Bach envy
So, among other things, we got the little one a violin for Christmas. Or sort of--it's a rental for now, until we're sure enough this is going to work out. She's been asking about learning for a while now, so it's this and lining up a Suzuki teacher, which we also seem now to have managed (crosses fingers for details still to be resolved).
The Suzuki program is big on parental involvement; it's expected the parents will act as home teachers, learn the instrument a bit, so they can demonstrate for the child at first. So I've been going through the introductory book, playing the pieces a bit (on the cello at first, to get the sense of them, before trying them on the violin, as the latter instrument is new to me).
And I gotta say: surveying the material in the Suzuki method book, I'm a bit jealous. My (DC-based) cello teacher, in the day, favoured the De'ak method, and I remember finding it a bit heavy on the Americana. No particular offense is intended to my friends south of the border, but Swannee River, America and The Star Spangled Banner didn't really do it for me.
I presume the point of using such things in an introductory book is you're expected to know them. And naturally, I didn't, or not particularly well. And, well, listen... besides that, I didn't much like them, either. Wasn't so much a conscious thing, but I think I just don't do weepy sentimental nationalist syrup, not in praise of any nation. I suspect being expected to play The Maple Leaf Forever or any equivalent rot pretty much woulda made me toss my cookies too.
The only bright side to the whole enterprise was the incentive it gave me: get through the freakin' pieces in the method book, and on to the studies my teacher had lined up after it--Bach's unaccompanied cello suites being first on the list. And I did, and that's about when it started actually to really become fun.
My daughter, on the other hand, will apparently not be suffering through any such musical tapioca. The Suzuki method presents Bach and Schumann for method studies--pretty, melodic little pieces, the lot of them.
Smart folk, these Suzuki people.
The Suzuki program is big on parental involvement; it's expected the parents will act as home teachers, learn the instrument a bit, so they can demonstrate for the child at first. So I've been going through the introductory book, playing the pieces a bit (on the cello at first, to get the sense of them, before trying them on the violin, as the latter instrument is new to me).
And I gotta say: surveying the material in the Suzuki method book, I'm a bit jealous. My (DC-based) cello teacher, in the day, favoured the De'ak method, and I remember finding it a bit heavy on the Americana. No particular offense is intended to my friends south of the border, but Swannee River, America and The Star Spangled Banner didn't really do it for me.
I presume the point of using such things in an introductory book is you're expected to know them. And naturally, I didn't, or not particularly well. And, well, listen... besides that, I didn't much like them, either. Wasn't so much a conscious thing, but I think I just don't do weepy sentimental nationalist syrup, not in praise of any nation. I suspect being expected to play The Maple Leaf Forever or any equivalent rot pretty much woulda made me toss my cookies too.
The only bright side to the whole enterprise was the incentive it gave me: get through the freakin' pieces in the method book, and on to the studies my teacher had lined up after it--Bach's unaccompanied cello suites being first on the list. And I did, and that's about when it started actually to really become fun.
My daughter, on the other hand, will apparently not be suffering through any such musical tapioca. The Suzuki method presents Bach and Schumann for method studies--pretty, melodic little pieces, the lot of them.
Smart folk, these Suzuki people.
posted by AJM at 10:42 p.m. (Permanent Link)
