"For the love of The Music Room" with Dave Durkee

When my family and I travelled to Canada recently we stayed with family in Nova Scotia. My husband and I were keen to keep up our regular musical practice, so we just thought we’d buy a cheap secondhand guitar and keyboard and that would tide us over. Scrolling through Facebook, my husband came across "The Music Room" - a musical instrument lending library that was only a short drive from where we were staying  - we couldn't believe our good fortune! The good fortune continued when we got chatting with the genuinely lovely couple behind this volunteer project - Dave and Judy Durkee. In this episode we'll hear from Dave  about 

• how the concept started and has grown over the past five years
• why this service is crucial for family and community engagement
• the Award of Excellence program
• how the Music Room supports local schools and community groups 

Note: Happy to report since the recording of this episode The Music Room has hit a total of 500 donated instruments in the collection since it started 5 years ago! What a remarkable achievement and an example of the generosity of musicians and music lovers from Yarmouth and surrounding areas.

About The Music Room
Dave is a semi retired music teacher living in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia (Canada). He and his wife Judy run The Music Room from the basement of their home. They accept donations of used instruments from the general public. With the help of 6 volunteers, the instruments are repaired, adjusted, maintained and made available, free of charge, to individuals and groups in their community.

It is such an amazing concept, and one that I hope spreads wide and far!
For more info please visit the Facebook page
The Music Room
*for local Nova Scotians contact +1 902-881-2354

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Transcript

00:02

Well, welcome to the music and mindset matters podcast show day from the music room. How are you today? Dave? I am well. Thanks for having me. You're very welcome. Now, as I mentioned in the introduction, my husband and I came across the music room. Um, via Facebook. Um, it's this amazing, amazing concept of, um, well, if I can say loaning out musical instruments for free, like a public library, but with instruments. It is exactly like a library. Yeah. Can you tell us a little bit about how the music room started and what was the motivation there? Sure, sure. I teach guitar primarily. I also teach ukulele and a bit of piano if I'm really pushed. I studied classical piano years ago, but I don't like to compete with the piano teachers because I've long since lost most of those skills.

But anyway, I was approaching my 65th birthday and teaching full-time five days a week and started to have a fair amount of problems with joint issues, wrists and elbows primarily. And as I always say to people, playing the guitar doesn't sound like a dangerous occupation but it can be, you know, if you do it enough hours a week, it can wear and tear on the body, particularly if you're in your 60s. So I needed to do less and..I love what I do. It's been an amazing way to make a living, but again, I needed to do less. So I went down to three days a week, but I don't do well with a lot of spare time. I love to keep busy. My wife says I have ADHD. I'm not sure about that part of it, but. You need a project? Yeah, I did absolutely need a project. So we thought about it and we came across the concept of a musical instrument lending library and thought, you know what? I wonder if that would work in

01:54

Yarmouth in a small town because they're all in big cities. There's one in Toronto, one in Montreal. Those are the two that I know of in Canada. And there are several throughout the United States. So the concept is people donate their excess used instruments and we put them back out into the community. And we lend them to basically anyone who would like to borrow one. That was the initial concept. And it just...It just mushroomed and blossomed from there, and it has become something much, much bigger. Over the five years we've been in operation. So when you said it's, so is this an American concept, United States of America, it started in? I'm not sure about that. I don't know if the original one, I have no idea what the first one, what or where the first one was. But it seems to be a North American concept.  the internet being what it is, we're contacted by people from all over the world who don't understand. Recently, I had someone from Houston, Texas message me and say, my PA is broken down. Could you possibly lend me a small PA for a gig I have tonight? And I said, well, possibly. Where are you? And she said, Houston, aren't you in Houston? No, actually I'm not. Oh, that is amazing. Yeah, so anyway, I guess the..The point I was going to make was that we've been contacted occasionally by people in Europe and they're just amazed. They've never ever heard of the concept. And again, they mistakenly think we're wherever they are. So I've not come in contact with one or heard of one other than in North America. And how did that happen for you though? You mentioned a few years ago, you'd already heard of them in Toronto and Yeah, well actually there was one in Halifax and I had heard of that and it's no longer an operation as far as I know. Yeah, so I was vaguely aware of the concept and I said to my wife, do you suppose that could work here? And she said, well, we won't know if we try, unless we try. So she plays several instruments, as do I, and we have collected many things over the years. So we made a little pool of. what we had to offer and made a Facebook page and asked people if they would consider, we take donations of instruments if anyone had anything they'd like to give us. So it started, the original concept was we would just loan instruments to kids if they wanted to try one. And no thought to income, there was no means test or anything, just any child who wanted to try an instrument could come and get one for free from us.
04:43

