WHO IS THE SQUAMISH ACADEMY OF MUSIC: THE PEOPLE BEHIND THE BUSINESSMay 25, 2021News
Squamish Academy of Music – Melissa Braun
Written by Stacy Thomas
Photo by Angela Bliss
When Melissa Braun’s husband visited Squamish for the first time, he instantly fell in love with the climbing and the beauty of the area. Then he went back to Ontario and waited patiently for his wife to finish her music degree so he could whisk her back to the mountains – and that he did. As soon as she graduated, they drove straight to the coast, and twenty years later, they still haven’t returned.
“I didn’t really know that we were staying forever, but we pretty much stayed forever,” Braun laughs. But one could say she’s made the best of it – as the sole proprietor of Squamish’s only music school, and one that is bursting at the seams, no less, she’s progressed from a young singer from Kitchener, Ontario to the proud principal of a bustling community of students and teachers.
As you do when you’re a musician starting out, when Braun arrived in 2002 she did a lot of different things. She worked in musical theatre in Vancouver, taught private lessons, and even worked in the public school system. In Squamish, at the time there wasn’t much of an arts community, but there was a growing number of students. Braun saw an opportunity – everyone who was teaching in Squamish had long waitlists, and there seemed to be a need for more private lessons.
But she missed the music school atmosphere that she herself had learned in – the vibe of community and relationships that a school could foster. So she decided to create her own.
“I grew up doing my lessons through a school, the Beckett School of Music [in Waterloo] and was also in an arts program in high school. I think having those spaces for me to develop my musicianship and my artistry were just so important, and the relationships I developed with my peers in those settings. Those community spaces that I built around music and performing were so important to me that I wanted to create a space that was like that.”
When Braun had her first daughter in 2009 (she has two, now 11 and seven), she decided to make her dream of a music school happen, and she began working with Community Futures to help her get the business on its feet. Two years later in 2011, the Squamish Academy of Music officially opened its doors.
Although she was a business newbie, she was pleasantly surprised to find that building something from scratch allowed her to express her artistic side.
“I was so excited to discover that running a business is so much more creative than I ever thought it was. Once I got into actually launching the business, I was like, this is a very creative thing actually, and enjoyed the process of being an entrepreneur a lot more than I thought I would.”
Braun compares running the school, with all of the moving parts, the people and the problem solving, to a performance: “There’s always a plan, and then there’s what actually happens. You have to respond and be flexible and nimble.”
That flexibility came into play in a huge way in early 2020. The school had been a bustling hub of activity—students, teachers, parents, performances, competitions—all creating a fun buzz that Braun loves to be a part of. But when the pandemic hit, all of that face-to-face interaction was replaced by completely new models of learning as everything went online.
But although the energy of the physical school was missed, the online platform also opened up new opportunities to grow; for example, Braun is teaching a master class at a school in Calgary this month, and in fact, her community feels even larger now because it reaches a greater geographical area and more students and teachers.
Over the last ten years, Braun has grown more confident as a leader and in her role as principal, business owner, mentor and teacher. Not able to perform much because of her demanding schedule, she takes satisfaction from watching her students grow and achieve their goals; with pride, she tells me that three of her voice students are graduating into post-secondary music programs in the fall.
This, plus participating in community jam sessions (on hold for now), singing with the Sea to Sky Big Band (also on hold for now), and the occasional glass of wine in the backyard are what get her up in the mornings and inspired to keep on striving. Also, she really looks forward to being able to put on performances again, like the bi-annual musical theatre concerts and the big Christmas shows.
“Those are the days that have been really missed during Covid because they’re a phase that mark the culmination of a lot of work,” she says. “You have those great days in the studio, and then you have these really outstanding days where you can really bring together all the skills and all the work and all the talent and all the community, and really feel they accomplished something, and really mark those accomplishments. Those days are the most satisfying and definitely have been missed this year.”
In the meantime, SAM is continuing with both in-person and online learning, and Braun also has some special collaborations to look forward to – her daughters both caught her musical gene; her 11-year-old is multi-instrumental and a singer, too.
