That’s When the Trouble Began.
Dreaming On In A Wobbly World.
It’s really happening! A dream I’ve held for over two decades is coming to life: an entire floor of an actual building in the most exciting city in the world—New York City—dedicated to musical progress, human greatness, and beautiful guitar music. Check it out here.
I started teaching guitar lessons in a single room on this same floor back in 2001. In the 24 years since, nations have risen and fallen, push notifications were invented, music styles have come and gone…and I’ve had the incredible privilege of working with a passionate team of music educators to teach over 15,000 people how to play guitar. Collectively, our students have now played thousands of shows. Wow!
Today, as I wake up to yet more turmoil in our culture and world—paired with yet another new beginning in my own life—I’m feeling reflective.
“All things are created twice. There’s a mental or first creation, and a physical or second creation to all things.”
—Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
To that I’d add: big things happen a little bit at a time.
Now, I tend to mistrust quotes from people who lived lives of crushing misery (no matter how profound their insights), but I do like this one from Van Gogh:
“Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together.”
That applies equally to the small series of brush strokes required to make a painting and to the days, months and years required to make a life in art, but nicely relegates severed ears and self-inflicted chest wounds to the realm of impulse.
(I myself am firmly in the “I’d rather not cut off my ear than be considered a great artist” camp. I hope you are, too!)
Vision + Small Steps
Big changes can come from big vision–and also from small actions over time. They’re both real. They both matter. And either way, there’s no finish line. Challenges keep coming—and so do the next steps forward.
Back in 2001, I was a door-to-door guitar teacher with a brand-new family and a small baby. My friend Sandy (who owned a teleprompter business and wanted to make films) and I had a great idea: what if we pooled our resources to rent an office with extra space, so we could rent it to creative friends and build a friendly place full of camaraderie, music, and art?
So we did it. A friend and I built cubicles out of drywall, and I lined up creative friends to move in: a cartoonist, a graphic designer, a writer. I even had a room in the back where I taught guitar—which conveniently also housed the bathroom, ensuring everyone had the chance to experience music.
That’s when the trouble began.
Shortly after we finished the walls, terrorists attacked the World Trade Center. Amid far greater tragedies, the NYC economy froze. Every single one of my creative friends found they couldn’t afford rent. Sandy and I were left with a bunch of empty cubicles.
In some alternate universe, a more genius version of me invented co-working spaces. In this universe, I was just a broke young guitar teacher terrified of going under. I became a part-time guitar teacher and full-time real estate broker. Eventually, we filled the cubicles with a medical sales agent, another teleprompter, a luthier, and a modeling agency.
And I’m happy to say that as beautiful young women and men practiced their catwalk struts up and down the hall, to the soundtrack of medical sales calls and guitar lessons, we were approaching the level of friendly chaos I’d dreamed of.
That’s When the Next Trouble Began
Now I had a new vision: write a guitar book and start a guitar school. I hired my first teachers (Vin and Lenny are still here, along with others hired shortly after!) and then my first part-time office employee, Jen (who is now a co-owner of NYC Guitar School). We built new plywood walls directly on top of the cubicles, cutting out spaces for pipes and windows, filling the gaps with plaster, acoustic foam, and duct tape—adding one extremely un-soundproofed lesson room at a time.
That’s when the trouble began—again. As our demand grew, we ran out of room.
So I sublet the bedroom of a hip-hop studio located behind the elevator. Each weekday evening, they’d take everything out—bed, dresser, dirty clothes—and stash it in the kitchen, leaving behind a carpet that smelled strongly of marijuana and dog. We’d bring in chairs, guitars, and students, filing through the control room, past the kitchen, into our “classroom.”
I loved it. Not all the students did.
So I fantasized about a professionally built space. And—it happened! We expanded and added our first real classrooms, full of beautiful music. I incorporated the business. Since I had heard that good business owners worked “on the business” instead of “in the business” I even hired a payroll company to handle taxes.
That’s when the trouble began.
The payroll company was a scam. The owner collected taxes from me (and 800 other businesses) but never turned them over to the government. Impressively, he even managed to sell his fake company to a larger firm before fleeing the country for better weather and a lower cost of living.
(I heard he was later caught and spent several months in a minimum security prison with a rehabilitative golf program—no doubt a terrifying deterrent for other potential white-collar criminals.)
I was left owing the IRS and other agencies a year’s worth of taxes—and no money to pay them. I got to practice explaining to my wife why successful business owners like me sometimes had to skip a few paychecks. She wasn’t as impressed as I thought she’d be.
And…
I fantasized about opening a Brooklyn location. We did!
I was hired by a group of Hasidic gentlemen to teach them guitar using only the music of Shlomo Carlebach. We launched mass guitar jams in Union Square. We started New York City’s biggest rock and roll summer camp. I was having so much fun!
That’s when the trouble began again. The 2008 real estate crash hit. Despite previous practice explaining to my wife how successful business owners sometimes didn’t get paid, it didn’t seem easier.
By 2011, our two larger competitors had gone out of business. NYC Guitar School was the largest in the city. I dreamed bigger. We opened five locations—including one in the legendary Music Building, right next door to Cyndi Lauper’s studio. Ah, New York!
That’s when the trouble began. COVID.
By now there is a good chance you know the story. If so, THANK YOU for sticking with us!
We shrank from five locations to two. Our teachers and students moved online. And because online students weren’t ready to commit to 10-week sessions, we shifted our beginner program to the game changing drop-in, gym-membership style format that we’re still using now!
Now It’s 2025
We’re back up to four physical locations. I’m thrilled about this next chapter. We just signed a ten-year lease on a full floor in Midtown—the same floor where I taught my very first students in a single room.
The plywood and duct tape studios are gone. In their place: insulated, double-sheetrock lesson rooms with acoustic panels and sound-dampening subfloors. We’ve even got a big room for events—community open mics, student gatherings, workshops with top professional guitarists. A continuum of guitar!
Of course…now the trouble begins. Because it always does.
There’s division and uncertainty in our world right now—I’m not happy about it, as a person, a business owner, a dad…even as a guitarist.
Maybe you’re feeling that too.
But whatever your vision is—learning guitar, launching something new, or just surviving the subway in the rain—don’t stop.
The trouble will begin. It’s not a bug—it’s a feature.
I won’t stop either. I’ll keep fantasizing. I’ll keep taking small steps. And while I can’t guarantee things will go the way I hope, I can promise you this:
I will never, ever, cut off my ear.
That’s a promise you can count on.
“Hold on tight to your dream, yeah
When you see your ship go sailing
When you feel your heart is breaking
Hold on tight to your dream”
—ELO / Jeff Lynne
On to greatness,
Dan
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