Exclusive selection: The top 20 music shops of Black Forest

Miss Dixie is a most wonderful teacher for students of all ages, loves her students as if they were her own children, and has more music education and piano talent than anyone I have ever met. She has been teaching my daughter for over 3 years starting in middle school, and I can not sing Miss Dixie’s praises enough for what she has taught my daughter. My daughter loves her time with Miss Dixie and has a special bond with her. I highly recommend her.

Absolutely high quality instruction for children and adults. There are none better than Ms. Dixie at teaching piano. I strongly recommend her studio for serious students – you will not be disappointed.

My 7-year-old daughter started piano with Dixie about a year ago, and we couldn’t be happier that we chose Dixie (and that she had an opening!). Dixie is wonderful at setting a strong foundation for piano, while also making it fun. She has a very well-organized program that incorporates every part of learning piano: theory, sight reading, counting beats, learning all notes on the entire piano, understanding the clefs, and understanding dynamic. She also makes the real heart of piano an integral part of regular lessons: relevant songs that kids love. Dixie really is amazing. In addition to being a strong musician herself and knowing how to teach piano, she truly cares about each student she teaches. This was perhaps the most important element for me when I was interviewing piano teachers for my daughter. Dixie values children (including teenagers!) for who they are, and she understands how to teach kids and help them grow musically while simultaneously making sure she supports their emotional needs. In other words, she won’t traumatize kids. She really loves kids and wants them to be happy and love music and grow as a pianist.

Tim, and his team are incredibly professional and helpful. I look forward to many encounters with them. They are incredibly knowledgeable, and will continue to support this organization!

Amazing experience. Took my son in yesterday to test out various instruments. We were immediately greeted by the gentleman there. He took his time and assisted my son with trying each instrument while abiding by the COVID guidelines, explained the rental plans, asked my decision on options provided and thoroughly explained every charge. They were also kind to assist in helping us find any additional materials needed for the school band and gave a discount.

Very polite experience. Clean and neat store. Small but very great selection. The gentleman was very knowledgeable.

Thank you so much. I am so happy to see my son start his band journey and thanks for making the experience a delight. We greatly appreciate it!

They have always been very helpful. May is their instrument sale. We have never had a problem with this store.

Great service. The staff takes an interest in you and your musical instrument.

Great customer service

Smaller store but pretty knowledgeable and helpful for the novice musicians. Reasonably priced accessories.

Great for beginners. Not a pro shop by any means.

The trend continues. Like many others have said in their reviews, I experienced horrible customer service the older lady working here!

We paid for the higher tier (tier B) for the school year, went to turn in our instrument and use our credits. The lady looked up our rental, saw our tier because she processed our deposit refund, didn’t ask any questions, and said all done! I then asked about how the credits work….because why would someone pay for the higher tier to NOT use the money they accumulated intentionally?? She just stared at me! I’m assuming she expected me to be as informed as her…? I asked her again. She responded short and snooty, if I wanted to use my credits, she would have to reverse the returned she just processed. Had I been a trained employee I would’ve known this and avoided her the 60 seconds of work. I explained to her that when we came in the first (and only) time, to rent, that we were encouraged to go with the more expensive tier and revert to the lower tier if we end up not being interested in using the credits toward an instrument and that they would helps us when we came back at the end of the year. Unfortunately instead of help, she was argumentative. She continued sternly warning me that I can’t use my credits on just any instrument, but ONLY on the orchestra instruments. I believe this was different information then I was given the first time we came in but by this time my son and I are feeling so uncomfortable and burdensome that I look over and he’s just shaking his head like get me out of here. So I just gave up and said thanks and we left. Over $100 in the trash. What’s the point in having these two tiers?? Maybe you can do right by my son and tell us how your credit policy works so he can get his instrument!!

Awful customer service. Instead of greeting us when we walked in, the woman behind the counter told us to write down our names and they would get to us when they could. Then she proceeded to walk off.

All I needed was a book. I stood there holding it for 20 minutes (being ignored) before I finally walked out and drove an extra 15 minutes to Graner music where they have always been nice to me.

If you want fast and friendly help, I recommend going to Graner instead.

***Response from the store owner has absolutely nothing to do with the fact the staff was rude to me and ignored me while I stood at the counter with only a book when there was only one other person in the store.

I walked in looking for a drum set and the sales clerk just stared at me until I said hello and greeted her. Unwelcoming and unhelpful. The clerk looked like she had just rolled out of bed and had nothing helpful to say. She whispered to another clerk in the store which would have been much less awkward if there had been any music playing in the store whatsoever. Very disappointed

Great people with Great Music !!! Really is some Great Concerts !!!

