Angelkeys Music Studio

Sunday, March 22, 2020 by Angela Sommer | Uncategorized

Dear parents and students

I hope you are all keeping well.This is unprecedented and we all are adjusting to a new ‘normal’ for now.Music is something that makes us happy and keeps us going through dark times in our lives.

If you have scheduled a lesson this week we need to talk about how to go about it by Tuesday, March 24, 2020.  I will have to create backing tracks for the singers before the session. :)

I will continue to offer music instruction for children and adults as I believe it will give children some sense of normalcy with school and many other activities being cancelled.

I am adapting my studio to work in the current situation:

1. I am switching my studio to 100% online using existing platforms such as Zoom, Facetime and Skype or in the long-run VoiceLessons.com.There may be others but three of them are integrated into my scheduling program called MyMusicstaff.I will not be offering in-person sessions until the crisis has passed.
2. I am switching to hourly rates only for everyone taking lessons. The rate is $46 per hour, pro-rated for 30 or 45 minute lessons.
3. I will need to set up a new schedule for any lessons going forward from this point.
4. I need confirmation from each of you to either continue and give me a time slot that will work or a cancellation notice of lessons for you or your children. 
5. Cariboo Festival:We are looking into doing the festival in a completely safe manner and are working with the adjudicators on the details.We are trying hard.
6. After our planned move this summer, I will have to offer this for all Williams Lake students anyways, plus some in-person trips once we can do that again.We are just 4 months ahead of schedule now.

Requirements for online lessons:

1. Students will need a cell phone, a tablet or ipad, a computer with a webcam or a laptop. Any device that you already have will work.We will need some adjustment time for sure to get everything set up and working properly, but I have done many online lessons before and we can do this. If you are worried about the set-up ask your child.They KNOW how to do all this stuff. 😊
   
   For Piano:
   Set up the device so I can see the student and their hands.They will get the same view from me.I might need a picture of the pieces they are playing since I don’t have an original copy of all their pieces due to edition changes in their books.The audio from their device is sufficient to run an online lesson.
   
   For Voice:
   Set up the device so I can see the student from the front and they will see my face on their screen.Vocal students will have to learn to sing with backing tracks which I will record for them and send to you.It is preferred that there is a second device that plays the backing track rather than do the video and playback of a track on the same machine.New songs are learned in sing back style or via a recording either from me or a good source available on Youtube.It is a bit like learning to sing Karaoke.Because of the time lag using online platforms, I can not live accompany students for their pieces.There is an American company that is working on that and I may use their platform once I have enough students online.That would mean I pay for the subscription and everyone in the studio has free access. 

Once I have a schedule I will send our further instructions to make this work.Students will have to be at the appointed lesson time on-time.  More to come.  

All we can do is hang it there for the time

Virtual hugs and greetings to all of you

Angela Sommer

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