And then from there, the next thing that happened was the, the donations just poured in and it became clear that we were going to have many more than we needed to fulfill our loans. So then we started to consider other ways we could put these instruments back out into the community. And it's just, it's gone from there. And what are some of the other ways? We well we there are there are there are eight programs or sub programs and I'll just go through them quickly. So we primarily, what we do is we lend instruments to anyone who wants to try and we have an amazing array of things. We have band instruments, we have violins, we have an upright bass, we have a cello, all it just goes on and on and not any number of guitars. We have tons and tons of ukuleles. They're extremely popular now. So almost without reservation, if you want to try an instrument, we probably have what you would like to try. So we also get more guitars by far than we need. So we give guitars, primarily sometimes keyboards, occasionally a violin, but mostly guitars to families in need. And we have a Christmas program and we give guitars throughout the year. So if a child borrows an instrument and if in talking to the parents, we find out that they would have difficulty buying a guitar for their child. If that kid does well and actually learns to play over the three months of the preliminary loan, we quite often will let them keep the guitar. Oh my gosh, that is so heartwarming to hear because the benefits of music don't just extend to the musical skills

06:33

It's about the brain boosting effects and the effects of attention and memory. The science is not even vaguely disputable. Kids have better outcomes in all aspects of their life if they have musical training. It's just as simple as that. It isn't simple, but why don't we have it more in our education? I don't know. Teachers constantly battle school boards and other...other kind of bureaucratic people who want to make music the first cut. Yeah. Anyway, if you like, I can get back to the other things that we do. Yes, please do. So we also lend and give instruments to schools and other community groups and organizations. We make resources available to preschools, daycares, nursery schools, you know, and some of the things that we talked about earlier, drums and tambourines and rhythm band instruments, auto harps, xylophones. We have all of that. We give therapy instruments to people dealing with PTSD. So it would be former first responders and military folk. People recovering from accidents or illness, we will give them a guitar or an instrument of their choice. Quite often, music can be a wonderful distraction from your troubles if you're dealing with something. Definitely. 

07:53

Yeah, my favorite program or I guess you could say sub program is what we call our award of excellence. When we hear of a kid who's done extremely well, who plays well, has learned to play whatever the instrument, often it's guitar, but they still have kind of an entry level instrument, we give them an upgrade. And probably half a dozen times a year we'll get a guitar that might be worth a thousand bucks. It's happened many times. People are that generous when they hear about the program. So when we find these kids, we say Hey, guess what? Got something for you. And they lose their mind. They can't believe it. It's just wonderful to see these kids in their reaction when they're given a beautiful instrument, which allows them to take their playing to the next level. It sure does because you know, you're like you mentioned, it's great to learn on something at the beginning. But when they're at that next level, they need to be, you know, they need that extra incentive to play more and a well-made instrument.  there's so much more connection you can gain and then you get into the emotions of music and and the... Oh absolutely and all of that all that expressiveness is is is easier to convey with a good instrument it just is. Yeah so a couple more so we we have uh is I think probably folks in most countries do we have a lot of refugees from Ukraine so we've started another program and we're in contact with the settlement committee in this area and we've welcomed many Ukrainians to our community with an instrument, usually a guitar but again could be a ukulele or a keyboard or whatever they know how to play or want to play. And then the one that you're familiar with, we do short-term loans to people who are visiting the area as well, mostly in the summer. And we've already done eight or ten of those this summer. That's fantastic, isn't it? Yeah.

