Practice the right way to make every practice count!

Learning how to practice well is essential to the development and success of every student. Bad habits form during practice sessions that hinder growth and productivity, so identifying bad habits and exchanging them for more helpful habits exponentiates the rate at which a student learns. Practice Coaching helps identify and eliminate destructive habits in students and improve the student’s ability to attain their highest potential in the practice room and on stage.

We hope you’ll take advantage of this unique opportunity to dramatically improve the productivity of practice time! 

Clarinet Practice Coaching:

• Provide constructive feedback to improve aspects of clarinet performance and practice
• Guide students to practice mindfully and methodically
• Improve practice efficiency
• Expand knowledge of music and the clarinet

Thomas is from Springfield, Virginia, and is currently pursuing his Bachelor’s Degree in Clarinet Performance at James Madison University. Throughout his high school career, he played with several ensembles, including the Flutopia Wind Ensemble, American Youth Philharmonic, and West Springfield High School Wind Symphony. He has performed in several chamber groups in high school as well as at James Madison. Public performance highlights include Carnegie Hall with Flutopia and the Kennedy Center’s Millennium Stage through the American Youth Philharmonic’s chamber ensemble program. In 2019, Thomas performed with the James Madison Clarinet Ensemble at ClarinetFest in Knoxville, TN.

Teaching Philosophy:

My teaching philosophy begins and ends with the student. I provide the student with the information they need to succeed with the tasks they desire to complete, and they will apply the information to their task. My goal is that the student makes their own discoveries in music, but I guide students when they cannot connect information needed to skills for improvement. I personally believe playing the clarinet or any musical instruments provides students with mental exercises that keep the mind active and engaged. My objective with my teaching is that students discover their personal methods for successfully applying information to improve skills. 

Positive reinforcement encourages the student to continue towards accomplishing their task, but a degree of strictness motivates the student to build the rate of progress. With strong implementation of positive reinforcement, students will feel more comfortable to take risks during lessons and make decisions that they would be more hesitant to make in a negative environment. Teaching how to practice will play an important part in the student’s curriculum, so the student knows what methods can be utilized to make practice sessions more productive and efficient. Better practice sessions bring better results during lessons, which in turn will motivate the student to reach for higher goals. If there are other subjects or skills outside of the clarinet world that my student is interested in, a goal of my teaching would be to spark the ability to apply learning skills from my lessons that they can use to build different skills. The ability to find progress and improvement will ignite motivation to improve more and more, and the student will find that they’re teaching themselves. 

Students will also learn to establish a goal and compartmentalize the different knowledge and skills needed to attain the goal. The student will then be able to create a step-by-step plan that makes large goals attainable and manageable. My ultimate expectation for my students is that they learn how to teach themselves through the applications they make in lessons. 

Risk-Free Satisfaction Guarantee

If the trial lesson doesn’t meet your expectations, we’ll gladly help you connect with another top-rated, highly qualified tutor—or issue a FULL refund.

Refund for Lesson Packages

You may cancel a lesson package with at least 24 hours' written notice before the next lesson. Completed lessons will be billed at the standard hourly rate, and the remaining balance will be refunded minus a 5% processing fee. The fee is waived if you keep the balance as credit on your TimeAfterSchool account for other lessons.

Cancellation and Rescheduling Policy

• Standard Policy: Provide at least 24 hours' notice before the scheduled start time to cancel or reschedule a lesson free of charge. Cancellations or reschedules with less than 24 hours’ notice will incur the full lesson fee.
• Grace Period for Packages: For each packages of 10 or more lessons, you are allowed one late cancellation or rescheduling (with less than 24 hours' notice) without penalty to accommodate unexpected situations. Any additional late cancellations or changes beyond this one-time exception will be charged in full.

Adult Supervision

All tutoring sessions for students under 18 years old must be supervised by a responsible adult.