FAQs
- What is your typical process for working with a new customer?
I believe successful teaching requires a willingness to help each student reach her or his individual goals and acknowledging that they may be different from another’s. Every student is unique, and every student is well-suited to some teaching methods and not others. A teacher with rigid, inflexible methods will never help each student with the efficiency, clarity, and ease that comes from adapting to each individual student’s needs. Item number one on the agenda, therefore, is always to discuss previous experience and goals, practice expectations, and come up with a personalized plan.
- What education and/or training do you have that relates to your work?
Proudly hailing from Milwaukee, Jake St. John is a young drummer and composer whose "aesthetically ambitious" (Entertainment Weekly) music has been called "an altogether hypnotic listening experience" (NPR). After attending the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music to study with Milwaukee jazz icon Dave Bayles, Jake received his B.A. with Honors in Musicology and Theory from Vassar College while studying with New York City percussionist and new-music specialist Frank Cassara (Philip Glass, Steve Reich) and composer Harold Meltzer (Pulitzer nominee and Rome Prize winner). (Jake was also the principal cellist of the Vassar College Orchestra for four years.) After college, Jake began his Masters studies in jazz performance at New York University, learning, working, and sharing the stage with the likes of Chris Potter, Kenny Werner, Joe Lovano, and Jean-Michel Pilc, studying composition with Andy Milne and drums with Ari Hoenig, Billy Drummond, Mark Guiliana, and Tony Moreno. Jake has recorded and toured internationally with multiple groups, including performances at venues as diverse as Webster Hall, Irving Plaza, and Lincoln Center in NYC, Summerfest and TBD music festivals, every single venue in Austin (thanks SxSW), beach parties in Punta Cana, country clubs in Medellín, and multiple Italian monasteries including one on a remote island in the Venetian lagoon. He currently lives and works in the greater New York City area, recording and performing with a number of projects including indie-dance outfit French Horn Rebellion, throaty nü-R&B wünderkind Pretty Sister (née Zak Waters), retro-noir femme fatale Deidre & the Dark, and his own alt-electro-rock band Una Lux. Some other recording and performing projects: French Horn Rebellion, Pretty Sister, Deidre & the Dark, Monica Lionheart, Ski Lodge, Violet Sands, Una Lux, Ashen Figure. Jake has also played in the cello section of the String Orchestra of Brooklyn.
- How did you get started doing this type of work?
In high school, I was recommended to give cello lessons to grade school-age students by my orchestra director. In college, I was asked to do the same on drums for other college students by my drum teacher who had a full schedule. I really enjoyed both and have continued teaching drums to this day.