The Outstanding Community Partner Award from Reaching Heights recognizes a business or community group that supports public school students and their families. No business is more deserving of this award than the Academy Music Company.
Academy Music Company sells and repairs musical instruments and offers music lessons. It was started by Thomas and Loretta Ianni in 1958 and moved to the location on Warrensville Center Road near Noble Road in 1968. After Thomas Ianni died in 1977 his son, Tom, assisted his mother in running the store and took over the woodwind repairs, a skill he had learned from his father. Tom’s brother Mark joined the business and opened a store in Solon. After their mother died, their brother Rick joined the business in 2016.
Academy Music Company is a trusted local institution for music education. It is the first place recommended to families because the Ianni family is known for being kind, fair, and knowledgeable. Most of their business is focused on introducing young musicians to their first musical instruments and their first music lessons. Everyone at Academy Music tries to make leasing or owning an instrument and taking private music lessons affordable.
They also accept instrument donations which they clean, repair, and deliver to the school district to add to the inventory of instruments available for student use. Tom says his greatest joy is watching local young musicians discovering music and then forming relationships with their families over the years.
Tom attended Heights schools - Oxford, Monticello, and Heights High- and he works closely with the CH-UH instrumental music teachers, visiting the middle schools and high school regularly. Every summer, Academy Music repairs the school district-owned instruments that need minor or major repairs before marching band camp and the start of school in August.
Bob Adamson, Instrumental Music Teacher at Monticello Middle School praised Academy Music Company when he presented this award at the Reaching Heights Annual Meeting. He said that Academy is a family business that treats employees and customers as family, too. And when a school instrument needs more than just a quick repair, Tom Ianni can always find a solution and regularly donates his time, tools, and skills to make sure the show or the lesson can take place.
Congratulations from the entire community to Academy Music Company, the 2023 Reaching Heights Outstanding Community Partner.