09:47

And what do you find, I mean, you said you're a guitar teacher at the start of this. So you would have already built up some connections in the community. And yes, exactly. Did you find that that was really helpful and that was the way to go to the word about the music group? Absolutely. We're in touch with all the school music teachers, plus all of the private teachers as well, piano, guitar, whatever. If you teach a musical instrument in this area, I'm fairly confident I know who you are. And we often are contacted by them because they may have someone approach them and say, you know, my child wants to learn piano, say, and I'm a little bit leery. You know, last week he wanted to be an astronaut or she wanted to be a ballerina, and this week it's piano. So I'm not sure I want to go right up and buy a digital piano. So they'll come visit us and borrow one.  We have about 18 keyboards and some full size, some the standard 62 keys, but most piano teachers will accept that short term if you make the commitment to buy, most people buy an electric piano now as opposed to an old fashioned acoustic piano. And so they'll borrow one from us for three to six months. And by then they know if the child is doing well enough with the lessons to make the purchase a wise one. Isn't that fantastic though? That's happened to me several times in my, I teach piano back in Australia. And, and the same thing, people are really adults, parents are really hesitant to commit to it because it is such an investment. Yeah, it really is. It's going to benefit their child and, and they know that there's an interest already there. So.

11:36

Oh, we need to take this back to Australia. Yes. So piano lessons will start again in September and all of our keyboards will go out within a month. Yeah. Oh, wow. Yeah, I can imagine. That's fantastic. So you do, so the model, just like a business model idea, is this something that you had to, you and your wife created together or is there kind of, is there a peak organization called the Music Room that then supports you with setting up your business, I suppose, or the organisation? No, it has been in the beginning, she and I, and we run the day-to-day operations. It became fairly quickly, it became clear that we needed help because simple repairs and a guitarist comes in that has really old strings or has broken strings, that's not a problem, I can take care of that. But with guitars and many other instruments, there are, There's routine maintenance and repairs, setups, adjustments, those kinds of things that are just beyond me. And our first volunteer, the first person we added was a man named Glenn Garnett. He's now retired. He's worked on guitars this whole life. He loved the concept. He's been with us since the beginning. Couldn't do it without, literally couldn't do it without him. We've since added a dedicated violin person. Violins are extremely fussy. They need work almost constantly. We have some beautiful violins and he keeps them in peak condition. We had a bequest from a fella from our area who was a fiddler. And by the way, the difference between a fiddle and a violin is the music you play on it. Exactly. We had that discussion just before we came because we had a little come and try Irish music workshop. Oh yes. And we had violin players and they said, what is the fiddle? And I said, well, it's traditionally the folk music or the type of music and the style that you play. So it's very interesting. So we are often given violins that need work. We have a beautiful half-size French violin by a known French maker. It's a beautiful, beautiful instrument. Brad, our violin fellow's name, he played it for me after he worked extensively on it, rebuilt it and got it in peak condition. and I've been in contact with some of the violin teachers in Halifax. There's only one in this area that I know of and he doesn't have anyone that's an appropriate instrument for. Half three-quarter size, eight size violins are rarely good quality because kids grow so fast and they move to the next size, but this is just a magnificent instrument and we're hoping to find a child who's a bit of a prodigy that we can give it to. Yeah, that would really make it sing, make that relationship with the instrument. Yes. I'm sure you'll find that person out there. Yeah, yeah. So we have a band instrument person, and I just want to make sure I don't leave anybody out. No, don't, please. They must, I mean, they work so hard. It's all volunteer as well. This is the... They're all volunteers. Yeah, we have another guy who's quite a talented amateur woodworker and he, particularly the instruments we give away at Christmas, he'll take the acoustic guitars and he'll, he'll sand out all the blemishes and the finish and reapply the clear coat and so on.