Always great musicians and great sober crowd that listen and appreciate the good music. Irish plus tonight

Love the Black Rose. Where else can you get 2 hours of acoustic music for the great member price of $7. The desserts are good too!

A fun venue for folk, bluegrass, Americana and more. It can get quite packed, and the audience can get quite engaged adding to the appeal. There is no air conditioning however, and with a packed house it can get very hot. Dress appropriately, and please remember the deodorant.

Matt knows what he’s doing. I don’t know a lot about guitars and had been having issues with the way mine sounded for a while and even the way it played. I’d taken it to guitar center twice and they did things… and well yeah let’s just say it wasn’t very helpful.

Matt immediately had an assumption of what it was, messed around for maybe 15 seconds with it, and told me he could replace the saddle and the little knobs holding the strings in. It was fair priced, he had it done in a week, and it sounds better than it ever has!

Thank you Matt!

Matt perfectly enlarged the fret markers on my brand-new spalted maple acoustic/electric guitar.
He also beautifully crafted a custom bone nut as well as a routine setup.
He’s knowledgeable, helpful, professional, and a true craftsman.
Reasonable prices.
I’m a satisfied customer & shall return.

Very detailed work and a deep passion to build you the right guitar. The choices of wood will impress you!

Thank you for fixing a tweek’d F cord latch on my daughters flute at no charge! Great service and i appreciate the family feel in the store! Im so blessed there are stores out there like this one still! BUY YOUR NEXT INSTRUMENT HERE!

Above and beyond instrument repair, sales, or rental, Charlotte and Kyle are really caring and great people who employ really caring and great people! Dean, Chelsea, Mike, Joslyn, and Jerry are what makes Graner School Music what it is!!

Went in for a repair (stuck mouthpiece in a tuba) and they could not have been better. The gentleman that helped me was super friendly and fast and knowledgable. Would definitely recommend their instrument repair.

Great place for kids to get musical lessons, voice lessons and books and instruments. They also do repairs here

Very helpful. Explained all contracts well,good with kids, instructors onsite. Staff helpful.

Great service, very helpful!

Rental beware! I started a rent to own process about 2015 payed on the instrument for about 4 years and thought so myself hmmm how much is a viola? And why have I payed about $1000 for this one? Their response was wow you definitely don’t owe us anymore money, you over paid, however we do not offer refunds! Wait what? If you do not pay attention they will just keep taking your money and not give it back. Two stars because at least they were nice about. So now I have an instrument that was way over priced.

The rental process is a scam.

Did not repair what they said they were going to repair. I trusted them and only realized when my kid went to play it. If they make it right I will update my review. This is absolutely horrible. I can’t believe they would do this to a local school teacher.

Square Music is awesome The people that run it are super friendly and have been exceptionally patient with my special needs son as far as teaching him basic musical concepts and also how to have a helluva good time! Also, they do basically everything, instrument sales and repairs as well as lessons but also Music therapy and local art. Rad little joint, do recommend.

Just bought an Ibanez bass guitar from them at a really great price. Cordell was super helpful in making sure that everything worked the way it should and that it would fit my needs. Very happy with my purchase and will definitely buy my consumables from Square moving forward

Brought my classic guitar in last week for new strings. The owner took to the time to do it right. You can tell that they know their business and care about their customers.

Dead business. No one answered the door, or phone during normal business hours. Would have liked to drop some $$$ on a local business, but I guess I’ll go to another major retailer.

I had found a guitar I really wanted at another Music Go Round store (a hard to find Washburn vintage inspired acoustic) but it did not come with the case. The Colorado Springs store had the “Coffin” case that the guitar comes with and it was at a fair price . It was advertised as used but appears to me as being brand new and unused. I am very happy with the purchase and appreciate the care taken to pack the case properly for shipping. With supply chains issues as they are now days , it is a relief to find what you want available to you by searching the internet.

I love this place. I am a bongo and conga player, and yesterday I found here for $40 a perfect pair of Basket Stands for my Congas….Previously I had bought a quality set of Latin Percussion practice bongos so I don’t have to carry my concert bongos around with me practicing on the fly. Price was superb and I could not pass it up. Probably going back to buy their large Latin Percussion concert bass Conga….

