I come from a family of 5 children. For some reason we were all "blessed" with a certain amount of musical talent. Perhaps not me so much, but my mom and brother and 3 sisters. I was dragged along for the ride, more or less, just so the others wouldn't look bad because of me. Little dogs don't do music that well, but they can learn if you beat them every day. Ok, I wasn't beaten every day.
Except my dad. The music gene was not in Dad. Oh, he could (and would) throw his head back and make an enthusiastic "joyful noise," but music? Not so much. Anyway.
So in 4th grade I was, for a few fruitless months, at least, chained to a piano for an hour each day after school. "Criminy a living death!", as my broken-legged friend Gary used to say. I will not even bother to describe my piano teacher and her ruler-knuckle-metronome method of making sure I kept my little fingers curved. But if you have ever had the pleasure of learning the absolute basics of the piano, you will empathize with the endless stupid scales and key signatures and John Schaum sequential piano instruction books with humiliating song titles like, "The Happy Halibut," and butt-numbing piano benches (especially cruel since my feet didn't reach the floor, much less the pedals.) This while my buddies were pressing their dirty noses against the window that was next to the piano and yelling at me to come out and play in the waning Michigan twilight. "Hey, JERKOFF," they would yell affectionately. "Hurry Dup."
Before too much of my life was wasted it became painfully obvious that piano was not going to "take" with me and I was let off the hook. But not for long. I broke my arm in 5th grade, but come 6th grade I was introduced to the violin and urged to become intimate friends with it. Shee-it.
"Why violin, Dad?"
"Because it costs less than a cello, son."
Who could argue with that kind of musical logic?
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I have been rudely ridiculed about the length of my posts. Accordingly, I am stopping here. But be warned I am not finished. Tomorrow you will learn the parts of a violin and why you should not change your strings all at once. Why should you not learn the parts of a violin? I had to. Hint: learning the names of the parts didn't help me play it better. It won't help you either.
So in 4th grade I was, for a few fruitless months, at least, chained to a piano for an hour each day after school. "Criminy a living death!", as my broken-legged friend Gary used to say. I will not even bother to describe my piano teacher and her ruler-knuckle-metronome method of making sure I kept my little fingers curved. But if you have ever had the pleasure of learning the absolute basics of the piano, you will empathize with the endless stupid scales and key signatures and John Schaum sequential piano instruction books with humiliating song titles like, "The Happy Halibut," and butt-numbing piano benches (especially cruel since my feet didn't reach the floor, much less the pedals.) This while my buddies were pressing their dirty noses against the window that was next to the piano and yelling at me to come out and play in the waning Michigan twilight. "Hey, JERKOFF," they would yell affectionately. "Hurry Dup."
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