15:02

Again, and he's built shelving for us and so on, just something that's really necessary. And you don't wanna give a kid or beat up old guitar, we give the nicest looking instruments that we have for this time. And we are the second to last volunteer that came out, a young man, he has some training with electronics and he's just a wiz at amplifiers, re-soldering connections on electric guitars, that happens a lot. You'll get guitars that cut in and out, the volume switch doesn't work or what have you. Plus he's even good with digital and computerized things. A lot of amplifiers have computer programs in them now and he can even repair those. So it's just all come together. And then our last volunteer is my son Andrew. When we have, occasionally we have money to buy things and we buy secondhand instruments because they're much cheaper. And oddly enough, give me a guitar either electric acoustic from the 80s or the 90s any day over a brand new one today because the quality is just so much greater. Instruments that are 20, 30, 40 years old will be way better. An entry-level instrument from the 80s is way better than something made today. And the one made that you buy today probably costs two to three times as much. So, and we buy things in the Halifax area because they're just, there's much more selection and the price is better because of the competition. So he negotiates those sales and picks things up for us. And he's our sixth volunteer. Yeah. This is amazing. Yeah. It's quite a team and it works beautifully. Yeah. And it's all because I'm convinced it's all because you have this, you know, this shared passion of bringing music to those that may not have access to it otherwise or. Oh, absolutely. All of our volunteers are musical. They all, they all play an instrument and they all love the concept and they all know how beneficial it is, particularly to kids. So yes, you're right. There is a shared passion there. It's, it's become almost a part of my identity. I just, I just love it. I I'll do it till the day I die. If I'm able. Yeah. That's fantastic. 

17:18

And tell me a little bit about the what you know about the school system, for example, your music education in schools, because every country is different, and I'm tipping Canada, massive country, so it's probably different in each state. How do you find that in Nova Scotia? Well, it's not great, to be honest with you. Again, school boards and those that have the kind of the fiscal power, they tend to think of music as a frill, and it's one of the first things to go. The biggest band, program in our area is a school called Maple Grove. They're out in Hebron. It's a junior high school. They have a big, big band program. And they still have the same old beat up instruments they had when the place opened in the seventies. There's just no money for new instruments. And of course, as you know, like all things, instruments wear out and need to be replaced. And so we've partnered with them over time and we've given them, I lost the exact count, but at least 25 or 30 instruments that are better than the ones they have. This is the kind of things that music teachers face, right? They're constantly being cut back and asked to travel between schools and that kind of thing, and not given the resources they need, unfortunately. And is that a high school? What do you call that, middle school? It would be a middle school. Yeah, grades six, seven, and eight is when they're about 12, 13, 14 years of age? Yeah, in that, yeah. And that's great that they've got a music program though. What about your early, is it elementary you call it? Yes, yes. Yeah, there are music teachers in those schools and they do things like recorder and ukulele and that sort of thing. And they're the shared, they go from school to school as far as I know, one teacher would work in two or maybe even three or four schools. Yeah. Very few of them would have a dedicated music teacher. Yeah, it's pretty sad. Yeah, and again, it's an ignorance of the science. If those that control the purse strings knew how vital it is for kids to have musical training, they wouldn't be so stingy with the dollars.

