Violin at 4.5yo?

[Worriedandlost]

Does anyone have experience of dc starting violin at 4-4.5, traditional lessons, not Suzuki? Ds2 is quite keen to start lessons as his older sister is playing but my concern is that it will be waste of time and money at this age? I mean he can start later on and progress much quicker than he would now. On the other hand if he starts early he simply would not remember his life without playing an instrument and it will be easier in terms of motivation? And dd's teacher reckons that younger siblings are quicker to learn as they already surrounded by music. Don't know what to do...

[ReallyTired]

A child should not be reduced to tears by music learning. Suzuki uses lots of bow games to make learning fun. In fact there is a lot of pre twinkle work before a child plays a violin. Many children lack the strength to hold the violin between the chin and shoulder. Early on dd just used to hold the violin between her chin and shoulder while watching TV just to build up strength in the neck. She also practiced her bow holds with a fake bow. (Ie a wooden piece of Dow with raisen box stuck to it to make the frog. She played lots of games to make it fun.

[Lashalicious]

My son began playing at eight, but asked me for lessons a long time before that. I didn't know if he was ready, violin seemed to me to be a difficult instrument and he was already taking piano. If I had to do it over again though, I would have definitely let him start earlier! He loves it so much.

I say go for it, your son is asking to do it! There is no better time than when your child is coming to you and is excited and asking to play! Say yes! There are many ways to keep it fun. Also, there are probably festivals, camps, and opportunities to play in an orchestra with other children and that will be even more fun for your son.

My son's violin teacher uses a combination of traditional and suzuki methods which keeps it interesting and fun.

[TheRachel]

I feel suzuki children definitely do play a big repertoire of suzuki, exam and other music. My dc have played folk music during their group lessons and all sorts during orchestra (which is also provided where they learn music).

My Ds (8) is in the middle of book 4 suzuki and working on grade 4 abrsm. Suzuki book 4 is incredible - he has already played a pieces currently in the grade 6 and 7 syllabus and will be learning the bach double very soon. Suzuki children tend to do well in exams as they are playing pieces that are easier than they are used to and they get them to a near perfect position. Sightreading is harder, but that also gets there in the end!

I have had such a positive experience I am looking forward to dc3 starting in a year!

[Worriedandlost]

A lot of people are big fans of Suzuki method but I am still in doubt tbh....I don't quite get it - child plays 12 pieces per one Suzuki book on average and by the time, say, they play about 25th piece (I know that book 2 has grade 4 level pieces), they are grade 4, all of a sudden? And then give them ANY grade 4 level piece out of Suzuki program and I doubt they will play it easily. Saying that, some traditional method teachers do the same sometimes. They teach very few pieces but with increasing complexity. I don't quite see the benefits of playing grade 7 level being on grade 4 exam level, why not to play more grade 4 and 5 pieces instead?

And this is not to mention that sight reading can become a huge problem for some children if they don't do it regularly. Each Fiddle Time book has somewhat from 40 to 60 little pieces, so if a child plays FT Starters + FT Joggers before grade 1 exam it makes more than 100 pieces as opposed to 12 pieces from the first Suzuki book even with some extras - it is a huge difference!

Exams wise, I think it all depends on a teacher and on a student. Dd's teacher goes ahead of exam level, for example dd played all gr3 scales before she took gr2 exam, and she will be passing gr4 exam at 8yo no doubt (could do at 7 but her teacher would not let her take exams every term). But I very much in doubt that ds will be able to repeat it, with Suzuki or not

I am not arguing btw, just try to understand better...

[ReallyTired]

Actually suzuki book 1 has about 22 pieces if you include all the variations and excercises. Suzuki focusses on techique rather than reading music. There is a massive emphasis on developing memory and ear training. Ear training is often non existance in traditional music teaching. Developing sense of pitch is really essential for violin.

I don't think you can compare the progression of ABRSM exams and suzuki. A suzuki child will be strong technically, but their knowledge of music theory will be non existant. They might be able to play a grade 4 piece, but they would fail the grade 1 sight reading test. The suzuki child would fly with the music aural/ oral test as they are so used to listening/ playing from memory.

I think that suzuki is good for the violin, but I am not sure that it is suitable for all instruments. I think that the ideal would be to do suzuki for violin and then learn another instrument the traditional way.

