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Parenting

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Original poster

Is this the ultimate competitive mother?

30 replies

bobbybobbobbingalong · 14/02/2006 07:20

I am a piano teacher

today's email "do you take 3 year olds?"

on talking to mother it transpired that he was actually still 2.

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Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

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trinityrocks · 14/02/2006 08:40

Oh My GoD!!!!!! Thats awful

ssd · 14/02/2006 08:49

maybe she's just niave and it's her first?

MissChief · 14/02/2006 08:52

a rather painful (ex)friend of mine took her 2 yr old along for 1:1 French lessons - then was worried that it wasn't a "real" French teacher so her dd might not pick up a good accent!

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Tommy · 14/02/2006 09:38

bobby, my D1 started piano lessons at 3 - his teacher is a friend of mine who is trying to develop a pre-school piano programme and she uses him as a guinea pig.
(although he says he doesn't need to go anymore as he knows all the notes )

Tommy · 14/02/2006 09:39

I don't think I'm the ultimate competetive mother.....

pablopatito · 14/02/2006 11:31

Mozart had written 4 symphonies by the time he was 3. Start 'em early I say.

tortoiseshell · 14/02/2006 11:32

If they want to do it, it's fine. It's when it's the MOTHER who wants them to do it that it's a problem imo. Mozart and Beethoven both had incredibly pushy parents - Beethoven's father in particular really pushed him to be as good as Mozart had been, and they were both paraded round the courts of Europe. Mozart died in his 30s, penniless, Beethoven led an incredibly troubled life and I don't believe he was ever really happy.

fuzzywuzzy · 14/02/2006 11:36

Ahh but learning the piano helps the brain develop the maths part of the brain...or something.

Don't little children love sitting at the piano and plinking away...regardless of what you want to teach them???

And no neither of mine have ever sat at a piano, although I am sure my eldest would be enchanted by it.

Piffle · 14/02/2006 11:40

Someone has to be a prodigy
Ds was quite good on the violin at 3-4 yrs until he became a devout left hander and developed a far more pressing interest in knex and his bike
Now he does terrible things on a guitar (he's 12) idolises Juston Hawkins from The Darkness and spikes his hair...
I blame the early violin for his backlash!
(it was his fathers idea - him being a double bass player...)

MrsBadger · 14/02/2006 11:50

you never know, maybe it was at the child's insistence.

My mother still tells the story of how I demanded a cello at 2.9 and they had to put up with ghastly tantrums about it till I was 4 and could start the violin - couldn't get a cello small enough.

To be fair I haven't picked it up in ten years but I did love it when I was little.

Original poster

bobbybobbobbingalong · 14/02/2006 17:54

I have put him into my preschool music programme, so he will still be an early piano player, but she is a little more prepared for what to expect.

I am just glad that she called me, I know several piano teachers who would have laughed at her - and nothing turns people off music more than that.

I genuinely hope he is talented - I don't want him to fail just because his mother is pushy.

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wannaBe1974 · 14/02/2006 17:58

I could play "I'd like to teach the world to sing" by age 6, and at that time I hadn't had lessons. Did have a few lessons after though but I am predominantly self taught, I do not read sheet music and play totally by ear.

My DS is 3.2 and he regularly sits at my keyboard and plays. He doesn't play songs of course but he doesn't bash the notes either - he plays note for note. I hope he has inherited some of my talent but I would never push him if he doesn't want to learn, but if he does then I will give him all the encouragement I can. And of course he may no want to learn keyboards which is what I play, (keeps fingers crossed that he doesn't want to learn the drums).

The problem I have with these very talented youngsters like Beethoven is that they all seemed to have a screw loose. I was at school with two extremely talented musicians. And although they were better musicians than I could even ever dream of being, they were very strange individuals. Artists' temperament and all that.

Original poster

bobbybobbobbingalong · 14/02/2006 19:05

I knew a pianist who was truely brilliant, but a complete raging alcoholic who I would pass in the street and he just looked (and smelled)like a hobo. When I saw the headline about that mystery pianist last year I really thought it might be him.

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snailspace · 14/02/2006 20:30

Message withdrawn

CarolinaMoon · 14/02/2006 20:55

anyone know what happened to the mystery pianist?

and bobbybob, what do you think is the right sort of age for taking up the piano? I've heard people say 11 or 12 is good.

Yorkiegirl · 14/02/2006 20:57

Message withdrawn

morocco · 14/02/2006 20:59

but (defensively)
ds1 loves trying to get a tune out of my mil's piano and he's ''musical'' in that he doesn't just bash away at it.
I had been thinking about getting classes
(slinks away)

starlover · 14/02/2006 21:01

mrsbadger i used to work as a mothers help and also had experience of an almost 3 yr old demanding a cello!
he started lessons at 3.5 and is now 13 and plays SO beautifully!

morocco · 14/02/2006 21:01

sorry yorkiegirl - crossposts there - no slight to your dd intended!!!
may she bash away to her heart's content

mistressmiggins · 14/02/2006 21:03

I agree maybe 3 is too young

I had piano lessons from age of 5 - I shared a 30 min lesson with a friend
I had lessons until I was 18 yrs old and reached grade 8

do you consider 5 too young as well?

snailspace · 14/02/2006 21:09

Message withdrawn

Elibean · 14/02/2006 22:28

Um...well, I started piano at three by my own request (we had one already) and I loved it. The bit that shocks me isn't starting a 3 year old on the piano (if they want to) its lying about their age in the first place!

Original poster

bobbybobbobbingalong · 14/02/2006 23:52

I started piano at not quite 4 myself. I teach a four year old.

It is more that I have known this lady since her ds was 12 weeks and she had started him on solids, he was in a bed at just over a year, he was the first to start potty training. It's more that I fear this her latest fad which will be replaced by something else as soon as he is old enough.

He will be fine having preschool music lessons with me - which focus on rhythm, pitch, timbre etc. I just didn't want her to think he would be reading music 2 whole years before he starts school. We do get to the piano once I have covered rhythm using the body, then percussion, then tuned percussion (which of course includes piano).

Personally I think 11/12 is maybe too old. Getting them before puberty is most successful IMO.

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CarolinaMoon · 15/02/2006 10:06

thanks bobbybob.

snailspace, I totally missed that - I can't (or, sadly, can) believe it was so misreported. Hardly surprising his family didn't recognise the "virtuoso pianist" as being their son .

Original poster

bobbybobbobbingalong · 16/02/2006 00:34

Okay - I've seen him. I think he has been baby mozarted to death. He wanted to watch me entertain him for half an hour, he didn't get my taking his lead in an activity at all. I personally think he would be better in a group - but his mum is not a group person. Hopefully he will be better next week.

He didn't want to leave though - so that's something.

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