19:38

I think so too. And you know, it's not just the, as we said, it's not just the musical skills they're gaining. It's, you know, there's more and more research coming out about their effect on literacy and you know, Oh, absolutely. Math scores. Math scores. Social integration. They're, they're just, they're more confident. They're, they're, they're able to interact with people better, better social skills. And I've seen it time and time and time again. I had a kid in lessons years ago and he was overweight, he was very shy, almost withdrawn, had no friends, hated his life, hated school and on a whim his mother bought him a guitar and signed him up for lessons and he just blossomed and he ran with it and just learned to play amazingly well and all of a sudden, you know, the outcast was the cool kid. Completely changed his life, made him a completely different person in the space of two or three years. It was amazing, an amazing transformation. And he went on to university and he's now a school teacher himself. That's such a great story. And it's just one of thousands. Yes, absolutely, absolutely. Yep. And there can be no doubt whatsoever that that was the key to the change in him. None. Oh, for sure. That makes me think of one of my students she had a couple of years before starting with me. And so she was about 14 by the time she came to me. Very, very academic person, but very shy and wouldn't do anything to do with, you know, public speaking or any leadership roles. She had a two, and when I teach piano, I'm sure you do this too. You're not just teaching them the music. You're also talking about coping with nerves or, you know, perseverance and keep on going and you've got this. And you know, every student is different. So you mold your teaching to the personality as well, and you give them extra about what they need. Well, the student after a year and a half with me, she became a school leader, a representative of public speaking, and she won lots of school awards, and you know, it just made her confident so much. And she will, Earl, that has gone on to a much more productive, successful life. Yeah. Definitely, definitely. She's in a final year and yeah, just absolutely flying it. So it's just so many stories like that and I think you know when we can, at any age of course, musical learning is really important and we can teach older people, you know, adults as well. Yes, yes we can and I do. Yeah, when we get to the students and young children early in life it just makes so much more more impact on their development and their learning and their wellbeing, doesn't it? Absolutely, it does. Yeah, it's remarkable. It's a wonderful, beautiful thing to watch. 
What's your story, Dave? Did you start lessons as a child or did you come to... No, no, no. I grew up in a very, very musical, but very poor family. There were seven of us. Oh, wow. And, you know, yeah, we had enough to eat and a roof over our head, but they're just...wasn't money for extras. But nonetheless, we had a piano and all my siblings could play something and there was a guitar in the house and I kind of gravitated towards the guitar but it was my brother's and he's right-handed and I'm a lefty but he was willing to let me learn but of course I couldn't restring the guitar left-handed. I learned right-handed and it kind of dispels the claim to know about such things, say that a right-handed, left-hander can't learn to play a right-handed or vice versa. It's completely untrue. I've had many. What's that? Yeah. But then I'm a right-hander. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, I learned to play. I was not gonna be the only one in the family who couldn't play something. And we have wonderful musical Christmas gatherings. We're all singing carols and big booming voices. It's wonderful.

23:55
Yeah, so I've always played and in the 80s, I decided to give teaching a go and I had a full-time job, but I did it one night a week. It was a Wednesday night and I would take three or four students and around the year 2000, I decided to see if I could possibly make a living at it and very quickly it filled up. There was not a lot of competition and I worked really hard to develop my methods and teaching style and still doing it, what, I guess 24 years later. Well, that's fantastic. Do you have exam systems? Do your students get interested in doing exams or performances? Yeah, every year there are a few that perform. I don't do exams. I have a certificate program which I've actually developed myself. And there are three levels and there are things that must be ticked off on a list, things that they must be able to.

25:01

Oh, we've just dropped out for a moment.

25:36

Okay, we just had a little tech glitch. So I'm gonna go to what you were saying about the certificates that you developed for your students instead of them doing exams. Yes, there are three levels and each has a set of criteria, things that the student must know and be able to demonstrate. And it's very informal and it's not an exam situation. It's not you get one shot at it or you pass, it's not a pass fail thing. In other words, you get as many retires as you like. Most will make it through level one quite easily and many go on to level two and a few go on to level three because you need to play at a very high level to reach that goal of the third certificate. And it's not for everybody. I mean, guitar is often a recreational instrument and people use the rhythm model. They strum chords and they sing over top of that. And many people, that's all they want to do and that's a perfectly legitimate thing to be able to do. So that's the only formalized thing I have and some folks will choose that and some won't. And you learn the same things regardless and you're able to take it to the same level, but it does take longer. It seems to focus things if you take the certificate program approach. And I tell people that, but some like the more casual approach, they don't want the pressure of having to learn specific things on a timetable. And that's where, you know, as a teacher, you develop your skills of reading a person's character and knowing what's going to, you know, work well for them, but also, you know, making sure that you communicate with them and that you have that understanding that we can, you know, gentle push, I suppose, if you know, some people like a little gentle push. Some people really, like you said, like a casual and they like to just come in and have that time with you and just get the joy and the magic out of it. And, and. Oh, absolutely. And, and, and I think a big part of it for me is making people understand from the beginning, especially kids that I'm on their side, you know, I'm completely a cheerleader, I want them to succeed. I want them to have fun. I want them to have the benefits that being able to play a musical instrument will give you. And, you know, let's get this done. It's all very positive. And I'm again, I'm like a cheerleader. I'm awesome. Way to go. That's fantastic. Yeah. And it works. You know, the old model where the piano teacher would smack your fingers with a ruler. And that really existed. I don't know about in Australia, but it did exist in the U.S. Oh, yes, it did. I have a student now and I also teach her daughter, so she's an adult student. She used to learn with a teacher like that and she still remembers getting wrapped on the knuckles and how much she developed a hatred for piano and that just breaks my heart. Oh it is, it is absolutely heartbreaking. I mean people would be traumatized, they wouldn't, you know, they'd be afraid to go back to their lesson. Yeah. I mean that is really a really dinosaur way of looking at education in general, isn't it? Yes, well, thankfully that that model is pretty much gone. You need to have that reciprocal relationship in any kind of. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, the kids in particular, they need to know that they're in a safe, you know, friendly space where they're encouraged and their success is what we both want.