Excellent price on new and used equipment. Staff took excellent care of my needs

Average shop customer service should be improved

First and foremost they are really cool guys!
They are musicians themselves so they can totally feel your pain when you have to sell a piece of gear that you really don’t want to sell. But sometimes (I know, how dare I “BLASPHEMOUS” but sometimes you just need the car more than that and/or amp
And in my personal experience they pay you very fair prices when buying your gear.
Or, if you have been trying to sell your gear online or In a paper and it’s not moving you can sell it here.
You can also buy some really cool gear here too.
They have used and new items.

Hope this helps.
I

Awesome place

They act like they don’t want me there, weird way to do business.Ive bought a guitar several pedals cases and strings there,as well as selling those things to them. Now the new people ignore me when I want to buy things or to inquire about it.I was going to buy a 2×12 speaker and boss delay,as the salesman was supposed to get the pedal out of the case, someone else came and started talking to him he and just talked to him and left me standing there.But it’s a good thing because they wanted $20 less for a model dd-6 than what I can get a dd-8 for brand new!

Total lack of professionals. Wanna get overpriced equipment come on on in. Nothing personal

I saw a flute advertised on their website so I stopped by the store to check it out and they said it was out for cleaning. Why would they advertise having the instrument, even have an option to buy it on the website? Pretty dumb, but luckily I knew not to buy it sight unseen. They took my number and said I would be the first to be called when it was back in the store. Two weeks later I called back, they still didn’t have the flute, and didn’t even see my name so he took my number again. I wonder if they actually sold it and were just lying about it being out for cleaning. 5 weeks later, no call, nothing, I went to Meeker music instead since this was a Christmas gift. Way to do business, music go round!

Best music store in town! I’ll never shop anywhere else.

Great place to rent an instrument, super friendly employees. Thank you

Very helpful, showed me how to determine the size of my violin, and they showed me that the violin I was selling is full size.

Walked in..it was dead quiet. A lil weird for a music store. I mean no nolse at all, no talking, no muzac, no musicians playing..nice enough place it just struck me as odd.

Friendly, family owned music store.

Courteous helpful staff, good selection

Rude employees

Over this place and their terrible customer service. There staff is so unfriendly and lazy. After 5 years of patience with their staff, I can’t handle it anymore.

We needed a larger instrument and the lady tried to say we would be fine with the size down. When we explained that our daughter’s teacher said she needed the larger size, she was upset because she had to go upstairs for it. I’m not even joking.

Not only that, we were given an instrument with a broken case because they didn’t have a proper one on hand. They suggest I sew it myself. They later replaced it after that one broke and I had to follow up on the previous replacement.

Any time we’ve been in the store, we have been greeted with ignorance and rude attitudes. I won’t even get into the recent situation but I have had it and will never rent or purchase from meeker music again. What a terrible establishment.

Was just there planning on buying a new instrument. Had a few hundred dollars in my pocket and walking in I wasn’t even looked at by the lady at the register. Upon playing the stringed instruments for about 15 minutes (mind you half that time I was tuning them all for them) I was told I had 5 minutes to buy something or I’d be asked to leave. It’s a shame I had my eye on a Washburn electric mandolin, strings, cables and rosin… could have been a 400 dollar sale but with that kind of rudeness I’ll take my business to one of the stores I frequent. BYE

Helped me find exactly what I wanted.

Went in to pick up a few things for my guitar that I forgot to pack before traveling up here to Colorado. Mark was absolutely amazing, very helpful for getting me squared away while offering some very appreciated knowledge about the area and some insight for my travels. Really felt right at home!!

Will and Chris were amazingly helpful when I decided to take up the violin. I felt no pressure and their passion for music was contagious. I signed up for lessons with John and I’m happy with my progress and I look forward to my weekly violin jam sesh.

Check out Music & Arts on Powers Blvd of you’re interested in playing an instrument. Great staff and instructors!

Very nice service l and I got an epic instrument

2nd Update- they refunded all the missed lessons and the lady I worked with, Erin, couldn’t have been nicer. I just feel like this shouldn’t have happened in the first place. I still caution readers to watch your bill closely. Document any missed lessons and if you don’t do a make up lesson, make sure you get a credit.

Update – after 4 months of lessons, I am not very happy with this place. The teacher seems fine but they are less than honest with their book keeping. The teacher has had to cancel several times, we had a snow day and we had to cancel once. We didn’t receive any of the 5 credits due to us. I had to call and alert them to this issue. I am now waiting a resolution. However, it makes me wonder how many other people they’ve done this to and how much extra money they make this way. I’m very disappointed. If you take lessons here or are considering it, check your bill closely every month.

