class, and what that teaches kids that private lessons cannot
• The real reason classes stay empty, and it's rarely the program itself

In this episode, you'll learn:

• The exact reframe that changes how parents respond to your pitch, and why "we sell lessons" is the wrong message
• A simple phone tactic to guide families toward the program that actually fits their kid's age
• How to build guerrilla marketing that costs nothing but consistency
• The teacher training timeline Kelly swears by, and why three months beats three days
• One phrase Kelly has every class memorize that changes how kids handle mistakes
• Why the real fix for empty classes is rarely the curriculum

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

In this episode, I talk about something that completely changed how I run my music school: the war room. If you've ever felt like you're constantly reacting instead of actually leading your business, putting out fires instead of planning ahead, this one's for you. I break down why that reactionary mode works fine when your school is small, and why it starts to fall apart as things get more complex. Then I walk you through the exact system I use to fix it, and no, it's not another app.

Key ideas covered in this episode:

• Why reactionary management feels fine early on but becomes a real problem as your school grows
• The difference between the "digital front lines" of your business and true strategic thinking
• A simple three-part notebook system for organizing every project on your mind
• Why mixing growth projects with operational ones keeps your business balanced instead of burned out

In this episode, you'll learn:

• How to do a full brain dump of every project you've been avoiding, and actually make sense of it
• A simple way to use AI to sort your messy notes into clear business categories
• How to estimate time for any project so it stops feeling impossible to start
• The exact method I use to decide which project to prioritize each week
• Why physically leaving your school once or twice a week sharpens your thinking
• How to build a habit that protects you from burnout before it happens

In this episode, I talk about something that happens in almost every music school at some point. A great teacher, sometimes your best one, tells you no. You ask them to take on something new, and they push back, and it catches you off guard.

I dig into why that happens, and what it actually reveals about the kind of leader your teachers think you are. Because a "no" is rarely about the task itself.

A few of the key ideas I cover:

• Why asking a teacher "would you like to do this?" almost always gets you a no
• The difference between the barbershop model and a mission-based music school
• Why respecting boundaries isn't always the full answer
• How to ask for something in a way that actually gets a yes

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why your best teacher saying no might be a leadership problem, not a personality problem
• The exact question that turns a request into an obvious no every time
• How to tell if you're secretly running a barbershop instead of a mission-based school
• A simple mission statement framework that changes how your team responds to you
• Why being a stronger leader has nothing to do with being stricter
• What to say to a teacher instead of "would you like to," so they actually say yes

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

In this episode, I sit down with John Kozicki and Mandy York, hosts of the Rock School Proprietor podcast, and we get into something every music school owner deals with whether they realize it or not. How do you keep growing when your teaching philosophy and someone else's look nothing alike? John runs a punk rock brick-and-mortar school in Detroit. Mandy is a classically trained Music Together licensee. On paper they should not get along. In practice, they have built a friendship and a podcast around learning from each other, and I think their conversation will change how you think about your own studio.

Here is what we cover:

• How two studio owners with completely opposite backgrounds found common ground
• Why parents deserve ongoing education, not just a sales pitch at enrollment
• Whether the traditional lesson approach should really come first
• What to do when a big franchise moves in down the street
• Letting go of guilt around pricing and profit

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why treating parents as students too can transform how families understand the value of lessons
• A simple reframe that helps kids fall in love with playing before you ever hand them a method book
• Why panicking when School of Rock or Bach to Rock opens nearby is the wrong move, and what to do instead
• How group and ensemble experiences build musicianship in ways solo lessons cannot
• The mindset shift that lets you stop feeling guilty about running a profitable school
• Why your business itself can be one of the most creative things you ever build

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

In this episode, I sit down with Brady Davies, who went from teaching zero instruments himself to building nine music schools and eventually merging his company with Ensemble Performing Arts. We talk about the moment his wife brought 80 piano students into their living room, the pricing mistake that cost him money for years without him realizing it, and the churn numbers he now watches like a hawk to keep his schools healthy.