29:19

That's so true. Oh my goodness. Oh, it's just, it's been so fantastic to hear about the music room, Dave. It really has. And, you know, I've absolutely loved hearing how it started and how it's grown so quickly. You know, five years is a short time when you think about, you know, you've now got, well, eight of you, there's six volunteers and then you yourself and your wife and how it's just grown. And there are so many, you must have so many families and children and going on to adults out there who are just so grateful and thankful to you, you've changed a lot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fantastic. So humble bragging, I think that is true. Yeah, you deserve the humble bragging. And you know, I'm incredibly proud of what it's become and it's not just me, there are many people involved. The donors, I mean, how much of this could we have done if people didn't open their hearts and their minds to this program and give us remarkable things. I had a lady just a few weeks back, she phoned me and said, do you want to base clarinet? I said, well, I really considered such a thing, but sure. And I said, we support, actually I left one thing out there. We have both a local band and an orchestra and we support them. Every year we have people come and borrow a clarinet, a trumpet, what have you. Because they maybe played in high school and would like to join the band or the orchestra But they're not quite sure about it and they don't want to go out and buy an instrument Anyway, I said this to this lady and I said I've never been asked for a bass clarinet But you know we may it would be wonderful to have one just in case so I went and got it and It's quite an elaborate thing. So I got home so I got on the computer andThose things sell for over $4,000. The exact model she gave us is made, they sell for over 2,000 used. So this woman, I'm sure she knew that, or she could have just sold it for a fair bit of money, but she liked, again, she liked the concept and wanted to share and gave us this very valuable instrument. We- I think that you think- Yeah.

31:30

Yeah, just one more thing about our evolution, if you have time, we're in the process now, we've started the application for official nonprofit status. And this will allow us to accept cash donations and to have fundraisers in that role. That's- Yeah, so it, well, it's extremely important because if we can build up a little cash reserve, if we have need of a particular instrument, if we're low on keyboards, we'll just go out and buy two or three. So that's the next big project. Yeah. Well, good luck. So what does that involve? Just probably lots of paperwork, lots of stuff. Lots of paperwork, yeah. Knowing that you're worthy of, you know. Yes, absolutely. And it's a prop. The government handles it properly. They just can't be given the status to anyone who asks, because you need to justify what you do. They can't have people like scammers and fraudsters and so on, because you can imagine if it was easy to get, many people would be asking for donations. So one more practical thing, Christy. So some Australian content. I don't... Hopefully you can see this. Is this a Didgeridoo? Oh, it is quite an elaborate one. This is a donation that came in within the last six months or so. Oh, yeah, look at this thing. And you can even tune it. Oh, wow. Yeah, it's beautiful. It really is a thing of beauty. I know there's not a whole lot of call for it here. Maybe you should take it back home with you. But eventually someone will ask us for one, I'm sure. And we'll be ready when they do. Oh my gosh. How on earth did you come across that? Or did it come across you? It just it just happened. This lady messaged and said, I've got a didgeridoo. I think it's quite a nice one. Would you like to have it? And I said, sure.

