Owner & Founder of Hoffman Academy

Inspired by his mother, who had recently started taking piano lessons as an adult, Joseph Hoffman began learning to play the piano at age six. He loved playing piano, made rapid progress, and by the time he was twelve he was invited to accompany a choir at his middle school. In high school, he studied with Alfred Mouledous, principal pianist for the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. He went on to pursue a music degree at Brigham Young University, where he had many wonderful opportunities to conduct music ensembles and accompany choirs on the piano, including a tour where he played on concert hall stages in Russia and the Baltic States.

While working on his master’s degree in music conducting at Brigham Young University, Mr. Hoffman began teaching piano lessons to kids in his neighborhood. He was surprised to find that many of his transfer students who had been taking piano with other teachers hadn’t enjoyed their lessons. He remembered loving piano lessons as a child and wanted to know how he could inspire his new students to have the same experience. At the same time, he was concerned that none of the available piano methods provided a rigorous, well-rounded musical training while still being fun and engaging for kids.

In search of a better way to teach piano, Mr. Hoffman began exploring different piano methods and music teaching philosophies, such as Suzuki, Kodály, and Musikgarten. He received training and certification in these approaches and started a group piano class where he could try out all the best ideas from these and other music teaching methods. As he watched his music students grow not only in their keyboard skills but in their ability to both play by ear and understand music notation, he realized that he was much more excited about teaching piano and creating his own piano method than becoming a music conductor. It was from these years of study, exploration, and experimentation that the “Hoffman Method” of teaching piano was born.

In 2007, Mr. Hoffman moved his family to Portland, Oregon to start a music academy based on the Hoffman Method. At first he taught lessons out of his own living room, but after one year he rented a small studio and hired a second teacher. By the end of its second year, Hoffman Academy had over 100 students. Around this time, Mr. Hoffman began to hear from some families that they wished they could afford to have more than one of their children take piano. Other families he spoke to couldn’t afford private lessons at all. That’s when he decided to film his piano lessons and put them online for free so that anyone and everyone could learn piano.

Mr. Hoffman posted his first YouTube lesson for “Hot Cross Buns” in 2010. In the video, he invited people to join an email list if they wanted to see more lessons, and was soon getting several clicks every day. Encouraged by this, Mr. Hoffman created a website called freepianolessons4kids.com with sixty free video lessons and printable materials that could be downloaded for one dollar per lesson. 

Around 2015, Mr. Hoffman decided to expand and rebrand his website. He hired a graphic designer, a videographer, and a software engineer to help him create a new level of learning. To launch his new website, which would include online learning games and guided practice sessions to accompany the video lessons and the printable materials, Mr. Hoffman ran a Kickstarter that raised over $300,000 USD. The new website, HoffmanAcademy.com, arrived in 2017 with only one game and around 150 lessons. The number of games quickly expanded to four, and the number of games and lessons continues to grow, with six games and more than 300 free video lessons now available, and there’s more to come!

HoffmanAcademy.com has grown to support a global community of music learners in over 115 countries with online video lessons, music learning games, and a large library of downloadable sheet music and other resources. Mr. Hoffman is thrilled to be sharing his passion for music and piano with thousands of kids and adults around the world! He has recently added piano teacher studio accounts and a series of teacher training videos so that others can use his highly successful piano teaching method.

Joseph Hoffman is the father of two boys. He loves hiking, reading, strategy board games, and, of course, playing the piano! He’s an active composer and conductor, and his original works have been heard in many performance halls. From 2011-2013, Mr. Hoffman conducted the Portland Ensign Choir and Orchestra. Mr. Hoffman regularly serves as an adjudicator of piano festivals and events, and provides training to other piano teachers in the Portland area on the Hoffman Method. He has created a collection of popular song arrangements for beginning through late elementary piano students, “Mr. Hoffman’s Popular Hits for Piano,” published by Hal Leonard, and a vocal pedagogy book in collaboration with Betty Jeanne Chipman, “Singing with Mind, Body, and Soul,” published by Wheatmark Press.