We've kicked off a very exciting contest for all aspiring photographers - The Learn & Master Photo Contest is open to any non-professional photographer and is an opportunity of a lifetime!

Learn & Master has teamed up with Renown Photographer Shahar Azran to make the dream of an apprentice photographer come true on August 31:

• Photo-shoot tour of New York City
• Hotel and dinner
• Tour of the famous Apollo Theater
• Photography Amateur Night at the Apollo
• Two Learn & Master Photography courses

To celebrate, we'll be having an Introductory Sale where you can get the comprehensive course on digital photography for only $119! (May 9 - May 16 only)

Learn & Master Photography, instructed by award-winning Photographer - Vince Wallace, is the most comprehensive video-based course on digital photography you can find. The course comes with...

• 24 Sessions (everything from parts of the camera to lighting to on-location shoots and more!)
• 15 DVDs
• 2 CDs containing hi-res RAW images to edit
• 96 page lesson book
• Vince Wallace, well, not actually him, but he is the instructor and he is good!

The course is a comprehensive instructional course on digital photography. Vince Wallace, nationally recognized photographer in Nashville, TN, is the instructor. Vince brings a ton of knowledge and experience with him and he doesn't hold any of it back! Covering both the artistic and technical aspect of digital photography, Vince teaches topics such as shutter, aperture, ISO, white balance, light metering, flash techniques and more.

Whether you've never touched a camera, your an amateur photographer or a professional, you can learn something by taking this course. Designed and taught in sessions, Learn & Master Photography starts with the basics and gradually walks you through more advanced aspects of photography.

Although the course was recently sent to manufacturing and won't be available to ship until early May, we want to offer a special, one week only, sale so you can reserve one of the first copies! After the sale is over, the course won't be for sale again until early May so act now to reserve this low introductory price.

>>Click here to secure this special price of $99

If you'd like to be kept up-to-date on the release of the course, you can follow @LMPhotography on Twitter or sign up here for email updates. In addition to getting information about the release, you will also get great photography tips from Vince.

Here's a great video of Vince explaining the course content:

"Our association—and our trade shows—serve as a hub for people wanting to seek out the newest innovations in musical products, recording technology, sound and lighting—everything you need to enhance and grow your business, presentation or event!"

Not only is it trade show, but it has educational sessions, artist signings and is basically a continuous, four-day concert with performances happening all day, every day.  Some of the performers include: Otis Taylor, School of Rock, Pete Anderson and Steve Rutledge. Click Here for a full schedule of performers. 

Oh, and random marching bands will parade through the exhibit halls!

Learn & Master Booth #4902 at NAMM

This year, The NAMM Show is being held in Anaheim, CA January 13-16 at the Anaheim Convention Center.  If you're there, you're serious about the future of the $17 music industry, and Legacy Learning Systems is there!

Our main purpose for being there is to introduce our retail version of our courses which released for distribution in late 2010.  The retail version is being distributed by Hal Leonard and is coming to store shelves near you soon!

Three "Legacies" (what we call our employees) are attending the show and manning the booth.  Lenny, Danny and Gabriel will be at Booth #4902 in Hall C.  If you're at the show, stop by, say and "hi".

Follow along with what's happening at NAMM on Twitter: #NAMM

I'll be tweeting photos from @GibsonsLMGuitar too if you want to follow us.

Our first session - Starting Off Right - was just published today.  The course walk through posts will correspond with the expected time-line for a person going through the course.  What I mean is this: Session one is expected to take one week.  That means the post for session 2 won't be published for a week.  While there will be other, regular content posts in between each session, I have created a category for the series so you can simply follow along with just the series posts if you wish.  The category is called Course Walk Through (our marketing team is working overtime on these names!).

I encourage you to follow along with the walk through as there will be real, valuable content provided to help you learn the guitar.  While these posts are not meant to replace the actual course, they will provide you with guitar instruction and information you can use and practice!

Originally, and not too long ago, this was the only blog we had.  Recently, however, we've had an explosion (well, that might be a bit of an exaggeration) of blogs.  First we upgraded our Student Support Forum and with the upgrade, our forum members can now start a full, dedicated blog within the forum itself.  Next came our Guitar Blog.  The Guitar Blog was a necessary step as we have so much knowledge of guitar and need to find ways to share it.  Then, Gayle Levee, the instructor for the painting course, started a blog on our student support forums.  Last - at least for now - we're planning a photography blog that will launch in the Spring, closer to the release of our photography course.

You can visit our Blogs Page for a portal to all of our blogs. I'll also list them below for you.  We're excited to fill these blogs with lots of great information to help you advance to the next level of whatever skill you are working on!

Gibson's Learn & Master Guitar Blog

This is your source to all things guitar related.  From beginner tips to advanced tricks and everything in between.  You'll also get contests and a few sale announcements...but mainly we'll provide hard-hitting guitar articles.

Student Blogs on the forum

Start your own and join our students in blogging your way through the courses.  Share your successes and struggles and interact with other students.  It's a great way to record your progress.

Gayle Levee's Painting Blog: Observation of an Artist

Gayle posts often about her paintings and life as an artist.  Read some great, inside, painting tips and find out more about improving as an artist yourself!

Vince Wallace's Photography Blog: In Focus

Coming Spring, 2011. In the meantime, sign-up to receive updates on this course.

Learn more and enter by clicking on the rather large, holiday contest graphic below.

contest terms & conditions.

Thanksgiving, but if you did, you are a brave soul!  With the recent proliferation of online retail in the past three years or so, Cyber Monday has become the Black Friday for online retailers.  The great benefit to Cyber Monday over Black Friday is that you don't have to get up super early or put up with massive crowds!  Here at Legacy, we've got a great deal for you today:

Buy One Get One on any course...plus...30% off our Spotlight courses: Guitar Set-up and Maintenance and Blues Guitar!

What you do with your second course is up to you.  Here are some ideas of what to do with it:

1. Keep it and learn a second skill
2. Give it to a friend or family member for Christmas
3. Donate it to your local school
4. Get the Ballroom Dance course and leave it around the house as a hint to your husband :)

Do you have any other ideas of what you can do with the second course that you will get for free? Let us know.