Brooklyn Music School — Local services in New York

Brooklyn Music School has been a wonderful and extremely impactful addition to my son’s life.

My son and I had been having a tremendous amount of trouble in schools with his behavior. My husband and I had tried our best to put him in pools all over Brooklyn, NY and nothing had changed. Obstacle after obstacle.. hurdle after hurdle.. phone call after phone call.. school visit upon school visit.. to no avail.

We were at the end of our hopes. Our son was one minor event away from being expelled from four schools. The school staff only provided him with ‘extra chances’ because he was so beloved. He is such a charming young man and a true master of multiple arts, but he could not get his behavior right.

We took away privileges at home and tried to put him in countless after school activities and still nothing worked.

One day a family friend of ours recommended a school for him to attend. It was ICS NY. We loved it and decided to enroll him. He loved it too and began to behave for a week or two. Then he was right back to the same shenanigans.

Honestly, his behavior only started to improve after he began attending the Thursday afternoon program via your partnership with his school. And even then he would have on and off days that had us worried about him being excused from the program. Thankfully the staff was very patient with him and continued to work with him through his behavior issues. You guys truly believed and showed him you would not give up on him.

Fast forward, now he has a great day mostly everyday in school. Especially because he does not want to be kicked out of his Rockband program. He is madly in love with music even more now and has transformed into a new person. We’re sure he will continue to blossom with the help of Brooklyn Music School.

My husband and I are both into arts (music/dance), so we do understand some of the frustrations that a true artist can/will experience in environments where their expression is filtered or muted.

Thankful is an understatement to what we are for this wonderful environment. We loved his Old Town Road vocal performance this evening. We are convinced that we have the next mega star...

Would not send my child here. The leadership is disengaged. Parents doesn’t even know who runs the building. There is a high turnover rate with the employees so there is always someone new around your child and/or chaos in its ARY children’s program. The building is falling apart with molding, broken windows, doors that doesn’t lock, broken theater chairs (the theater like the last reviewer mentioned is still disgustingly hot if you attend any of their shows or visit in the summer for summer camp), the basement floods and etc. There is no safety plan so therefore there’s never a fire drill or other mandatory procedures happening. There was a rat infestation over the year and you would be able to smell dead rats throughout the building or even see rats running around the building in broad daylight around the kids! Staff there has not gotten paid three consecutive pay periods in a row which is one of the many reasons why employees are constantly quitting (directors, teachers, counselors, finance department and leadership positions). This place needs to be investigated and shut down. Just take a visit for yourselves and you will see. I am also not interested in any response from the organization as nothing has changed in all the years that I knew this place. It has especially gotten gotten worse over the...

The BMS has been a revelation for my daughter, who had previously spent 3-4 years playing violin when we decided to switch her over to cello, assuming the skills would carry over. Well, thanks to both her private instructor at BMS as well as her orchestral group her development has accelerated faster than even we expected. She’s since participated in a recital trip to Paris and had the most amazing group learning experience.

The teachers and faculty are becoming like family and this is probably the biggest factor in our daughter’s learning process. She looks forward to attending lessons, and that right there is the gamechanger. Of course none of this would matter if the instructors weren’t tier musicians themselves, but they are, so I am comfortable knowing that their skills and talent are rubbing off on our 9 year-old girl.

I personally cannot wait for my five year-old piano playing son to begin attending the school and unlocking his full potential. If you have a child that you want to introduce to the musical arts, I can’t think of a better home for music than the Brooklyn...