Hello, Ascend Music Studios, and happy new year! I am Lauren Koetje, a violin, voice, and piano teacher at the Jackson, MI location, and I will be taking over the blog for the next few months as we dive deeper into each of our core values. The first value we will be looking at is ascension.

Whether you have been dreaming of playing an instrument or you are looking for a solution to take you to the next level of playing, we are excited about helping you do that! However you are starting with us, we are dedicated to working with you to get to the next level of your abilities. It is important to us that we meet each student where they are, understanding their musical background and former training, so we can walk with them until they achieve their goals. 

Sometimes, I like to think of the process of taking lessons and practicing as refinement. Like a precious metal or stone, there are impurities in our playing in its most raw form. Those metals and stones undergo intensive processes in order to become what we see presented in the store. Diamonds are refined through a series of chemical baths, intense heat, and extreme pressure. When I first picked up a violin, I had no idea how to hold it or make beautiful sounds. When I drew the bow across my instrument, it was not pretty, but my teacher met me there. She sat with me as I struggled to understand how to contort my thumb into the shape of a banana for it to rest on my bow, and she coached me to play with confidence. Overtime, through practice and attention to detail, my violin began to sing as I drew my bow across it. My abilities had been refined through the process, and I had ascended to a new level of playing.

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