This one is for any school owner who feels maxed out, unsure if it's time to expand, raise prices, or bring in more help. Brady doesn't sugarcoat the hard parts. He talks openly about the fear of signing his first lease, the friction he and his wife worked through as business partners, and the belief he had to unlearn about what a music school could actually be worth.

A few of the big ideas we cover:

• Why being at full capacity is a sign you're underpriced, not a problem to solve with more square footage
• The smarter way to test a new location before sinking money into a full buildout
• How tracking churn, school-wide and teacher-by-teacher, reveals exactly where you're losing students
• Why the strongest loyalty a family can have isn't to a teacher, it's to your school's culture

In this episode, you'll learn:

• How to test a price increase without scaring off your current families
• A simple way to open a second or third location without betting the farm on it
• What churn rate actually signals about your teachers, and how to fix it before it costs you students
• Why credentials don't always predict which teachers keep kids enrolled
• How to build the kind of loyalty that makes it hard for a teacher to poach your families
• What it really takes to step back from the day-to-day and let your school run without you

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

In this episode, I talk about the real reason so many students quietly lose interest in lessons, and why it has nothing to do with talent, motivation, or how good the teaching is. I share the story of a student named Marcus, a kid who went from showing off Queen bass lines to watching the clock, and what that pattern taught me about a structural problem hiding inside almost every private lesson.

If you've ever had a parent tell you their kid "just won't practice," this episode gets at what's actually going on underneath that.

Key ideas covered in this episode:

• Why better teaching, better communication, and practice incentives don't fix declining engagement
• The real difference between kids who stick around and kids who quietly fade out
• Why most "group classes" aren't actually solving the problem they think they're solving
• How reframing the very first lesson changed retention at my own school

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why a private lesson is one of the most intimidating settings a young beginner will ever walk into, and what that means for retention
• The one shared trait among the students who kept showing up prepared, without being nagged
• Why most group classes are secretly just "six private lessons happening in the same room"
• A simple shift you can make on day one that changes how a beginner experiences their first months of lessons
• What changed for my students the moment they had a real performance instead of a recital
• How this approach became a referral engine without me ever asking for referrals

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

In today's episode, I talk about the moment I realized the biggest obstacle to student retention was never the child's effort. It was the model I built my whole school around. I share how I stumbled onto the fix almost by accident, while trying to solve a completely different problem in my studio.

Here's what I get into:

• Why music lessons are the only youth enrichment activity built around a homework requirement
• The real difference between adult accountability and peer accountability, and why it matters so much for a child's motivation
• The accidental discovery that came from trying to serve kids under seven
• How repositioning the private lesson as a destination instead of a starting point changed my retention and my bottom line

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why the practice problem was never really about practice at all
• What every other youth activity understands about motivation that most music schools miss
• How a program I built to solve a completely unrelated problem ended up fixing my biggest retention issue
• Why I was nervous to tell parents there was no at home practice requirement, and why it became my strongest selling point
• How shifting to a group first model helped solve my teacher shortage without me even trying
• A simple structural shift you can make in your own school to build identity, community, and retention from day one

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

In this episode, I want to revisit one of the most downloaded topics in the seven-year history of this podcast: the practice problem. But I'm coming at it differently this time. Because I don't think we've been solving it at the right level. We've been focused on fixing problems inside our model without asking whether the model itself is the problem.

That's the question I want you to sit with today.

Topics we dig into:

• Why parents anticipate conflict before the first lesson even starts
• How music lessons compare to every other activity in the youth enrichment category
• Why the practice battle is a design problem, not a motivation or curriculum problem
• What group programs and ensembles do differently, and why it works
• Why declaring your lessons are "fun" doesn't actually fix anything

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why families quit over practice friction that was built into your model long before they met you
• How soccer, dance, martial arts, and theater eliminated the homework problem entirely, and what music schools can learn from it
• Why students in ensemble and group programs stay longer and practice more willingly
• The difference between treating the symptom and fixing the root cause of student dropout
• Why social accountability is a more powerful motivator for kids than parental pressure or teacher expectations
• What the most successful music schools have quietly figured out, and how they've built something around the private lesson that changes everything

http://davesimonsmusic.com

Most music school owners who've tried group classes have walked away thinking the same thing: parents just prefer private lessons. I thought that too. And I was wrong.

