Customer ReviewsforMusic & Arts

This company is horrible and should be avoided. I tried to pay off a violin and was told one amount. When I called back to pay, they upped it by over $300. Claimed a manager would call, they never did. I called back and they said a manager had called. They hadn't. Total thieves. Absolutely no concern for their customers.

WARNING!!! Management and staff at the Music and arts store in Leesburg va and the corporation in Maryland va are LIARS and THIEFS. A one star rating is generous, this is how bad customer service is. I would never recommend this company to anyone and will never do business with this company again. When you pay in store and are told by management your account is paid in full. Corporate call you and tell you still owe. You find out the the record keeping in the store is different than corporate records. In addition the store payment months remaining compared to the company payments remaining are different numbers. The monthly amount applied to your instrument in the store as you are told is higher than the amount in corporate records thus corporate is showing that you owe more. Nothing is transparent and nothing make sense. You just keep paying and paying and paying and the lies are perpetually.

They will charge you for an instrument that was returned to the school. They do not check on returned instruments to schools and will not acknowledge that you returned the instrument.

Very bad customer service in the Quioccasin Road, Richmond, VA branch. They have told different price than my bills now, and I have try to return but they have refused. Not honest you can't trust staff there. Don't go you will regret.

zero stars, returned my child's rental violin in Jan of 2022, paying my $40 bill in full. I am still being billed over 2 years later and have gotten no reply to multiple letters. zero customer service!

This new front company is a massive scam and an embarrassment to Mr. ********* legacy. Some big box music company (Guitar Center's 'American Music,' I think?) purchased his original Bethesda store and turned it into a swindling snake of a false storefront, just like the rest of Guitar Center's hubs of corporate greed. To cover their trail, they are marketing freely on social media as well as other online forum advertising platforms as an "online music store," and hiding behind the band and orchestral instrument lesson and rental industry to get tax breaks with local schools. The address says Maryland, but the customer phone support personnel are in locations that range from Texas to Florida to Washington state. They base themselves in every state to make sure that customers are paying state taxes, not for the customers, but for their own tax write-offs. My own experience: I placed an order at 2PM, canceled the order at 2:45PM, received email confirmation that the order had been cancelled at 3:30PM, then received an email FOURTEEN HOURS LATER at 5:30AM that the item had just shipped out, despite the confirmation of cancellation. This is nothing short of employee laziness. I called to speak with customer support about how to resolve the blatant disregard for the cancellation, and the customer support tech ASSURED me that ALL MUSIC & ARTS PACKAGES MUST BE SIGNED FOR. He LIED. No signature was required, the package was delivered, and I spent over 2 hours on hold, being hung up on, and being told that someone would resolve the issue, on TWO SEPARATE DAYS!!! The order did not cost that much money, but the hassle cost me time I cannot recover and stress that was unjustly assigned to me instead of their customer service. The company never resolved the issue. If you purchase from them, know what you are getting yourself into - this is Walmart level ridiculousness, so if you want cheap crap for musical gear, on your head be it.

This company appears to be a scam and I warn anyone from renting from them. They immediately took my money for an oboe rental and reeds, as well as my payment for expedited shipping to get it right away. The box arrived with only the reeds in it and the oboe on back order. Then when I tried to call to find out what was going on, they kept hanging up on me, after three different representatives gave me three different stories about what was going on. Do NOT trust this company or their representatives. I am now unable to get a refund of what I paid and am going to cancel my debit card so they cannot continue to put charges on there. I can't find another way to protect myself from them.

My son rented a trombone from the school return it where he received the instrument at school. They continued to charge us for several months although the instrument was returned. I called the company already 10 times trying to get this figured out and we still have gotten anywhere. The company does this to take your money secretly. They claim you need a slip saying the instrument needs to be returned but no slips are given out to parents. That’s what they continue to repeat. Never any email updates on instrument rentals were sent either so they stay quiet while they have your credit card information to charge you monthly. Be aware of this company and how sneaky they are with their so called policies and rules. Their customer service department doesn’t follow up with open cases and are hard to get ahold of also.

They have a bait and switch process and do not honor their contracts. After getting told clearly on two separate calls that all of our equity on a rental would go to purchase an instrument, upon going to purchase said instrument we were told that only the first 24 months counted (which is not referenced on contract nor what was shared on phone) and then when in store we were also told that it only counts for student instruments (also not what we were told on phone nor is that stated in contract). Our last two conversations have been completely different and we've been told we are 'reading the contract wrong' and that it's misleading and it's supposed to say that but it doesn't. So apparently it's my fault that they wrote the contract poorly and won't live up to its actual wording. Considering getting a lawyer since we only stayed with them to build up equity and to get the discount - which apparently are no longer good. Ridiculous scam.

Unauthorized/fraudulent charges to our credit card. Learn from our situation and watch out for what I can only describe as a scam. Our daughter joined her school band and we entered a Rent-to-Own agreement with Music and Arts on 9/29/2021. They were the exclusive provider of rental services through the elementary school program. We signed a contract for 18 months, at which point we would own the instrument for a total cost of $599.99. However, it has been more than 26 months now and we have been charged over $1,000. We have been in contact with Music and Arts for six months via phone calls and e-mails with no results. They are trying to claim we traded in the instrument for an upgrade, which triggered a new agreement, and that we will be charged until 2025 to pay for the exchange, which will be over $1,300 in total. This information is incorrect. The initial instrument that was provided to us was not in good working condition. Its screws kept falling out, causing the instrument to malfunction and disassemble frequently. The instrument was brought to the store for repair. The employee at the store made the decision to replace the inoperable instrument with a functional one, since we had LDW insurance as part of the agreement. There was no request for a replacement or an upgrade. There was no awareness that the new instrument was any different than the old instrument, other than it was operational. At no time did we agree or authorize to modify the Rent-to-Own agreement or to enter into a new agreement. Again, the instrument was brought to the store to be repaired. The employee chose to exchange the instrument. The employee chose the new instrument for replacement. Through the school program, there is no additional cost to the renter and does not modify the rent-to-own agreement. However, Music and Arts continues to charge our credit card, even though there is no authorization for these charges. Stay far, far, away from Music and Arts.