“As her skills build, we can start to work together on things. I see that coming in the next few years, that we’ll be able to collaborate a lot, which is super fun.”
Squamish Academy of Music – Melissa Braun
Written by Stacy Thomas
Photo by Angela Bliss
When Melissa Braun’s husband visited Squamish for the first time, he instantly fell in love with the climbing and the beauty of the area. Then he went back to Ontario and waited patiently for his wife to finish her music degree so he could whisk her back to the mountains – and that he did. As soon as she graduated, they drove straight to the coast, and twenty years later, they still haven’t returned.
“I didn’t really know that we were staying forever, but we pretty much stayed forever,” Braun laughs. But one could say she’s made the best of it – as the sole proprietor of Squamish’s only music school, and one that is bursting at the seams, no less, she’s progressed from a young singer from Kitchener, Ontario to the proud principal of a bustling community of students and teachers.
As you do when you’re a musician starting out, when Braun arrived in 2002 she did a lot of different things. She worked in musical theatre in Vancouver, taught private lessons, and even worked in the public school system. In Squamish, at the time there wasn’t much of an arts community, but there was a growing number of students. Braun saw an opportunity – everyone who was teaching in Squamish had long waitlists, and there seemed to be a need for more private lessons.
But she missed the music school atmosphere that she herself had learned in – the vibe of community and relationships that a school could foster. So she decided to create her own.
“I grew up doing my lessons through a school, the Beckett School of Music [in Waterloo] and was also in an arts program in high school. I think having those spaces for me to develop my musicianship and my artistry were just so important, and the relationships I developed with my peers in those settings. Those community spaces that I built around music and performing were so important to me that I wanted to create a space that was like that.”
When Braun had her first daughter in 2009 (she has two, now 11 and seven), she decided to make her dream of a music school happen, and she began working with Community Futures to help her get the business on its feet. Two years later in 2011, the Squamish Academy of Music officially opened its doors.
Although she was a business newbie, she was pleasantly surprised to find that building something from scratch allowed her to express her artistic side.
“I was so excited to discover that running a business is so much more creative than I ever thought it was. Once I got into actually launching the business, I was like, this is a very creative thing actually, and enjoyed the process of being an entrepreneur a lot more than I thought I would.”
Braun compares running the school, with all of the moving parts, the people and the problem solving, to a performance: “There’s always a plan, and then there’s what actually happens. You have to respond and be flexible and nimble.”
That flexibility came into play in a huge way in early 2020. The school had been a bustling hub of activity—students, teachers, parents, performances, competitions—all creating a fun buzz that Braun loves to be a part of. But when the pandemic hit, all of that face-to-face interaction was replaced by completely new models of learning as everything went online.
But although the energy of the physical school was missed, the online platform also opened up new opportunities to grow; for example, Braun is teaching a master class at a school in Calgary this month, and in fact, her community feels even larger now because it reaches a greater geographical area and more students and teachers.
Over the last ten years, Braun has grown more confident as a leader and in her role as principal, business owner, mentor and teacher. Not able to perform much because of her demanding schedule, she takes satisfaction from watching her students grow and achieve their goals; with pride, she tells me that three of her voice students are graduating into post-secondary music programs in the fall.
This, plus participating in community jam sessions (on hold for now), singing with the Sea to Sky Big Band (also on hold for now), and the occasional glass of wine in the backyard are what get her up in the mornings and inspired to keep on striving. Also, she really looks forward to being able to put on performances again, like the bi-annual musical theatre concerts and the big Christmas shows.
“Those are the days that have been really missed during Covid because they’re a phase that mark the culmination of a lot of work,” she says. “You have those great days in the studio, and then you have these really outstanding days where you can really bring together all the skills and all the work and all the talent and all the community, and really feel they accomplished something, and really mark those accomplishments. Those days are the most satisfying and definitely have been missed this year.”
In the meantime, SAM is continuing with both in-person and online learning, and Braun also has some special collaborations to look forward to – her daughters both caught her musical gene; her 11-year-old is multi-instrumental and a singer, too.
“As her skills build, we can start to work together on things. I see that coming in the next few years, that we’ll be able to collaborate a lot, which is super fun.”
