Should You Go To Music School?

Studying music in school can be a great choice or a bad one? Here are some of my thoughts on the matter.

[Commanderc]

Dude this advice applies to pretty much every college degree.

[mattswanson]

Hey Steve, I'm your number eight fan. Love your work.

[adamcolbertmusic]

I majored in music. If you want to go to music school for the sake of getting a music job, then it depends on what kind of job you're aiming for. But in terms of becoming knowledgeable about music theory, it definitely put me in the "elite" class of understanding, and that has helped my musicality immensely.

[michaelryan]

I'm 27, I've been out of high school for *9 years* and I still don't know what I want to do with my life.

[davidflint]

Nothing in life is guaranteed. A college degree isn't a guarantee of a job or success especially a music degree. You communicated this effectively. I believe the people that do well in life with an education in music even are the ones with a great entrepreneurial sense.

[peteplaysmusic]

I enrolled into a year long diploma course at the ICMP in London in when I was only 16 and straight out of high school. I failed miserably, I was simply to young to comprehend the amount of work and commitment involved. So as you said take your time and think about it for a year or so, there's no rush. I learned from my experience there and it wasn't all bad, I met my guitar tutor Martin Goulding there who I ended up having lessons with for the next few years. I found that one on one learning environment much more useful and it turned me into the player I am today. Great video man! :)

[AugustBurnsSam]

You released this video four weeks into my first music school semester.

[aaronchatterpaul]

I wish I had this advice when I was in Music school...
Keep up the great advice samurai, and thanks!

[joshmaddux]

I love the humility you display. Always encouraging one to get as much knowledge and experience from as many people/sources as possible. Admirable.

[FrostyMac]

I’ve been composing and producing music since my sophomore year in high school, and now that I’m in my senior year, I’m looking into some music schools, Berklee in particular, and this video was pretty useful. I’m still going to go to music school, but I’ll keep all of this in mind. Great video!

[jonathanangeles]

Samurai te amo (i love you greetings from Peru)
Descargo todos tus videos y los escucho en el bus:)

[bleakryan]

Thanks for the advice! Im a Fresher at BIMM(British and Irish institute of Modern Music) i start my course next week (October 2nd). I agree with everything you said. I will be paying close attention to my tutors and peers seeing who are the right people to be getting in with! Thanks again man! A really helpful video!

[gringogreen]

Great information! This is true about many degrees especially in the Humanaties fields. IF you graduate you will have a very specialized and a very niche degree. The good news is you still have a degree. A bachelors in Music will get lumped in with all the other degrees when employers are looking for someone. Another thing if you get a Music degree is that you may be better off going to where the jobs are, so Los Angeles, Nashville, Austin, New York... This will give you more opportunities to leverage your education. If not you will need to build from the ground up a local prescence to be succesful.

Outside of music this degree will be of very limited use, but that's pretty much true of most advanced degrees. If you get the degree for making money you will have to work hard to carve out those opportunities. There are people who do get advanced degrees for personal reasons that may have nothing to do with that field after graduation. Getting a degree will not gaurantee a job or a career in that given field, not everyone who gets a History degree goes on to be a historian or work in a museum.

I will tell you that I have never heard anyone after getting a degree say that they didn't need it nor that it didn't help them. Education creates opportunities that need to be explored and acted on. You have to hustle once you get to that rung of the ladder just like everyone else who has that same degree or something similar. So is it worth it? I like the part aboit taking your time to figure out what you want. I recommend looking at your life from the end to the beggining, what type of money do you want to make? What type of schedule do you want to have? How much do you want to travel, etc. Once you answer these questions the picture gets clearer and you can see if there are any gaps in the dream. It also lines up your education really well too.

Just so you know I have over ten years working in Higher Education on all levels both advising and recruiting students. I've pretty much seen it all. This video is well thought out and has a great message.

[jye_]

My Man I just enrolled and when u said 3 years out of highschool a smile grew on my face. This is my third year out of highschool!! Great video brother real Music and Live music will shine again!

[noimkat]

This is perfect timing as I’m in the process of applying to schools! Thank you for the advice

[tatedavis]

I'm a drummer and I enjoy watching these and all of your guitar videos. Thanks for posting this.

[kevinwidjaya]

I have a lot of friends who became musician without taking music major on university. Some of them were an economic graduated, psychology, etc. I'm an accounting student, but my time were most invested in practicing music. Right now i'm still on my journey to get graduated while teaching classical guitar in a music school. Thanks for your advice Mr. Samurai Guitarist. I've learned a lot from you. Thanks for being inspired! Anyway, sorry for my bad english :)

[srincrivel]

I love music from the bottom of my heart, but I don't have the guts to make my degree be about music. I am really afraid to become one of those guys who know about music but end up teaching 10 year olds to play country guitar... I don't know, I just feel like the path is way too tough and I feel ashamed about it.
So I don't know, I'll try to own a studio and hope to connect the dots down the line, wish me luck!

[Novemberbridges]

Dude you are not just a YouTuber/Musician. I believe even you don't know your worth! On close observation, i have noticed you say so deep stuffs that have relevance in a lot of fields beyond music. You should be a monk and preach your knowledge someday. I would love to be a follower. You are so fucking awesome, man! My life has changed since i discovered you. I am a self taught amateur musician with no formal education or a teacher, and i fear i might never make it big. But you have been so inspiring, it gives me a lot of motivation to continue!
Cheers!

[antmortensen]

True, there is always risk involved, especially in music. I'm actually leaning towards becoming a guitar mechanic and owning my own shop one day.
Peace and love brotha ✌