Renaissance Men

Leonardo Da Vinci exemplified the ideal person, the Renaissance Man. He was extremely well-rounded, skilled in a variety of pursuits: academic, athletic, artistic, and musical. I have already described ad nauseam how I have contributed to the renaissancification of my boys sports-wise. Allow me to describe another facet to the well-roundedness that my wife and I are trying to foster in our boys- music. My older son takes piano lessons, and my younger son has just started the violin. Exposing one's child to music is, of course, a wonderful thing as music lessons benefit the child in many more ways than mere mastery of one instrument. Learning a musical instrument requires discipline, hard work, frustration tolerance, and concentration. Any parent would agree that these are required components for a healthy and successful person. Unfortunately, assisting one's child in learning a musical instrument also requires discipline, hard work, frustration tolerance, and concentration. One could argue that these are required components for a healthy and successful adult, too, but, honestly, don't we have enough on our plate already?
This past Sunday, my boys each had a recitals. They performed well (this is probably more of an accomplishment for my older boy as pre-K students' first recital does not involve any playing of the instrument and only consists of their bowing before the audience). But as I proudly watched my children during the recital, I could not block the memories of helping them get to this point.
My older boy has played piano for two years. He is quite good. This may not be saying much as I am both his father and a totally incompetent musician. However, I can honestly say that he performs well, and his piano pieces sound good. Whenever I see his finished work (i.e. a recital or an impromptu performance at home), I am struck by that old adage "practice makes perfect." Although, I would change the words to "practice is painful." Now, I've got to tip my proverbial hat to my wife, here, because, as a piano player, she handles all practices with my older boy. And handle, really is the appropriate word because she does more than merely practice the music in question. She handles the constant struggles that orbit my son's practicing. "Constant" may be too weak a word to describe the frequency of the aforementioned struggles. They are not merely constant; they are a force of nature as usual and predictable as the rising of the sun. The struggles stared as my son refusing to practice. "I hate piano," "it's stupid," "I stink," were all provided as reasons for not practicing. These struggles were invariably more pronounced early in the week before my son knew the piece that he was practicing. As he gained mastery throughout the week, however, he would practice more readily, eager to display his new-found skills. These struggles remain, today, but there has been a shift in his problems with practice. Currently, he starts playing a song quite well, but misses a note in the middle of the song that totally derails him. There was a character from the Muppet Show (I believe he was called Mr. Music) who perfectly demonstrates my boy's problem. Mr. Music would start to play a song like "Mary Had A Little Lamb," but would always run into problems, forgetting one word. That one forgotten word would so frustrate him that he would pound the piano in frustration. "I'll NEVER GET THIS RIGHT!!!!" Mr. Music would wail, "NEVER!!!!!!!!!!!" His head would then collapse on the keyboard. Like Mr. Music, my son will play wonderfully until he mishits one note in his song. Instead of overlooking the mistake and continuing the song, he become fixated with the error. This fixation never fails to end with my son either pounding the keyboard in frustration with his hands, dejectedly lowering his forehead onto the keyboard, throwing piano book on the ground, screaming 'I'll never get this. NEVER!!" or a mixture of any of these reactions. It seems, that in my child's case, piano is teaching him frustration intolerance rather than tolerance. Still, kudos need to be given to both my son and my wife. Through her patient assistance and his persistence, my boy has become a really good pianist who always performs well in his recitals. Sunday, after he had played the piano wonderfully, my boy and a friend went to the back of the Great Hall (where the recitals occur). My boy sat down in one of the plush chairs. Putting his hands contentedly behind his head, he reclined, beaming. He looked every ounce the don. "This is my domain," his body posture proclaimed, "I rule here." I smiled to myself.
My younger boy has the bad luck of having me as a practice partner. He started violin about two months ago. I have never played violin, but played cello for about a year as a child. (This was not a very successful venture into the world of music. I was fired by the tutor whom my parents had gotten for me.) My younger boy and I have frequent struggles regarding practice. These usually consist of my boy (I've described him as a crafty little guy previous postings) playing me like a fool using a vicious cocktail of passive and active resistance. He's a true master at the body flop. He, and this is really quite a sight to see, manages to stand for a fifteen minute practice without ever really standing at all. His body is in constant motion. He doesn't move his feet really, but he never stands solidly. He is a living, breathing limp noodle, always giving the impression of impending collapse. This makes focussing on the violin difficult for him. It makes keeping my cool hard for me. "Cheese and RIce!" I often will exclaim (see my earlier post on avoiding frequently uttered oaths) "Will you please stand still!!!!!?????!!!!!" When we do start to play the violin, he gets floppy with his bow hand, creating an ear-piercing shrieky sound that nearly brings tears to my eyes. I think he does this on purpose, but I don't really know (one of the signs of achieved psychological attack is making one's victim doubt reality). On the whole, though, our practices go fairly well. For every successful practice (which is every completed practice, in my mind), my boy gets a smiley face on his practice chart. Ten smiley faces equals one prize (he's earned three Tintin books thus far). Our newest hurdle, comes on Wednesdays when we have practice at school with the violin teacher (in a cruel twist of fate, I have to be present for these mental scuffles). My youngest, who started his violin career being very deferential toward his violin teacher, has gotten rather provocative. He does the spaghetti flop with him, refusing to stand straight during rest position. He claims to not know how to do different drills that we have practiced. All in all, he makes a difficult situation a little more difficult. Last practice, the violin teacher assured me that beginning students will try to test the teacher after a few lessons so I shouldn't worry. He also said that the one on one practice format (my child and the teacher) can be a little overwhelming for children. These are all probably true. Such assurances, however, do little to bolster my resolve when I am entrenched in battle position (practicing violin with my boy). In a couple of years, however, I'll look over my shoulder at my younger boy reclining in the back of the Great Hall. By then, he, too, will be a young don. That will make all the pain of practice worth it.