In today's episode, I dig into why group classes fail at so many schools, and why the answer has almost nothing to do with curriculum. The real issue is something most owners never consider: the difference between a group class and an ensemble. One feels like a compromise. The other changes kids' lives. And once you understand that distinction, everything about how you build your program shifts.

Key Ideas in This Episode

• Why parents don't actually prefer private lessons, they prefer transformation
• The design flaw that causes most group classes to feel like divided private lessons
• Why ensemble programs create identity, and why identity is what keeps students enrolledThe student who never missed rehearsal, even though he barely practiced
• The four things every successful group program creates (and what happens when any one is missing)

In This Episode, You'll Learn:

• Why almost every other children's activity is group-based, and what that tells us about what parents are really buying
• The specific structural mistake schools make when they add group classes, and the simple mindset shift that fixes it
• How an ensemble creates a sense of belonging that makes kids genuinely not want to quit
• Why a student's identity as a musician matters more for retention than their skill level does
• The four pillars of group programs that actually work: identity, belonging, performance, and pathways
• What your school would look like if you thought about the next ten years of a student's journey, not just the next semester

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

What if the families leaving your school aren't actually leaving because of sports or busy schedules? What if there's something deeper going on that most schools aren't building on purpose?

In this episode, I explore one of the most important retention insights I've come across in years of running music schools: the difference between students who do music and students who become musicians. Youth sports accidentally get this right all the time. Music schools often accidentally get it wrong. And once you see the structural reason why, you can start to fix it.

What We Cover • Why the same child who cried when soccer was cancelled shrugged when piano was cancelled • How identity drives behavior far more reliably than interest or motivation • Why sports accidentally build tribes while music schools sometimes accidentally build customers • What I unexpectedly discovered when I built Kidzrock • Practical questions every music school owner should sit honestly with right now

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU'LL LEARN: • Why families rarely quit activities their child has deeply claimed as their own — and what that means for your school • The real difference between "I want to learn guitar" and "I am a guitarist" (it sounds small, but it changes everything) • How sports create belonging accidentally through structure, and how music schools can engineer the same thing on purpose • Specific low-lift tactics to create identity and community without overhauling your entire program • The three questions your students are silently asking that determine whether they stay or leave • Why your teaching is probably already great — and why that might not be the thing to focus on right now

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

Most music schools run two or three recitals a year and call it a retention strategy. I used to think that was enough, too. In this episode, I want to challenge that assumption, because I think it's costing schools more students than they realize, and the fix has nothing to do with running better recitals.

In today's episode, I break down why recitals work when they do work, what's actually happening in a parent's mind when they re-enroll after a shaky performance, and why building your retention around two big events a year is less of a strategy and more of a rescue operation.

Here's what I cover:

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Why parents don't quit because their kids hate music, they quit because confidence quietly erodes

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What a recital actually does inside a parent's brain (it's not what most of us think)

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Why "the problem is practice" is the wrong diagnosis almost every time

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What soccer gets right about retention that music schools keep getting wrong

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The visibility gap that's silently draining families between your recitals

In this episode, you'll learn:

•

Why recitals are "confidence restoration events" and what that actually means for how you run your school

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How to map parent confidence across your school year and see exactly where families are slipping away

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Why blaming practice charts and accountability systems is solving the wrong problem

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What the real lever for retention is, and why almost no one in this industry is building around it

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How to start thinking about weekly visibility instead of relying on two big moments a year

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What changes when you stop asking "how do we run a better recital?" and start asking a much bigger question

http://davesimonsmusic.com

Most music school owners are fighting a retention problem they don't fully understand yet. Parents aren't quitting because their kids aren't improving. They're quitting because nobody ever showed them that they were. In this episode, I share a simple, practical tool that any teacher can start using this week to close what I call the "visibility gap" and keep more students enrolled for the long haul.

