Alex and Yelena Ovando love teaching music. The husband and wife love it so much that they're opening a second Music Box School on Stage in the Memphis area.
The Ovandos founded the music school in August 2019 and operate a location 7516 Capital Drive in Germantown, serving about 250 students (about 80 of whom are adults) and delivering 10,000 lessons a year on piano, drums, guitar and much more.
On Monday, July 8, they will celebrate the soft opening of their second location at 1950 W. Poplar Ave. in the Collierville Criss Cross Village subdivision, between Bailey Station and Houston Levee roads.
Yelena Ovando said the main reasons for the new location were to make it more convenient for their Collierville customers and to build their customer base.
“I did some research and there are six [Collierville] elementary schools within 10 minutes driving distance of that location,” Yelena Ovando said. “If we had half a percent of that population, we will be set for life…. There is nothing like us in the area.”
What's planned for Music Box School on Stage in Collierville?
Yelena Ovando said current and potential customers who reside in Collierville have been asking the Music Box School for a few years about opening a location in Collierville. She said about 30% of the Music Box School clientele live in the Collierville area and are driving 40 to 45 minutes to Germantown location.
"We're starting the Collierville location, which is 20 minutes away from this location, with 40 students all from this (Germantown location)," Yelena Ovando said. "A lot of them are staying because they love the teachers."
According to the Ovandos, they anticipate growing to around 100 clients during its first year at the Collierville location, with most of the customers being school-aged students coming to the Music Box School after regular school to take lessons.
The Collierville Music Box School will start with four instructors on site, all of whom can play and teach multiple instruments. The Collierville location will consist of eight instruction rooms. In the next three years, the Collierville location aims to serve 200 students.
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The Music Box in Collierville will offer services similar to those in Germantown. These include small group programs, summer camps, monthly performance workshops, educational workshops and celebratory events on site like boutique birthday and graduation parties, porch concerts and occasional customer appreciation events.
As for its physical location in Collierville, the site was formerly a real estate office for RE/MAX, according to the Town of Collierville staff reports. The building, which was constructed originally as a residence, also previously had been an attorney's office. The building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It was placed on the list in April 1989 due to the efforts of Dr. Donald N. Anishanslin and his family.
“That location is so pretty and it’s beautiful,” Yelena Ovando said. “We didn’t have to do much to it. It’s a historic building and I have been in that building several times during my lifetime. I always marveled at it, and when it came on the market, we were just ecstatic. The whole transition, we agreed on everything within three days.”
On June 24, the Collierville Board of Mayor and Aldermen unanimously approved a conditional use permit that essentially gave the Ovandos the green light to move forward with the project.
What is Music Box School on Stage all about?
The Ovandos are the owners and founders of the Music Box School on Stage. Alex, who is from Guatemala, has taught guitar, bass, piano and drum lessons for more than 20 years in the Memphis area. His wife, Yelena, who is from Russia, is also a trained musician in piano and voice lessons. Yelena spent much of her career in the corporate world, having worked for FedEx for 15 years and Cummins Inc. for six years.
“I learned sales and marketing and used like every inch of my experience to help start this,” Yelena Ovando said.
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The couple was influenced to start Music Box after seeing the movie musical “The Greatest Showman.”
The Music Box in Germantown offers nine instruction rooms and has 12 instructors including Alex, Yelena and their 15-year-old son Marco Ovando, a drum set educator at Music Box, who began his music studies at the age of 3.
The school covers piano, guitar, bass, ukulele, drums, voice and music production. The Ovandos also teach music as a language, where students can learn to play, perform, ab-lib, and read and write music. The Ovandos said they provide private and group lessons for both children and adults, while offering camps, workshops, birthday parties and other special events like concerts.
“We teach a lot of beginners because as musicians it’s very vulnerable,” Alex Ovando said. “... Music is intimidating to people, so what we wanted to do more than anything is get people excited about taking music lessons. We allow all of our students to learn in a relaxed environment.”
Corey Davis is the Collierville and Germantown reporter with The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached at Corey.Davis@commercialappeal.com or 901-293-1610.
Music Box School on Stage in Collierville
Address: 1950 W. Poplar Ave., Collierville
Hours: By appointment
Phone: 901-626-0973
Website: musicboxinc.com; people can enroll, schedule trial lessons and contact Music Box through its website
Instagram: @901MusicBoxInc
Email:info@musicboxinc.com
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