33:18

This is our unofficial goal is eventually to have one of everything. Awesome. Oh my God. You are going to get that non-for-profit organization status and build a new building. Can you? Almost. Yeah. We have instruments in four rooms in our house now. Well, when I, when we came to collect the instruments, um, from you , There's so many instruments. I couldn't believe it. You saw two of the four rooms. When you first come in, there's a room that's completely full of drum sets. Yes, yeah. Yeah, and then of course the main studio and there were two rooms beyond that. We are at almost exactly the 500 instrument level now. We keep very detailed records. I can tell you what happened to every instrument that's ever been donated to us. We're at, I think, 497 at this time. Goodness me, this is fantastic, isn't it? Yeah, many of them, of course, have been given away, but there are still hundreds here. But still in the history of the music room, this is what you've achieved. This is an amazing achievement. Wow. Well, thank you. That's so it's fantastic to be able to talk to you and listen, how can we? I mean, obviously, I'm still in Canada. We're heading off in a few days time back to Australia. But how can Canadian fellow Canadians support you or how how can we?

34:39

How can we support the cause a little bit more, even if we don't live in Canada? Yeah, well, you know, encourage someone in your area to start the same, perhaps a retired musician, and perhaps- I think my husband and I have already got some light bulb moments working. There you go, yeah, yeah, it's actually quite easy to do. There is a regulatory process. I have no idea what the rules are in Australia, but In Canada, we did check it out to make sure it was okay to take donations. And we were told that, you know, donations of things are fine, particularly if you keep records and you're redistributing them. No one's going to hassle you or bother you about that. But be very careful about money. If you accept money, you have to you have to have not for profit status or you're actually breaking the law. So, yeah. Fair enough. So it is, but it is fairly easy to do. Facebook, you know, sometimes gets a bad rep, but we need absolutely no other promotional tools in Facebook. We have a Facebook page, we post on every community page in this end of the province. We cover this whole, this is another way we've grown is that we cover the whole end of the province, Shelburne, Yarmouth and Digby counties. And we have a Facebook page, my wife handles the advertising. She knows every single music-related or community page, and there are many, many, many of them. All our posts get reposted to those pages. We get about 30,000 views a month. That's just an average month. In September and around Christmas, when it's a busy time, we'll get over 50,000 views for our posts per month. So, and that's completely free. If you had to buy that kind of coverage, it just wouldn't happen. So, you know, Facebook is another thing that's made this possible. And it's another testament to how important your project is, you know, it's, it's organic. It's not like, as you said, it's not paid for advertising. You're just organically attracting the people. Absolutely. It just all seems to have happened and people are so generous. We get on average two donations a week. Oh, that's a lot. Yeah. It's amazing. It really is. Okay. No, for my listeners out there, because I do have quite a few from, um, I'm starting to get a few listeners from the podcast from Canada, but there has always been quite a few in America. Not sure why, but I'm grateful to those listeners. Of course. So if you are out there and you're listening and you do live in Canada and particularly in Nova Scotia, you know, the best way to contact Dave is at the music room, your Facebook page and also those links in the show notes. Sure, sure. And I'll even throw out a phone number, 902-881-2354.

37:20

Excellent. You heard it right there, people. Give us a call if you have questions or something you contribute or if we can help you in any way. We'd love to hear from you. Oh, that's fantastic. Well, listen, Dave, good luck. It's so heartwarming to hear you and your team at the Music Room doing such an invaluable project to help to get the power and magic of music to as many people as possible. Thank you so much for having me. I've enjoyed talking to you and I enjoyed meeting you in person as well. Yeah, you too, Dave. We'll take care and our listeners can find all the information in the show notes. All right. Thanks. Bye bye. Bye for now.