School of Rock striking a (power) chord

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 14/03/2016 (3730 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

As legendary musician Neil Young famously sang in My My Hey Hey (Out of the Blue) “rock and roll is here to stay.”

A new school in Crescentwood is carrying on the tune and teaching new generations the foundations of rock.

Owner Darrel Drachenberg and general manager Mike Reis opened School of Rock at 657 Corydon Ave. on March 5. The popular franchise has approximately 175 schools worldwide and the Winnipeg location is the first of its kind in Western Canada.

“We want to start a revolution — it’s pretty simple. Live music is not as common as it used to be and we’re trying to bring that back,” Reis said.

Drachenberg, a cancer surgeon at the Health Sciences Centre, decided to take on the task of opening School of Rock after seeing the impact the program had on young musicians.

While on a business trip, he stopped in a School of Rock and saw kids passionate about playing rock standards. A classically trained guitarist who gravitated towards rock in Grade 8, Drachenberg still plays in two bands, Malpractice and The Void, and said the School of Rock reminded him of how he discovered rock.

“I realized that it recapitulated the exact process that I had self-discovered when I was in Grade 8 that made me love music, but they had it in a plug and play scenario,” Drachenberg explained.

The performance-based school will teach students — and all ages are welcome — the ins and outs of rock and roll, from learning scales on a guitar, to developing a great vocal performance, to jamming with a band, and rocking in front of a live audience.

The first performance students will tackle? Nothing less than Pink Floyd’s The Wall.

“Performance for this is the final exam,” Drachenberg explained. “The nice thing about (The Wall) is that the music is very engaging, with a choir of little kids from three to five singing, the more intermediate kids in Rock 101 playing some songs, and we’ll have some more advanced pieces being played by the teens and adults.”

Students at School of Rock will not be limited to one type of music either, Drachenberg said. As part of the curriculum students will delve into the history of rock ’n’ roll, study the blues, classical, and jazz.

“We want to run the gamut and have students appreciate older music and historic music and classical music by looking backwards from where rock began. We’re very versatile,” Drachenberg said.

Reis, a longtime touring musician, said he is looking forward to seeing the friendships that are formed over a shared love of music.

“The most exciting thing about the school for me is that I am going to have the privilege and the power to provide something for kids that I didn’t have when I was growing up, trying to find like-minded individuals to play music with,” Reis explained.

“It goes beyond the music lesson for me. It’s about a sense of creating a community here and a social network where kids can meet like-minded kids, form friendships and play really cool music together.”

For more information about School of Rock Winnipeg go to winnipeg.schoolofrock.com or call 204-615-7625.