I have a child taking lessons here. It’s ok but nothing special. My older child took lessons at a different place and it was a much better experience. If you’re looking for instruments, they have a very small selection. Mostly guitars and a few keyboards. I can’t pinpoint anything wrong, it’s just not the friendliest place. When they didnt have the lesson book the teacher told me to get, they didnt even offer to order it or tell me where I could get it.

Large selection very helpful staff and you can even get free guitar lessons different days of the week

Worst company in Colorado Springs. Do not sign contract with them or do any business what so ever. They charge my account after the account was closed and refuse to get me any refund. Their excuse is that their system is new and it is backed up. Basically they treat people like they are idiots. When I first started with them they say that if class is cancelled they would issue refund and I am still waiting for 3 classes of refund after I have been promised that they will posted a week ago. They will tell you that corporate does that, but they are lying. Their corporate office told me that the refund has to be issued in the store. The store apologized and said that they cannot do that and ticket has to be summited and that was 11 days ago. The company is runned by bunch of crooks on local level who just want to take you money and have no intention of giving you the money back.

Do not do business with this company. U get a brand new instrument and when it comes time when u have $2000 of rental credit they want to say u can only have this instrument with a hole in it at a $1000. I don’t think so. Also with lessons they don’t cancel your Lessons when u cancel them weeks in advance and then charge u for it. They are horrible company. Don’t even do lessons with this company they cancel them and don’t tell you and don’t refund you the money or credit you. This company has gone way down hill it the year and this has become the worst.

Would not purchase from here….just saw the older, lazy man who works there put his cigarette out on the sidewalk and then kick it into the parking area! Lazy, trashy people…and he even saw me watch him do it…not a care in the world!

Great work, knowledgeable, easy to work with, with a quick turnaround. I’ve worked with a lot of guitar repair people in my life and would highly recommend getting work done here.

when restoring,designing,or even an upgrade to guitars or lapsteels….the big instrument is the best….i had my non-pedal steel re-designed,with new electronics….a beautiful blue heavenly finish….p90 pick-up….volume and tone added…new designed legs making it more stable… it came out great….i also had my telecaster upgraded….frets smoothed….it plays so much better….here you will enjoy a friendly atmosphere….with knowledge to spare….thank you to the big instrument…

I recently bought a guitar at a pawn shop and wanted to up grade it. About my experience: 5 stars all the way. Here is why. Initially I contacted this place through email explaining what I would like done with my guitar. I get an email back the next day with all kinds of info about the guitar I bought that I didn’t even know. So I make an appointment. I get there. Angelo was very informative, and super laid back. He even updated me with video footage on the progress of the repairs he was doing. I can’t say enough good things honestly. Really cool dude. The work is a fair price, and the place is conveniently located near me. You will not be disappointed with service.

It was amazing he shouted out people that it was there birthday for every song change if it was someone’s birthday

Great dj work. The songs were changed at just the right second and the music was spot-on. Very high quality service. I recommend this to everyone. Changing Times Music Services rule!

Eric did an awesome job DJing our wedding! He was very easy to work with leading up to the event and attentive to our requests. He helped make it work even though the original dance floor got rained out. The pricing was reasonable, too. I would absolutely recommend Changing Times Music Services!

He is really good at being a DJ and he puts on good songs.

Eric was a good DJ, but i dinked off a star because he did not play my recommended song

This is a great little shop. The owner is cool and they carry some of my favorite brands of guitars.

Great spot, always been fair and truthful with me

Good and decent quality amps and instruments for fair prices! Owner is way cool, and don’t forget to pet the super cool dog that’s there to greet you upon entrance! Thumbs up!

Everyone says this place is always closed when they say that they will be open. Well unfortunately that is the reality I too have experienced. Multiple times I’ve tried to visit during posted operating hours but I can never seem to catch the store open. I’ll keep trying though maybe they need some extra help like a part time employee. We need local musical instrument stores or all there’s gonna be is guitar center.

Stopped by to get a guitar and they are closed. Wish I would have know this, I wouldn’t have drove across town to come here.

2nd time I’ve stopped by during advertised open hours and shop is closed. I mentioned this to a friend and he laughed… Apparently it’s pretty difficult to figure out their schedule even though it’s posted on their front window and on the internet. He told me that’s definitely their reputation around town. Maybe it’s an amazing shop. I keep trying to find out.

Not that great, I went in there with high expectations and came out disappointed. First, I got blatantly ignored, the person who worked there was talking to another person and didn’t acknowledge my existence, He didn’t say anything like ”I’ll be with you in one moment” NOTHING! I stood there awkwardly for about 10 minutes, finally the guy stopped catching up with the other customer and got to me quite UN- enthusiastically.