What we cover:

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Why marketing promises and lesson experiences often don't match up

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How the visibility gap silently drives your dropout rate

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A simple end-of-lesson formula that takes 30 seconds and changes everything

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Why talking to parents about scales and method books is costing you students

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What parents are actually paying for (it's not what most teachers think)

In this episode, you'll learn:

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Why "we're too busy" is almost never the real reason a family quits

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How to make student progress visible to parents who don't have trained ears

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The exact before-and-after formula to use at the end of every lesson

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Why timing your encouragement matters more than you think

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How saying the right thing in front of both the parent and child creates a moment that makes families want to stay

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Why retention improvements are harder to measure than ad results, and why that's exactly why most school owners ignore them

http://davesimonsmusic.com

Most music school owners assume students quit because life got busy or they lost interest. But the real reason is something quieter, something that's been building for months before that cancellation email ever arrives. In today's episode, I want to climb inside the head of the parent writing you that tuition check every month and show you exactly what's happening in her mind long before she decides to quit.

Understanding this changes everything about how you approach retention.

What we cover:

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Why retention is never a single decision and always a slow, quiet drift

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The three signals parents rely on to determine whether lessons are "working" (and why all three are unreliable)

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Why letting parents observe lessons doesn't always fix the problem, and can sometimes make things worse

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The structural reason music lessons are uniquely vulnerable when a family's schedule gets tight

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A simple two-sentence habit that can meaningfully rebuild parent confidence over time

In this episode, you'll learn:

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Why the cancellation email you received was actually decided months earlier, and what you can do about it

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What parents are really evaluating every time they see the monthly tuition hit their bank statement

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How to make the growth happening inside your lesson rooms visible to parents who have no musical frame of reference

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Why "parent communication" that focuses on practice assignments is missing the point entirely

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The three mental shifts that move retention from reactive to proactive

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A concrete, low-effort communication habit your teachers can start immediately that slowly rebuilds parent confidence one lesson at a time

http://davesimonsmusic.com

In today's episode, I discuss why student retention often has less to do with teaching quality and more to do with what parents can actually see. If parents don't understand the progress happening inside the lesson, they start judging value based on how their child feels afterward.

For music school owners, this is a big shift. Your lessons may be working, but if the progress stays invisible, parents may still question whether it's worth continuing.

Key ideas in this episode:

• Why parents use mood as a signal for lesson value
• Why real progress can look like frustration
• How music competes with activities that make progress easier to see
• Why great teaching still needs clear parent communication

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why retention is often a visibility problem, not a teaching problem
• How parents misread productive struggle as a sign lessons are not working
• What music schools can learn from sports about showing progress
• The four things parents need to know after every lesson
• How making progress visible can build trust and improve retention

https://davesimonsmusic.com/

Most students don't quit because they're busy or lose interest. They quit because parents quietly lose confidence that lessons are working. In today's episode, I break down the hidden "visibility gap" that's driving student drop-off, and why even great teaching isn't enough if parents can't clearly see progress.

This shift changes how you think about retention. When you understand what parents are really evaluating each week, you can start fixing the real problem, not just the symptoms.

Key ideas from this episode:

• The real reason students quit isn't what most music schools think
• How one simple parent-child interaction shapes long-term retention
• Why parents rely on emotion, not evidence, to judge lesson value
• The difference between lesson quality and parent confidence
• Why music lessons struggle more than sports when it comes to perceived progress
• The hidden "visibility gap" that most schools never address

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why improving your teaching alone won't fix retention issues
• What parents are actually using to decide whether to continue lessons
• How invisible progress quietly leads to cancellations
• The critical moment each week that shapes a parent's perception
• How to shift from guessing to clearly showing value to parents
• The one lever that has the biggest impact on long-term student retention

https://davesimonsmusic.com/