Ill Factor's Elevate program was Invaluable! Ill Factor's Elevate program was amazing! Not only did we get access to Ill Factor, but also other industry professionals that he has join. Being able to hear and see that caliber of experience, their mindsets, and approach was invaluable! I'm looking forward to the Elite program next year as well!

Quality degraded compared to before Used to be great but now it's just a money making business. The subscription is 5 times more expensive than before, the platform itself (updated) is horrible compared to the forum it was based on before where you could really collaborate and communicate with artists in a simple and creative way. There's the content and video tutorials created by the founder IllFactor that are useful and all, but not really worth 500$ / year. Better save the money and invest in buying gear and tools to make music.

Excellent Decision - Everything I Need To Keep Pushing Me. I really appreciate Beat Academy and the community. The instruction is excellent and having a community to bounce thoughts and questions off of is really great. Additionally the challenges constantly give me something to strive for. Really happy to be part of this community.

Amazing training by an amazing coach I gained a lot of knowledge and had a lot of insights. the guidance we received every week was great. Ivan really cares about his students and freely shares the experiences he makes in the music industry. He is a fine producer with a great ear who can point out in a clear and concise way what the problems with a student's composition or mix are. We also had access to his massive library of training normally only available on the 'Ultimate Producer' course—free of charge. His openness and level of sharing are invaluable for someone who wants to make it in the industry. The course is perfect for someone who wants to acquire the knowledge to make it in the industry and be held accountable every week.

Great Networking Platform First and foremost, I will speak very honest about my experience with this education site. All of my statements are in my own opinion and I will speak about the pros and cons of what I have experienced. I do not mean to praise or speak hurtful. I understand it takes a lot of hard work and effort to create such a platform. The platform is designed very well. Navigation of the website is very intuitive. There is a lot of content for educational viewing. The majority of the content is geared towards new production students. The content is delivered in a clean and highly professional manor. The material is delivered into easily digestible portions of knowledge. The topics discussed are relevant and current to the trends followed in the music industry. This platform is trying to provide 3 services. The first being music production education. The second being a place to network with other likeminded producers. The third being a location to give professional opportunities to songwriters. I’ve been producing music for about 13 years, primarily for pleasure. I have been hired by several artists to write material for their EP’s. I am by no means a great producer. My main concern with this site is that minimal content is added to the platform. I have been a member for 5 months and the “Library” content does not have any new additions. I do see “free” YouTube content regularly added posted. I do understand that the “Free” YouTube videos will provide advertising to promote the website, but this will be at the cost of students suffering. This is because the students cost of tuition is not being validated. So this is where I think, is this an educational site or a networking platform? I believe that this is a networking platform. If this was purely an educational platform there would be assignments, quizzes, daily tips, a learning path to follow, etc.… When I hire a private instructor I expect there is accountability on both parties. The teacher produces a lesson plans and provides assignments per lesson. The student is accountable for completing the work before moving on to the next lesson. To make a long story short… Watching instructional videos will not help if there is no homework for the student to build the skill set. Can you imagine taking a math class and never been given homework to verify you can do the work? Maybe in the courses, assignments are provided in each section and the students can upload it to the forum for peer review??? Then the student can have feedback on what they have learned in each lesson. Challenges are a great concept, which can help to motivate students. You may want to create challenges that are tailored to specific courses in the Beat Academy library. Like a Mixing Challenge, or a Topline writing challenge, Drum Programming challenge, Ivan provides the melody & the student creates the chord progression or bass line… This way you can focus the knowledge taught and redirect it into an assignment to validate the knowledge has been learned. There is so much knowledge to be learned to create a full compete song. These types of micro-challenges will probably help to increase the morale of your students and their skill sets. I believe Beat Academy shines as a networking platform. There are people with great personality’s as students, conversations are very tactful. Honest feedback is given on uploaded songs and WIP’s. The Live calls should occur twice per month, limited to 5-7 submissions (First Come First Serve). The process allows Ivan to listen to the entire song and provide criticism. If the song gets scrubbed through… then there is no need for professional criticism. It has already been delivered by ignoring sections of the song. This is very important to your students. I’ve been teaching guitar for more than 2 decades. If I were to leave the room during an adjudication or pick up my phone…. then the student already knows how I feel about the performance. It may be difficult to listen to a newcomer’s productions, but they are paying for your professional advice. Teachers are there for guidance & feedback; students do the real work. I hope this review helps. I think the Beat Academy is great website. I’m just confused about the websites vision. I would definitely recommend this site to new producers and to those who are looking to network with others.