It's always nice if your child turns out to be the next Mozart or Beethoven!

All joking aside, though, the principle that we embrace at Westminster Arts is that every student really has his or her and unique capabilities, and we’re not here to try to force methods or goals on students.

In fact, in many cases, classical music training isn't really why younger students signed up for music in the first place. There’s a lot more to it than that. 

Music as an Experience

We understand that there is a classical training field and ways to orient to that, but we also understand that for many families, ignoring or neglecting music as an experience can be a big mistake.

Music is inherently an experience, whether you decide to orient toward a specific kind of training or not. So that's really something that the student comes to as he or she works through the process of advancing. It's not something that should be really put first and foremost at the beginning of someone's training. The experience has to come first.

Music and Socialization

We're dealing with specific challenges in today's world.

The pandemic has isolated many of our students to the point that it seems unhealthy in some ways.

Children are looking for connections and nurturing experiences that enrich their day-to-day lives. They're reaching out and wanting interactions.

Always, and even more in today's environment, this has to be the starting point for music instruction.

We take this to heart in offering our individual and group classes and options for every learning level in various ages.

When a student chooses an instrument and forges ahead, that makes us excited, and we want to encourage that passion for learning and the experience of music, not just as an achievement only, but as a journey into the richly rewarding world of music that may include reading sheet music, playing by ear, or just hamming it up with your instrument and having fun.

Here's another way to think about it – many students move from initial music training at a younger age, into middle school or high school band. Band is about musical performance, but it's also an incredibly enriching group experience where people bond and share their realities. We feel that all musical instruction should be like that, in a way, because it engages students and offers them a more multidimensional way to learn. Take a look at our site for more on how we foster interest and engagement in this very important type of learning.