[downandoutindulwich]

I think someone has already stated that Suzuki book 1 will take a child up to Abrsm grade 3 standard. You can't compare the books to grades easily. And Dd loves the social aspect of Suzuki

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

Can I just say that I dread a grade 4 student's interpretation of the Bach Double? Yes, you can get through the notes. I tried to play Paganini at eleven and I'm sure I massacred it. :D

Also, fwiw, being a non- Suzuki teacher doesn't mean I don't use games or teach children to play by ear. I teach traditional fiddle as well as classical, and we learn all the trad pieces entirely by ear. We improvise and compose, rather than just memorising. We do group lessons and ensemble playing as well as the one-to-ones. I incorporate aspects of Kodaly and Dalcroze etc. so my students use solfege as well as reading notes, and they can lilt then play back a phrase, if not yet a whole tune, but they can also sightread, because how else do you cope with orchestral playing?

So... I challenge the grade four Suzuki child, instead of learning the Bach Double, or rather on addition to, to learn the Minor Swing and improvise on the chord changes. I love Bach, and I also love Grapelli, and I have to thank my first teacher for that. At grade four, improvisation on the minor pent atomic should be fine.

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

Pentatonic. Darned auto correct.

I think the point is it always depends on the child, the family, and the teacher. Do you do magnetic fishing with bowhold? It's my favourite.

And I cry easily - major breakdown girl and borderline Aspie. But if you'd given me a box violin at seven d have told you to get stuffed.

[Worriedandlost]

ReallyTired, Fiddle Time starters has 70 pieces and Fiddle Time Joggers 47, just checked.... and this is not to mention other books including Suzuki...
I am not comparing really, just curios what is all this fuss is about :). But it cannot be bad, surely, as so many people are excited about this method.
I see your point about pitch and memory and agree with it, it may benefit some children, namely those who don't have perfect pitch and good memory. But of course it is difficult to predict upfront.
Btw, Suzuki method is not a guarantee of flying through the aural test, as friend's experience show :). As traditional method is not a guarantee of flying through sight reading test :)

[Worriedandlost]

downandoutindulwich Suzuki book 1 ends with grade 2 standard. You can google this information actually, it is available

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

Worried,

I find Suzuki parents far more "into" Suzuki than ?Suzuki teachers. But I think they have to be - the method relies on strong parental involvement. It's a positive thing, but doesn't work for every family. It wouldn't have worked fir mine, nor most of my students, precisely because of this. And my youngest pianist was 2yo when she started, so I do teach littles. A year on and no, she isn't reading notation, but she will be next year, before starting school. She also isn't playing pieces yet, but she will be learning several short tunes a week next year. From notation, but clapped, read, sung then played.

Being able to play a grade 3 piece doesn't make you a grade 3 student. Being able to sightread it fluently, otoh, makes you around grade 5, I think. I'd hope most exam candidates are in between that!

[ReallyTired]

"And I cry easily - major breakdown girl and borderline Aspie. But if you'd given me a box violin at seven d have told you to get stuffed."

Suzuki is started very young. It is more sensible to use traditional violin methods with a seven year old.How you teach a three year old and a seven year old are very different. Suzuki is designed for teaching small cihdlren who maybe as young as two or three. Most traditional music teachers do not take students as young as three.

A seven year old will be significantly stronger and not have to work at strengthening neck muscles. They also have the maturity to know to look after a violin. The reason a suzuki teacher would use a cardboard violin is that they know that a small tot will struggle to hold a real violin until they have built up strength. If a two year old drops a cardboard box then no harm is done.
A seven year old can learn to read music quickly and easily where as a three year old would struggle.

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

All I will say is that there are good reasons why I don't hold the violin that way, in my particular case, and therefore why I don't teach that technique.

My4yo pianists read music fluently to the level they play. For strings... Google Stringbabies. It's an alternative. Suzuki is not for everyone and I worry about the sightreading lag. I concentrate hard on teaching it, because I never understood why people were so bad at it.

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

And with all that, I still have kids do exam sightreading a fifth out at grade one....,,

[Worriedandlost]

JulieMichelleRobinson
ReallyTired, oh no! You are sooo wrong about 7 yos! :) They do drop violins, and I know one 7yo who still does not sight read after two years of lessons!

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

6.5 likes to put her fiddle upside down on the floor. 9yo not much better. Otoh I left mine on a train aged 18.

[Worriedandlost]

I read that Maxim Vengerov left his Stradivari violin couple of times :) He was lucky to find it. And he was not a child anymore....

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

Who was if dropped the stead down the stairs?

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

Well, after all this...

Today's lesson, Miss 6yo decided that she was ready to start using her fingers. We've only tackled first finger today, but she learnt two new pieces from Stepping Stones. We sightread with solfège (Do is lower string, Re is first finger, So is next string up) and then played it. Hand shape is looking good, bow is going nice and straight even with the added complications, and first finger is correctly in tune (give or take) without any visual aid. I knew she'd do it when she decided to.

Two lessons left this term...

