The Piano Recital

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To whom much is given, much is expected. 

It's easy to pick on Lily, because she deserves it. She is gifted musically. A few years ago she began to compose her own music. It was good enough to get her some invitations to perform, including in church and as part of a Women Composers Program sponsored by the local piano teachers guild. I don't know how this could be my child but there she is. And she's won scholarships for piano lessons the last two years.

She plays violin in the school orchestra because the alternative is to take gym. When she first started she was a second violin and when one of the first violinists (who took private lessons) would choke and stop playing, Lily would switch parts and play the first violin part to help carry the music. She's not a star -- the first chairs are filled with dedicated violin students (mostly Asians) but she doesn't work at it either.

She has long wanted to quit music. We told her what my parents told me. You can quit music anytime. And that same day you quit riding. 

At the piano recital last night there was a little boy who wanted to take piano so badly that he's doing yard work for the teacher in exchange for lessons. Another teenaged girl has decided she wants to be a piano teacher and had three beginner students playing in the recital. Music is a gift to us all.

Lily's piano teacher is a very stern but sweet elderly woman whose back hurts so much she can hardly sit in the chair while she gives lessons. But she has a job to do, and she's going to teach these children music. No fudging, either. It has to be right. She's an old-fashioned kind of piano teacher. Everybody needs one of those. Lily says Mrs. S is the nicest person in the world until you get on the piano bench. We're all afraid of her. 

When I need to tell her something I know she won't like, I call and leave a message on Tuesdays when she's teaching in another county. I will never feel like a grown up with this woman. I turn into a seven-year-old who didn't practice my music. "Yes m'am" is all I know how to say.

At the end of the piano recital, the teacher gave out awards for the most improved, best student, etc. At the end she had a special award. She described a student who didn't practice and in fact, practiced the least. She said that this student was gifted. Lily immediately knew it was her. The teacher went on to say that she hoped this award, the Most Creative, would encourage this student to use her gifts. 

I hope so, too.

In the car on the way home I tried to talk with Lily about it. (Paul is absent this weekend -- he's part of a Kairos Prison Ministry weekend in Broad River Correctional Institution, a maximum security prison.) 

How do you get a person (a teenaged person) to recognize her gifts and to want to use them? I could use force (take away her cell phone until she practiced) and might end up doing that. But there's something more fundamental here: the squandering of gifts.

She says she doesn't care about piano, though she likes to compose and play her own pieces (yet she's quit doing that). I asked her why when she has been told repeatedly that she's gifted that she doesn't use her gifts. "Because I'm lazy," is her honest and heartbreaking answer.

We will talk about this further. This talk should be called "The Day I Beat My Head Against the Wall Again." 

To whom much is given, much is expected. How about we drop the "much" and say "a little"?

I am out of ideas. 

Her piano teacher says that she has been told a million times by adults that they wished their parents had never let them drop music. And she says that she has never been told by adults that they were sorry their parents made them continue to play.

Choices: punishment, bribery, logic, cajoling. Something creative, like an hour of practice for every hour of riding. Except then I think she'd just not ride, since that passion is wavering with her growing awareness of boys. (Wonder if the boys are aware of her? They're all 14.)

To whom much is given, much is expected. It was given to her, not to me. But she was given to me. 

Need to figure out something. 

Comments

[Katie]

Ah yes... the old piano problem. I too learnt piano around Lily's age and hated practicing (i'm pretty sure I didn't have natural talent though) and now I thoroughly wish my parents had not let me quit.

I don't have any ideas for you though sorry.

[groovyoldlady]

I'm already facing that with Girly-Girl and she's only 9. At this stage I can mandate practicing, but I don't know about later.

Would Lilly be willing to switch to another instrument?

[Mumnah]

I live in a parallel universe with a 14 year old girl, 2 horses and a clarinet. Let me know when you find an answer.

[Christina]

I happened upon your post while searching for ideas for awards for my students' upcoming recital. I have seen Lily's non-chalant attitude numerous times in my teaching career, and more often than not, the students are from 13-15 years old. But every single one who has quit has come back to me saying that they wished they had not.
When I was about 10 and wanted to quit playing the piano, my parents told me I could quit. On one condition.... I had to tell my parents. They wouldn't tell her for me. I loved her so much and was so scared of disappointing her that I never could tell her and just kept taking lessons. After about a year, I loved piano again and have ever since! Maybe you could tell her SHE has to break it to her teacher that she's quitting?
Something else to consider... Since Lily plays both piano and violin, maybe let her choose one. After a while, she'll come back to the other. My youngest daughter took violin for a year and hated it. She loves piano, though, and even picks up her older sister's violin once in a while.
Good luck!