Today we’d like to introduce you to Jenny James.
Jenny, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I’ve been a teacher for 20 years. I studied elementary education and music at Baylor and taught in the public school systems for a few years. Then I moved from teaching mainstream classroom to teaching private piano lessons out of my home. This was a great career switch for me since my husband traveled and it allowed me to be at home with our boys while they were young.
In 2017, I opened Legacy Music Studio in old town Lewisville in a tiny 700 square foot space with my friend, Carissa Thompson. After a year, the studio grew enough where we doubled our square footage and added several more teachers and instruments. In the last year, we added recording & production services with Charles Tobias Recording as well as photo & video services with Trey Hernandez Media. We recently partnered with ResponsiveEd, a charter school organization, to provide after-school campus music classes.
With a team of 10, we are expanding once again. This spring we bought a historic home in old town Lewisville that will undergo an extensive restoration and a new addition to perfectly fit our needs. Legacy House will open in 2021. We enjoy being a part of Old Town Lewisville. Our students and clients are the best part of our job. We love to foster a sense of community and help our students achieve all their music and creative goals.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Starting up and running your own business is extremely rewarding, but it’s not without hiccups. It’s been exciting to plan for and execute all our times of growth, but one thing we never planned for was COVID-19. As with every business owner, we had to quickly innovate our business model. Thankfully we were able to use the week of spring break to prepare at-home learning packets and train everyone to teach online. Getting the right equipment into each teacher’s home and moving to virtual lessons has undoubtedly been the biggest challenge our studio has faced. But we are so thankful to have families just jump in and make the transition with us. Even now, we can see that this has stretched us and allowed us to best meet the needs of our students. Going forward we can better leverage technology in our lessons and even offer online lessons in our regular schedule. So, while this season has been extremely difficult, we are continuing to grow and adapt.
Please tell us about Legacy Music Studio.
Legacy Music Studio offers lessons taught in an energetic, nurturing environment where students gain experience with different genres of music, master recital pieces, and perform in various venues. Our teachers adapt their lessons to best fit the students’ learning style while creating an engaging, positive experience to keep students excited about their personal music journey. At Legacy, we currently teach piano, guitar, bass, drums, strings, voice, and production lessons. Our students range in age from preschool to mature adult. We also offer recording/production services as well as photo/video services for musicians and artists.
Our students and their families are considered our extended family. The culture at Legacy is warm, inviting, and inclusive which helps foster creative expression and confidence in our students. We love nothing more than to see our students nail an audition, perform on stage, lead worship at their church, or just take a next step. I’ve been teaching long enough where I now have several former students as teachers at the studio. It’s a full-circle moment for me to watch them now teach the next generation.
Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
I grew up in Waco where my Granny owned a large farm, Cloverland, on the banks of the Brazos River. My favorite memories consist of long summers where my cousins, brother, and I splashed in the river and played all around the farm. We really had no rules other than to get along with each other and have fun. We spent hours on her trampoline with a water sprinkler, jumping on rope swings, leaping on hay bales, climbing the cotton in the barn, shooting roman candle fireworks at each other, and riding on top of the car… on the gravel road. It’s amazing we all survived our childhood. I love that I got to live a bit of my life as a free spirit and allowed to test boundaries. I believe it’s helped me as an entrepreneur. Life is full of risk, and life is meant to be fully experienced.
Pricing:
- 30 minute lessons/ $135 month
- Summer camps/$110
Contact Info:
- Address: 190 W Main St, ste 101
Lewisville, TX 75057 - Website: www.legacymusicstudio.org
- Email: info@legacymusicstudio.org
- Instagram: legacymusicstudioofficial
- Facebook: legacymusicstudiolewisville
- Other: YouTube: legacy music studio
Image Credit:
Trey Hernandez Media, Blackhall Photography
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