"Musicians must be paid and paid on time. It's a form of respect to their craft and their occupation." ~ Peng Chi Sheng, Promising SME 500 Award recipient

It is never easy earning a living in the music industry. Many musicians have day jobs, and even if they are working full-time in the music industry, they have to wear many hats as writers, performers, sessionists, educators, artiste managers, publishing managers and many more. When Chi Sheng started out as a student and music enthusiast in a local music school, he never dreamt of becoming an entrepreneur. But fate has it when he eventually established his own outfit, Intune Music School, with a fellow ex-colleague, and struggled with the steep learning curve of turning from employee to employer. Yet, he has come a long way, and the business has since then not only stabilized, but also been recognized by various institutions, including the Small Medium Business Enterprise Association of Singapore, which presented them the recent Promising SME 500 Award 2012.

Chi Sheng (centre) and his partner, Aaron Lim (left) receiving the Promising SME 500 Award

Q: How did you get started out in the music industry?

I started out as a student at Lee Wei Song School of Music (LWSM) when I was 21, and was quite fortunate to be one of the last batch of students taught by Lee Wei Song himself. During those days, I started performing at Music Dreamer Café (爱情海民歌餐厅). The owner of the café, Sally, was also my music teacher. She saw the potential in me and gave me the opportunity to go on stage for a regular gig, and within half a year, I was able to perform on the popular slots on Fridays with local artiste Cai Li Lian and former lead singer of ‘Dreamz FM’ Ric Low. The weekly gigs were a motivation to hone my playing skills. Although we were only paid a transport allowance, the exposure was good and it served as an opportunity for me to jam with other musicians. Later I became a music instructor teaching music theory, but continued composing. We wrote songs every week as homework submissions, and one of my songs was selected for Tony Leung (梁朝伟). Lee Wei Song helped refine the song, so the final version was co-written by both of us.

I was a teacher at LWSM for 6 years, and was a publishing manager for the last 2 years there. My job was to look out for writers who have potential and ensure that the group of writers under me submitted good quality demos. I also formed the writers’ club, organizing monthly meetups for writers to showcase their demos, usually attended by one of the Lee brothers. The group of writers consisted of both current writers and those who were selected from the pool of students upon graduation. I had about 15 writers under me, and published about 10 songs over the period of 2 years. The biggest challenge for being a publishing manager is to ensure good quality demos, because most of the time, demos are rejected because the singer was not suitable, or the arrangement was not good enough. But once the demo is right, pushing the song to the sub-publisher will be much easier.

After 6 years at LWSM, a few of us left, and Aaron and I set up Intune Music School.

Q: So you went from being a writer/teacher to a publishing manager and finally an owner of a music school. What were some of the challenges you faced?

We set up Intune by circumstance, but I never regretted the decision because I have definitely learnt a lot throughout the years. I’m very fortunate to have Aaron take care of the school’s administration, finances, accounting and business development, so I can focus on the classes, PR, and the artistic development of our students. Running a business is never easy; it is always a challenge to maintain profitability. However, our principle is to never default on payment to musicians and music teachers. Musicians must be paid and paid on time; it’s a form of respect to their craft and their occupation.

Q: Tell us more about Intune Music School. Who are your customers? What are your strategies to attract new students and retain current ones? Has the strategy changed or evolved over time?

Running a school is running a business, so the decisions and strategies that we undertake are commercially driven. Our school is unique because we offer many different types of courses, including vocal classes in classical broadway and ukelele courses. Our customers are aged from 13-35, and about 30% of them are international students. We are seen more as a bilingual music school, unlike from other music schools which may focus on Chinese pop. We are also the official examination centre for the London College of Music Examinations since 2007.

To attract new students, our marketing is done purely online, so most of our students find us through our website. We also conduct live performances to increase general awareness.

Intune’s main revenue stream stems from our in-house classes. However, we also conduct music classes in various Primary and Secondary Schools, which is a growing market, as many schools celebrate an annual two-week festival promoting mother tongue by bringing in various vendors to expose students various fun and interesting ways to learn the language. There are also schools that engage us on a longer stint to conduct 8-week music classes for their students.

The courses and activities we conduct in schools vary from iPad Music Making, Vocal Placement, Chinese Lyrics writing to song writing competitions such as the NEA Eco Music Challenge.

Q: What are your plans for the future?

Now that the school’s operations have stabilized, we have just set up our own publishing arm and are planning to work with a sub-publisher in the near future. The timing is right, because we now have a stable of writers and are able to create a consistent flow of good quality demos. We will start small, with 5 writers under the publishing wing. It will be an exciting new phase for us.

About Peng Chi Sheng

Chi Sheng is one of the directors of InTune Music School, and has 10 years of music teaching experience in Singapore. He specializes in pop songwriting and sing-and-play courses, and has achieved Honours for the London College of Music Pop Vocals Grade 8 Examinations, as well as a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Recording Arts from Middlesex University, in partnership with the School of Audio Engineering (SAE) Institute, Singapore.

As a songwriter, Chi Sheng has published a number of songs for various artistes, including Kasih Indah (Love is Beautiful) for the NTUC 'U Care' compilation album in 2009 and 《这次是真的》 for Hong Kong Artiste Tony Leung Chiu Wai.