[MightHaveDoneBetter]

Dear Worried & Lost ... and other parents with little wannabe violinists/pianists...

research into 3 - 6 year old muscle coordination skills shows that often, small muscle coordination (that's fingers/hands) precedes gross muscle coordination (legs etc) . And of course, skill acquisition = esteem/confidence building. This is why music (violin or piano) can be good ... one of mine is still unable to ride a bicycle (almost 18 now) but could play Suzuki bk 5 pieces age 8 - 9. (no comment on quality - but intonation was superb)

also - I have noticed (and would be veryvery intererested to hear from others on this) that many younger children seem to have almost perfect pitch.. I've heard toddlers singing while sitting in shopping trolleys at grocery stores... their abilities to sing perfectly (hitting all intervals correctly) is astonishing... are many of us born with perfect pitch ... and then we lose it because it isn't cultivated?

other thoughts- yes - the Suzuki method has some pitfalls... however, if you really want to learn about it read 'To Learn With Love' by William Starr.. (It's maybe not in print any longer but you might be able to get it from the suzuki association in london). All very american so maybe annoying but interesting ideas.

lastly - I just wonder if we are maybe too focused in this country on abrsm grades and suzuki levels...

love your child, love the PROCESS of learning... and they will respect you, themselves and try their very best.

.... 'the woods would be very silent if the only birds that sang there were the ones that sang the very best'

[Moominmammacat]

I worry about what Suzuki pupils end up doing ... it can all be so mechanical. Think Nicola Benedetti may have been a Suzuki at some point but apart from her? It may have its good points but it does churn out repetitive little machines ...

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

Moomin,

I think that may have more to do with tackling comparatively advanced repertoire at a young age, while still lacking emotional and musical maturity. The only difference between Suzuki and 'traditional' in that regard is that Suzuki-taught children are more likely to be doing the pieces whilst younger. I imagine (and hope) that many of those 7yo-plays-really-hard-piece children grow up to play the same pieces as adults with much more musicality.

The other strength of Suzuki in this regard is that it does get children listening to someone else's interpretation of a piece, which is generally a 'received' interpretation, and listening to it quite young. There are things that most performers do in a particular concerto, for example, or ways that a symphony is traditionally played.

Of course, if you're me, you rebel against that anyway and play Kreisler's Praeludium und Allegro like it's a piece of Bartok (once won a competition with that, but my teacher was pulling hair!).

[JulieMichelleRobinson]

And of course, you get the occasional young child who is not only technically competent but really emotionally mature with the music... but they are far rarer.

[MightHaveDoneBetter]

Suzuki is not about creating wunderkind... it's about creating beautiful and disciplined human beings who have big hearts, respond sensitively to others and work hard so that they can become productive members of society... ... (please read the literature).

Unfortunately in this country, the philosophy and method have become completely highjacked by the competitive mummy set who care only about grades, GCSEs, A levels and what university their kids go to.

apologies for being so direct but it just breaks my heart when I see the way that some mums treat their offspring...and then mock (or gossip about) the performances of other children... and I have seen plenty of
this first hand.

AND JulieMichelleRobinson - there are many more differences between the suzuki & trad than you might imagine... am just wondering how many suzuki concerts/conferences/workshops you might have attended... and how many suzuki lessons have you actually observed ... I wish you would stop presenting yourself as an authority on string pedagogy ..... there is always more to learn!!!

[ReallyTired]

MightHaveDoneBetter, I'm not a music teacher. I have experience of Suzuki both from being a child and being a parent. In Surrey in the 1980s there was a definate dark side to suzuki. As a small child it was horrible being compared to other children in the class by other parents.

I had to admit that I had an adversion to my daughter having violin lessons because of my experience as a child. My daugher pestered for violin lessons after seeing Tamsin Little perform. I gave in after three years of dd pestering. Now realise that the dark side that I experienced was Surrey competitve parenting and not Suzuki. Doing Suzuki with my daughter has been a healing experience.

Most music learning is pretty repetitive. In the early days children learn to play in tune and that requires a bit of mimicary. It could be argued that the suzuki children to learn their pieces parrot fashion. However we also learn to speak by listening to our mothers. It could be argued that we learn to speak parrot fashion in the early stages, but unlike a parrot we learn how to use the words in the right context.

I feel you have to take a step back and think what music is. Music existed long before it was written down in music notation. There are musical traditions all round the world that do not use western notation. The music score is an aid rather than an end itself.

I have read some of the suzuki books and its clear he had ambitions rather greater than just teaching a child to play the violin. He wanted to create a good character, a work ethic as well as noble heart. Suzuki had lived through the horror of the second world war and wanted a better future for mankind.