New Biz Oly: Sound Star Music Academy

Introducing you to new locally-owned businesses..

Sound Star Music Academy

Skyler Blake’s whole life is dedicated to music. He started young in Monroe, playing guitar, coronet and piano, and quickly discovered that playing guitar lead to demands for playing bass. He’s played both ever since, along with piano, drums, lap-slide and harmonica.

Skyler earned his BA in music at Northwest College in Kirkland and immediately moved to Olympia to serve as Youth Worship Leader at The Evergreen Christian School. Hosting open mics around town and teaching music, he also began performing many genres of music in a variety of bands – country with the Aaron Crawford Band; hip hop with Old Dominion artists like XP with Macklemore; blues, rock and Americana with Sour Owl; rock and roll with The Hard Way, which has a CD coming out in June.

Now he operates Star Sound Music Academy out of the house he calls a “musically condensed location providing study, recording, and studio space.” His colleague, Smoke, five-year winner of the 25360 Award for Producer of the Year, runs the studio in what they call “The Bass-mint” of the house. It’s a central, functional, friendly space with ample parking, perfect for musical pursuits of all kinds, including use of a full drum set.

“I have a passion for music that has enabled me to dissect it and come up with my own curriculum designed to fit anyone’s parameters of what and how they want to learn through whatever instructional methods to give them tools for their own musical creativity,” Skyler says. “I wrote my philosophy down over a year ago: twelve steps in learning music, a method I use in my teaching. It turned out to be a magic number that leads to the interval 13,” he smiles, “and I plan to publish it to use in my program.

“As a musician, having worked jobs and taught along the way, I decided to make teaching the center of my life along with my love of music. As I developed my core curriculum, I realized I had good, sound substance for a school. I opened Sound Star Academy on January 1st with my current students on board, and then did some advertising and product branding. Now we have 30 students per week. My goal is to have 60.

“John Croarkin, who brings huge talent to the community as player and mobile recording engineer, teaches flute, sax and harmonica. Brad DeVol makes and sells dijeridoos and runs workshops. We’ll be offering other workshops soon,” Skyler says. “It could be anybody in Sour Owl giving one!”

“I give instruction on guitar, bass, drums, and piano, focusing on theory and how music works, using fundamental concepts to build instrumental confidence. Because I want the process to be affordable, our three-month terms feature classes at $20 for one-half hour with half-off band classes. There’s a discounted family rate for siblings – ½ off for additional family members. Our process involves half-hour lessons and one hour band classes so the students can perform in context with other players. Those who want to explore an instrument or check out their interest in music can take four introductory lessons for $40. We provide performance options four times a year at the end of each teaching cycle…mid-December, March, June, and September, at various venues including the Eagles’ Club, in which I am a member. It’s a special place for events. Sometimes we perform next door at Bruce Whitcomb’s Arcade Recording Studio, and he’s recorded some of the events that can be heard on YouTube, Facebook or on Twitter,” Skyler explains.

“I am a small business owner operating on a small budget. I love what I do, believe in it, and want to help others ignite their own passion for music, which is the most rewarding thing I see happening in my students, whose ages range from 5 to 50 years old.” ◙

Sound Star Music Academy

350 North Street

soundstaracademy.com

New Biz Oly is written by Holly Graham. To suggest a new business to be featured, send us an email at .