As an adult beginner, do videos like this get under your skin?



I am ashamed to admit they kind of get under my skin. When I was a little kid I asked my parents for music lessons and they said "no way." I think I am jealous, not because she can play that well and I can't; rather, it is because I was never given the opportunity to learn to play that well. Of course there is no rational reason for me to be jealous, since its not my fault (so far as I can tell) that my parents never let me take music lessons.

To be completely honest, videos like the one above and this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnVNZ413yfE&feature=related
actually makes me want to work harder at the piano just out of sheer frustration and spite.

Part of what makes these videos so much more irritating is that I know these kids aren't actually prodigies in the true sense of the word. They are just young kids who have been made to work incredibly hard for a few years. And it is quite possible that they have perfect pitch to aid them. For instance, the little boy in the second video seems to me to be nothing more than just a little stimulus-response engine his parents have shaped like a scientist shapes a rat to press a lever. Even without all the glaring mistakes he made, there is no way I would buy and intentionally listen to this kid's performance, whether I knew his age or not. If he played the piece like this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7YJHgZaelY&feature=related
then I would consider him a prodigy.

A prodigy in the true sense of the word should inspire me to listen to their music. For instance, I would consider buying a CD of the girl in the top video, but given her age she has probably been playing for a good seven years at least and thus can't be considered a prodigy. Which is what makes it all the more irritating! Because this suggests to me that if I had been given the same opportunity it could have been me playing the Moszkowski Etude. This is definitely jealousy of the highest order, but I don't care.

If were simply the case that these kids were actually prodigies then everything would be so much simpler. Their talent could be explained away by just pure luck in the gene pool. But as anyone who has read "This is your brain on music" knows, this is simply not the case. And if you think it is, and you think you have an example to prove it, there are a lot of cognitive psychologists who would like to have a word with you.

Anyway, I am of course venting. I wish both these kids the best of luck, but seriously, I do hate these videos.

So what's the problem? In seven years of hard work you too can be playing like this...or better! So go to your piano and practice, practice, practice!

You haven't been at it long enough. The piano repertoire is incredibly vast and the dropout rate is very high (it is not unheard of for a talented player to graduate from a top conservatory and then never play a note again). With the piano, it typically takes about ten yrs. just to get your feet wet. Early twenties is still very young for a beginner at the piano.

It's OK to get just a bit envious of young people who can really play. Check this six year old out, this is really good unlike the 7 year old's Flight of the Bumblebee.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slbqXKReg9g

Then there's Aimi Kobayashi! Here she is playing the 1st movement of the Waldstein at 12.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBWtNK32qoU&feature=related

It's heartening to me that such ability exists, even if I don't possess it. C'est la vie!

I'm guessing you don't listen to "From the Top" on PBS every Monday?

Have you seen this!



I have had enough! From this day forward my one all consuming goal is the Piano! The rest of the world can go up in smoke for all I care.

WAU! I am tremendously impressed by Gavin Georg! His playing is brilliant!! He is 6 years old and he has a deeper understanding of music than I will probably ever have! And he only plays a couple of hours per day. That is pure talent if you ask me For instance the child that polyphasicpianist posted above played 8 hours a day and he doesn't sound quite like Gavin.

I am usually not very impressed by youngsters playing since their music is usually not very musical. Sure their physical skill is out of this world and very much beyond me, but I listen to music for music, not the skill Gavin on the other hand has all the music one could desire for!

Okay to be envious.

But don't kid yourself. Think back to when you were young - would you REALLY have practiced?

That's what I ask my adult students who say they wish they started when they were younger.

No.

What they wish is that they were at the same level without any of the work.

Regardless of the age you start, you can learn. Don't be bummed out about it. Look to it for inspiration.

+1

A teacher told me that fewer than 1% of kids who start out young make it to an advanced level, and probably even less reach an advanced level below the age of 12. Statistically, you probably wouldn't have been a prodigy. It requires a very specific set of circumstances. For example, most teachers don't believe that pushing a kid that hard, that fast is a good idea. I've studied with a teacher that did, and it was no piece of cake. That kind of teacher also requires cooperation from the parents to be partners in enforcing a strict practice regime, which mine didn't. Even if your parents had signed you up for lessons, would they have had the gumption to force your butt on the stool for 3+ hours a day?

This sounds about right - but even most of those few prodigies who make it to the advanced level probably don't continue to any great length or extent with their piano studies or make a career of it (except for teaching) - after all, how many concert pianists can the arts world support at any time and how many recording contracts are actually available?

But it's still so common here at PW to see posts of YT videos of these prodigies - we've had them over and over and over and this is becoming tedious and irritatingly boring simply because there is nothing new or unusual or exciting about them anymore.

If you want pianistic accomplihments that are new and unusual and exciting all you have to do is listen to the ABF's monthly Piano Bars and quarterly Recitals - this is where the true incredibly remarklable achievements - by adults - are happening.

