In another forum somebody has contacted me about syntheziser lessons, referring to a post I had made about my plans to give syntheziser lessons. The person is in town for a few days and wants to come see me on one day and possibly on the next two days as well, and he wants to know what this will cost him. I am really not sure about how much I should charge. Do any of you know how much money other people take for lessons? Is it better to charge by the hour or in total?
I would very much appreciate some help, thank you.
Re: How much should I charge for synthesizer lessons?
When I gave guitar lessons, I charged $40-$60/Hr. I found that charging in hour segments works out best, but not so that you can charge extra. Instead, if I was having fun and it was over an hour then it would be free. If I wasn't having fun and it was over an hour, I would remind them that it would be extra $$ if we kept on going.
I am not sure what synth lessons would entail, but I am interested to hear about how this goes! Keep us posted.
Re: How much should I charge for synthesizer lessons?
Yeah..I'm with SadSandwich on this..I'd say about $50 per hour is about right.
Mind you, it really does depend on the format of your teaching..meaning are you going to sit down and walk this person through the basics?..or are you going to give them handouts, links and other materials? If so, then maybe charging a higher one-time fee might be better and promote it as a complete course, rather than individual lessons.
The main benefit of offering a course is it frees you from the one-on-one thing that lessons demand of your time. A course on the other hand,is basically everything up front, in one box they can go through at their own pace.
You can of course offer follow-up support with a course, too..so it's not like they are left out in the cold to figure everything out for themselves.
In the end, I guess it comes down to which you like better..but if it is lessons you're going with, then..yeah..about $50 per hour should be about right.
Re: How much should I charge for synthesizer lessons?
While I see AM's points...I think it is easier to charge by the hour until you get a sense of what you are willing/able to provide service wise and what makes people happy. In a per hour scenario I feel like there is probably less chance you'll end up arguing with an unhappy customer over price. If they feel like you aren't worth a damn they should have bailed in the first hour or two right? They should be watching the clock and evaluating what they are getting out of it.
I'd also make sure to have a minimum one hour charge.
While designing a course on paper is one thing, I don't think people will be willing to pay a ton of money for something like that these days. Personally, if I were going to pay for guidance at this point, I'd want one on one face time with the gear and music in front of us, not a book or a video. Just a thought.
Re: How much should I charge for synthesizer lessons?
I think it also depends on the standard of living where you live. I live in a pretty poor area, so I work with people around here. Also teach in a rich area, where I am more merciless. I might just look up some people in your area and charge what they charge.
Re: How much should I charge for synthesizer lessons?
This depends a lot. Yes, a lot of people charge around $50/hour, but most people also hold around 1-2 hour sessions at maximum. If they also assign "homework", or things to practice between sessions, this is a much more efficient method of teaching than a few days of intense training. They are also incurring costs (both money and time) of transit for each lesson. I'd assume that eight-hour-sessions would end up costing less/hour by default.
Apart from that, what gear and what skills you have? Are you a skilled keyboardist, and if so in what genres. A good Jazz keyboardist might be able to charge more than a skilled rock/pop keyboardist, because Jazz is "high musacs". Gear of course plays a part, if you have a few really nice synthesizers and can demonstrate different techniques on them, that is obviously a bonus. What experience do you have teaching? At least in Finland, most music teachers have a degree in music pedagogy, which obviously makes people more comfortable handing out money.
But yeah, 30-60€/hour. Less only if you're organizing lessons in large bulk and have basically no gear or travel expenses. More if you're a famous synth superstar with walls of modular.
Re: How much should I charge for synthesizer lessons?
You can teach me some stuff through skype for free and then i'll let you know how much you should charge other people heheh. JK of course. Depends where you live. Since in Germany (and more specifically Berlin) music production is at its best and everyone makes a fair amount of money, you could even charge 50 euros per hour. But in general i think around 25 euros would be a good amount for all this knowledge. Even poor guys would pay that money considering all colleges for music production are freaking expensive.
Re: How much should I charge for synthesizer lessons?
Guy was here, we basically covered the basic workflow of Ableton Live and then I showed him how I'd start a new track.
Then he had lots of questions ofc. Tried to answer them and after that was done he tried to play with Live and recorded some stuff.
After that we plugged his Virus TI Desktop in and had some fun.
2 hours of teaching/2 hours talking/jamming/etc. - He gave me 50€ and asked if that was ok.
He plays in a christian band, they also play lots of concerts in churches so not what I expected^^
I didn't really start teaching yet, our cat keeps us busy as well as other stuff in live - also I think people are more interested in learning a daw. Don't think there are many people interested in synthesizer lessons in my city....
Anyways, I found out music lessons are usually 15 €/h here.
We moved from Frankfurt to Leipzig few years ago. Frankfurt is a rich city compared to Leipzig, music lessons are usually 30-40€/h there...
I thought about teaching Ableton Live, but that needs much more planning than teaching synthesis so...we'll see.
My wife and me are pretty busy with that animal protection stuff we're involved these days.
Re: How much should I charge for synthesizer lessons?
I'll just add some perspective on what's been said here.
I think that looking at what other people charge in the area is a good start, but I don't think that you should try and charge top dollar if this is your first teaching experience. Also, some of these music teachers probably have a degree (if not multiple degrees) in music, or music education. Especially the ones teaching the 'higher forms' of music (i.e. classical instruments). So they can charge a higher base rate.
I charge $40/hr for private consulting/lessons - less than that if its a long term arrangement, or I find the work compelling. More than that if there is travel involved, or if there's other factors making the job more difficult (deadlines, scheduling conflicts, etc.)
I think you're right about there being less of a market for straight up synthesis lessons. I think conceptualizing it them general music production lessons might cast a wider net.
