Dr. Greg E. Cope has a music and education background. He has a BA in Music Education, two Masters Degrees: one in Education and a second in Music Education. Dr. Cope's Ph.D. is in Education and his research was on school-dropouts and the use of the Hebrew Education Model in alternative education. Dr. Cope taught music education and teacher education at the university level for 18 years. He founded three public schools and co-founded an Outdoor Adventure Nonprofit company. He also has a ministry background and served on staff in churches in Utah, Kentucky, Colorado and Indiana. Dr. Cope started building musical instruments in high school and throughout his life he has experimented with a variety of materials for making sound including gourds to make fiddles, plungers and car jacks for percussion, fiberglass lute bodies, ABS plastic for the backs of the Psaltery and Le Lute, along with various woods to create and build banjos. Dr. Cope began building and repairing Orff Xylophones after studying Orff and Kodaly in college and graduate school.