Meet Music for Life Kids’ Terrific Team!!
Mary Bolouri, CEO & President
Mrs. Mary Bolouri is the President and CEO of Music for Life Kids. It was in 2004 when she was in college working at her parents childcare center in Ohio, watching the children free play with blocks and cars, when she decided that Music had to become an integral part of early childhood education. Over the next several years in business, she came to see what she had already experienced for herself, and this is that Music Changes Lives! Since then it has become her lifelong mission to bring Music to Kids Everywhere! In 2010 she brought her time tested programs from Ohio to Maryland, Virginia and Washington DC. She is currently expanding the fleet up and down the east coast starting with the Sunshine State. To date Music for Life Kids teaches at over 150 school locations and 3000 kids per week, and growing.
Mary loves it when she is able to get into the classroom and teach! She began learning piano when she was 4 years old and started writing her own compositions when she was just 5 years old. She informally began teaching her cousins to play different instruments when she was 11 years old. Since then, she was awarded a scholarship to play French horn at the Catholic University of America. She then studied under Matthew Mayhem, Associate Principal French Horn player of the Cleveland Orchestra.
She attributes the company’s remarkable success to her amazing teachers, solely recognizing it takes a great team of many to touch and change so many children’s lives through music.
Leah Finklea, Instructor & Enrichment Coordinator
Ms. Leah Finklea is currently working on her 2nd Bachelor’s degree in vocal performance from Morgan State University. She began instruction in voice, piano, and saxophone during her primary education and she continued training in voice and piano in high school at the Cab Callaway School of the Arts. She later attended Morgan State University as a double major in hospitality management and vocal performance where she traveled with the World Renowned Morgan State University Choir. She currently sings with her youth choir and praise team. Her future goal is to finish her last year at Morgan State University and to continuing refining her guitar playing skills. In her free time Leah loves to read and listen to music.
Ivey Church, Instructor & Hiring/Recruiting Director
Ms. Ivey Church has had a love for music and movement from a very young age. She joined a local dance studio at the age of five where she studied ballet, lyrical, tap, jazz dance, and theater performance and participated on the competition team. In high school, she began to teach two to six year old children for the competition team. In her senior year of highschool, she began working on, and received, her 90 hour child care certification. She went on to college with a focus on early childhood education. She has worked in centers and preschools as a teacher for almost eight years. She has combined her love for teaching young children, and musical performance to join the Music for Life team!
Memory
Background music may aid in developing memory. Most importantly, memory recall improves when the same music played during learning is played during recall.
Emotion and mood
Children of different ages were mostly consistent in identifying the “emotion” of the variation as excited, sad, happy, or calm.
The prodigy myth
Famous classical musicians are often deemed child geniuses. Mozart is the most common example.
Academic Skills
Music and math are highly intertwined. By understanding beat, rhythm, and scales, children are learning how to divide, create fractions, and recognize patterns.