Thai Music School - Raison d'etre

December 22, 2011 at 4:45 PM

I've met a guy today who told me looking straight in the eye that his music school just wants to make money. None of this "educating the young minds" and "helping to build a music culture in Thailand" business. Parents pay, teachers get the money and pretend to teach. Everybody is happy. As simple as that.

Such honesty was refreshing. Thai person who is not afraid to call things by their names. Such rare species. Wow.

Better than old pretentious and obnoxious uncles who steal from the government, built an empire with concrete walls and palm trees, call it Music College and declare it to be the best in Southeast Asia.

Did you know it's basically enough for students to come to entrance examinations, bring their violin and viola cases and - and boom, they automatically become members of this elite society?

You are in luck if some of them can play a one-octave scale. And should I mention levels of some of their teachers?

To be honest, I've never seen so much mediocrity in one place.

But hey, music is not for the faint hearted. We knew that when we came here.

Too bad the "educating the young minds" and "helping to build a music culture" part got lost in between the pretty palm trees.

From Terez Mertes
Posted on December 23, 2011 at 10:28 PM

Well put, and yes, nice to hear some refreshing honesty on the man's part. There's a lot of money to be made in that kind of education business - be it film schools, creative writing programs, music study programs, acting/dance/art, etc. I'm not referring to true, accredited schools, of course. More the other ones, advertised on the Internet and in the back of magazines. They sound so appealing and glamorous and the students are charged $$$$, and in some ways it's a win-win situation and in other ways it can be lose-win and the student isn't the winner. Ah, so is life, sadly.

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Thai Music School - Raison d'etre

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