This for-profit educational company operates and sponsors franchises for extracurricular music instructional programs in the United States.
First established in Philadelphia in 1998 by Paul Green, schools have opened in states including New York, Utah, California, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Maryland, Oregon, Washington, D.C., Virginia, Florida, Georgia, Texas, Colorado, Delaware, Washington, New Jersey, and North Carolina and internationally in Mexico.
[2] He took out a loan for $7000 in 2002[5] and established a permanent location for the first Paul Green School of Rock Music in a dilapidated building at 1320 Race St, Philadelphia that has since been demolished.
[6] The location had a number of small rooms for individual instrumental instruction as well as larger performance spaces for full band practices.
[8] In 2002, a crew from the Viacom television channel VH1 filmed for four days at the Philadelphia location for a proposed reality TV series.
Green was bought out in 2009 by investor Sterling Partners and the management team he had brought in,[14] headed by former Clear Channel executive Matt Ross.
Students learn songs from popular bands/artists like Led Zeppelin, The Who, Pink Floyd, 80's glam metal, punk, and grunge.
There are occasional workshops featuring accomplished musicians, and the artists will include discussions about their past experiences, songwriting, live performance and fame in general.
The film displays him showing off his wide variety of teaching tactics and also how the school affects the lives of the students that attend.
Special events included a lecture from Jello Biafra of Dead Kennedys fame and a shred contest sponsored by PRS Guitars.
The Festival Pier at Penn's Landing hosted the final two days with the Hold Steady and Devo on Saturday and Goldfinger, Less Than Jake and the Dropkick Murphys on Sunday.
There was also a Shred Contest sponsored by Gibson Guitars, won by a Princeton SOR student named Russell Chell.
They go on tour to play such venues as BB Kings in Times Square, The Knitting Factory in LA and NYC, The Roxy and Crash Mansion in LA, Stubbs in Austin, Hard Rock Cafes, House of Blues, and many of the biggest festivals in the country such as Lollapalooza, Austin City Limits, along with many others.
They often tour and play with famous musicians from rock's past and present, such as the Butthole Surfers, Slash, Les Paul, Brendon Small, LeAnn Rimes, C. J. Tywoniak, Perry Farrell, Jon Anderson, Peter Frampton, Eddie Vedder, Alice Cooper, Adrian Belew, Napoleon Murphy Brock, Stewart Copeland, John Wetton, Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, Ike Willis, and Ann Wilson.