Calhoun School of Music had its genesis when a traveling musician and church organist was asked to open a music studio and teach his technique of playing to others. The School began with one teacher and fifteen students, working together in a building upstairs above a bookstore.

The teacher Ronald G. Calhoun, an engineering student from Southern Technical Institute of Technology and Purdue University. Calhoun, and a former music student and church pianist, had studied under legendary performers and musicians such as Otis H. Saeter who studied under John Philip Sousa and was a decorated musician in the World War I Band in Europe. Ronald G. Calhoun was one of only a few teachers of the Saeter system of Expression and Interpretation.

Although he had worked as a studio musician, publisher, composer and church choir director, Calhoun was forced back to the engineering field as the economic pressures propounded. In 1970, a fire destroyed the original studio. This represented a turning point when over one hundred and forty students enrolled almost instantaneously, showing the publics desire of support.

Before long, Calhoun’s students overflowed the studio and there was a long waiting list of students clamoring for admission. From his own studies and experience, Calhoun was aware that there were almost no opportunities for musicians to receive formal training in areas that would prepare them for professional careers and music. And, in Calhoun’s vision, music teaching was due a major overhaul.

Armed with this knowledge and experience, a determination to rectify the situation, and with his practical experience in demand as a teacher, Calhoun opened the school in Eastman, Georgia that was to become Calhoun Conservatory of Music.

Requests for Calhoun’s services begin to come from a broad spectrum ranging from the United States Armed Forces in Europe where he founded and directed the All-Europe Marching and Concert Band composed of active duty military, civilians and German nationals. This was in support of German-American relations. Calhoun, while under command of the Air Force Logistics Command, served as Director of numerous entertainment projects which included designing and implementing the Talent On Parade Talent Program in the United States and in Europe. This program became one of the largest stages for young performers to begin their careers in the entertainment business.

Founder Ronald G. Calhoun’s philosophy of emphasis on a broadly based, vocationally oriented curriculum has remained unchanged since CCM’s beginning in September 1969. The goal of the school remains the same; to provide student, professional or recreational musicians the opportunity to get the best practical music education offered today.

The success of Calhoun’s unique approach to music education is reflected in its recognized stature as one of the leading independent schools of music in the world, with correspondence students worldwide and thousands being taught of all ages and music preference. The school specializes in private lessons in all instruments and voice, to all ages, with emphasis on fun and recreation for non-career students.

Through the CCM website, we are helping students of music all over the world (sending the piccolo part of "Stars and Stripes Forever" to a student of music in Norway, providing free beginning theory lessons over the website and receiving thanks from many students of music such as a software engineer who wanted music scales to practice during his lunch break in California, just to name a few).