“Backstage Music Lessons” Brings Unforgettable Music Lessons to Fans
Backstage Music lessons offers the most memorable and awesome experience you could imagine — a 1-on-1 music lesson with your favorite band.
When I was in high school learning guitar, I sat in my room alone for hours every single day, painstakingly working on chords, and fumbling around for what seemed like an eternity before making any progress.
But I loved every second of it, even the struggle, because learning an instrument is one of the most humbling and rewarding experiences you can have. For me personally, doing so changed the entire course of my life in ways too profound to completely understand.
Although I’ve always loved teaching myself music, many of my biggest breakthroughs came from sitting down with other musicians who were able to open my mind to a new scale, chord, style, or way of thinking about it.
This is why I was so excited when the incredibly talented and highly respected drummer from the band Stick Figure, Kevin Offitzer, started his company “Backstage Music Lessons.” The company essentially links fans in each city with a chosen member of their favorite bands, and gives them the opportunity to sit down for a personal, 1–on-1 lesson.
At this point, I’ve been playing music for almost twenty years, and learning to produce my own for the past three. When I saw Kevin start this exciting venture, and noticed many of my favorite bands offering lessons around the country, I knew I had to be involved.
As reggae band Iya Terra came to play an incredible set for a packed house in Saint Paul, Minnesota the other week, I had the opportunity to get my first lesson. I’ve always really enjoyed chatting with Iya Terra’s guitar player Nick Sefakis, and he’s been truly supportive of all my musical endeavors, so I reached out a few weeks back and booked a lesson with him.
I’ve been working hard to further my music production skills, so I told Nick I’d love to focus on producing during our lesson. The way it works is you show up a few hours or so before the show, sit down at the venue with the band member of your choice, and have an hour to work with them on whatever you choose.
As always, Nick greeted me with a warm smile and hug, we told each other how great it was to connect again, and began setting up our computers so we could get to work. He said he’d love to hear one of the recent tracks I’m working on, give me some feedback, and go through my process.
As Nick put his headphones on to listen to my jam, it felt pretty awesome watching his face light up as the song kicked in.
“I really like that man!”, he said enthusiastically. He then dove right in to checking the EQs on my instruments, and boosting/cutting signals where he felt it would help them stand out, explaining his reasoning as he went. He also introduced me to some really awesome effects that I hadn’t been using much, and showed me how he uses them on his own songs.
We went back and forth between some of my songs and some of the unreleased ones from his upcoming album, comparing how they were mixed, how the instruments had been processed, and how we approached producing them. Every second of the lesson was solid gold for me; Nick is an incredible producer, and being able to pick his brain for an hour, listen to some of the songs off his new album, learn about his process, and have him help with my song jumped me forward what felt like light years in my production. We even listened to some Stick Figure, and worked on dissecting parts of “Hawaii Song” to try and figure out how Scott had created certain effects.
The hour went by fast, and before we knew it Nick had to be taking off to head to his VIP Meet and Greet with fans. I walked away from the lesson with my song sounding 100% more professional than it had when we sat down, and true to my past experience, the amount of knowledge you can gain from a lesson like this is incredible.
Also, another less talked about benefit of these lessons is the ability to make meaningful connections with musicians who are extremely talented, and already achieving awesome things in the music industry. This isn’t something guaranteed in the program or anything, but if you sit down 1-on-1 with anyone for an hour and get to know them and learn from them, chances are that there’s a connection there.
Let’s say in five years your guitar playing skills are incredible, and a band that you love in the scene happens to be looking for a guitar player. Instead of having absolutely no idea how to approach the situation, you could potentially reach out to the musician you had the lesson with that knows them, ask if they would mind referring you, and all of a sudden you may have a warm introduction.
Again, this is just a personal (but practical) observation of mine — obviously the program can’t promise that sort of stuff, and you shouldn’t just expect that you’ll have some amazing connection with the musician after your lesson, but trust me, stuff like this does happen.
Regardless of what happens, whether it’s receiving an awesome music lesson, an incredible fan experience, an expansion to your pro network, or all of the above, Backstage Music Lessons is an insanely great value. I can’t wait to take my next one — I’m even considering traveling for it (other people have already started doing this!)
Please like and share Backstage Music Lessons with anyone you think would be interested, and give my man Nick Sefakis a follow if you haven’t already! Feel free to reach out to me directly or comment if you have any questions :)
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Email: backstagemusiclessons@gmail.com
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