Can we get out of giving notice for music lessons?

[roisin]

ds2 sings quite seriously, quite well, has been fortunate to have a teacher who was passionate about boys singing and expert on cambiata voices.

When we moved house there was a possibility of voice lessons at his new school; I asked if he could have a trial lesson, but was told no. It turns out the teacher is a "musical theatre" type, not classically trained herself, and seems to know very little about boys' changing voices.

Today ds2 came very upset home because she'd been forcing him to sing in a far far higher range than is comfortable for his current range. He was really upset and didn't stay for chamber choir (which he loves), with a different teacher, because his throat was hurting so much. They'd clearly had a bit of a barney and she'd told him to come home and have a chat with me about whether he wants to continue lessons.

Obviously there seems little point continuing. But we've paid for 6 lessons upfront, he's had 3; but we have to give 6 weeks' notice to quit, so will have to pay more... And we have to pay an annual fee to the school... All because the teacher is simply not appropriately skilled/qualified to teach him and probably just wants to teach girls who want to sing pop songs on X Factor.

Hello.

It sounds like she only teaches musical theatre, but this doesn't make her unqualified to teach your son.
Moreover, he requires a different teacher who does teach his style.
I would speak to the Head of Music to see if there is another teacher, if not then ask if you can cease lessons without further payment at the end of this half term.
Then I wouild go private tbh, this is what we ended up doing with dd, for similar reasons.
Please don't knock the teacher though, modern theatre is just as technical as classical and opera. Some people think they can teach both genres when in fact they can teach neither.
This teacher just may have a leaning towards theatre, but be really well qualified.
Good luck

Are there any other voice teachers at the school? If not, are the lessons provided through your LEA? They may be able to arrange for you to swap into their evening system and that way you hopefully won't have to serve notice/lose money.
It's always difficult swapping teachers, especially with voice imo

Did the school provide any information on the qualifications of the teacher and what her specialism was? If not it was perhaps unwise to sign your son up for lessons, especially as there was no trial period. However, regardless of genre or qualifications, if she was forcing him to sing outside of his current range then she is misguided at best and possibly dangerously damaging to young voices. Because of this I'd advise you speak to the Head of Music at the school to see what can be done regarding changing teachers or avoiding paying an additional notice fee. I personally think any teacher (I don't teach voice but do sing, and teach other instruments) who is forcing a child to work outside their comfort zone is misguided and not doing themselves any favours.

Just refuse to pay, you should have been allowed a trial period
I refused to give notice when my dcs' piano teacher changed. The new one was awful, shouted at ds and only gave my dd three fingered excercises, because she said DD couldnt read music and lots of other things.
Any change of teacher or new teacher should have a trial period, even when my dcs were tiny and we went to a little music group run by the council i refused to give notice when there was a change of teacher because the whole atmosphere of the group changed.

Fully agree you should raise your concerns with whomever you are paying for lessons. However, I would suggest you steer clear of talking about the teacher just wanting to "teach girls who want to sing pop songs on Xfactor" because that makes you sound narrow-minded, sexist and generally unpleasant.