JF

I have to admit to a huge amount of green-eyed envy when watching these incredibly skillful children, but I have also to admit that I don't (and never did) have the sheer determination and drive to sit at the keyboard for 3+ hours a day studying theory, technic, and repertoire.
My hat's off to these kids for their brilliance and work ethic. It's because of them and their predecessors that we can to to concerts and hear the most complicated works of Chopin, Beethoven, and Liszt rattled off with flawless ease and musicianship.
Were the piano world left up to people like me (and to the fellow I was at age 8, forced to take lessons), we'd be flocking to concerts to hear "When the Saints Go Marching In" and "Lavender's Blue."

Indeed. But the characteristics that defined us when we were children -- difficulty in focussing for long practice sessions, and an inability or an unwillingness to sweat the technical details until quasi-perfection is achieved -- often still define us as adults.

This is not simply pessimism. I think it's a realistic way of looking at ourselves. If we want to progress as adults differently than we progressed and learned as children, we must in some sense change ourselves. This makeover is not easy, and many of us never fully achieve it.

Adults do have certain advantages, but we also face many other constraints. The balance between them is very individual.

Yes.

I respectfully disagree - while these two characteristics may occassionally define some adult learners, I think that more often than not exactly the opposite is precisely what defines the majority of us - an ability to focus and a willingness to "sweat the details", along with a solid long term dedication to achieving realistic goals.




But, many of us have done this - slowly, haltingly, clumsily, painfully and sometimes incompletely - it's called "wising-up", aka maturation.

JF

Me too. Not on the prodigy level of course but I think had my parents been able to give me a piano when I asked for one at 14 I would have at least gone into adulthood somewhat proficient at playing and reading. Instead of watchng MTV when I was supposed to be doing my homework I probably would have been playing piano instead of doing my homework.

I was talking about the people who particularly remark on how they could have been at an extremely high level. The truth of the matter is, you probably wouldn't have practiced that much.

And really, you can easily say yes now, but you never know what you would have actually done as a child.

Google 'Emily Bear' for some YouTube videos. She picked out scales at age 3 and went on from there. She's now 9 or 10, I think, and has composed music (jazz and classical) which sounds pretty good. I think she is a true prodigy, not the product of being forced to practice hours a day. For some, they hear the music in their head and music comes out their fingers. More power to them.

Emily Bear

compositions

+1

...rant...

I don't know why it is people feel a need to parade young children out as "prodigies". Having the technique and physicality to play advance pieces is impressive, but does not a 'prodigy' make. At some point playing pieces becomes less about any actual talent and more about simply putting in the required practice hours. The numerous videos out there of so called "young mozarts" speak less of talent and more of a helicopter parent culture pushing children in some horrific competition with other like-minded parents.

As a child, I rapidly became uninvolved and detached in music because of the sick competitiveness of it. Over time, I've come to believe that a truly great musician shares part of their soul with the audience - a representation of their full life time of experience and emotion. Look at the 'classic' songs with staying power through the past 100 years, and you'll see a large number of stories and character.

When the dust settles from one of these children on stage, only a few leave anything beyond "wow, she/he was so young". Those few may eventually live on to deliver great things to us, provided that they have an opportunity to grow and realize that music and life is about so much more than simply being 'better' than someone else.

Has music really become so shallow as to only measure greatness by the age someone first hits a competition or plays some arbitrary piece? Developing at piano requires practice and passion, not constant comparisons to other players. Great art is expression - otherwise, we might as well just put in a CD.

../rant...

+1

(Finally someone understands why I created this thread.)

I appreciate the "rant" as well.

1. First of all I feel many of these kids are a product of parental manipulation. One could take any child and with hours of teaching and practice teach them to do surgery, dentistry, fly a plane, etc. So what? To what end?

2. What is being sacrificed to all this piano practice? Friends, sports and exercize, movies, other music, reading? Will these children have a chance at being "normal"?

Tiger Woods was raised as a progidy, the world revolved around him all his life. He really turned into a nice family man...

+3! The arts are about communicating. Just as writers need to have something to say, so do painters, sculptors, and musicians. Stanza, you raise a really important point about the things being sacrificed to piano practice. Friends, sports, movies, etc all add up to being involved in life & having something to say artistically.

There have been some children who showed a lot of aptitude early in life though - Art Tatum & Ray Charles both started playing as soon as they could reach the keyboard; Duke Ellington, on the other hand, had lessons when he was a kid, but didn't show much interest, was more interested in sports, & studied commercial art in college. (I read a lot of biographies - about to start Bill Evans')

He was even very nice to his "extended family"...all 12 or so of them...

JF

my rant..
I don't have envy for those talented children but my heart goes out to their siblings (if they have any).

Maybe not completely the same circumstances, but I was also overwhelmed by competitiveness. For my mother, art is the most important thing. She did not care about my grades at all. My mom teaches Japanese dancing. She tried to teach me Japanese dancing but gave it up because of my lack of talent (supposedly I danced like a foot thumping pesant dancer and displayed total lack of gracefulness - I was only 6 years old). Ok, folks, don't criticise her now. She is an old beauty queen and has not really grown up. Anyway she decided to let me take music lessons instead. My brother, my cousins and I all played piano, violin and had to study drawing. Both my brother and one of my cousins won reginal piano competitions at different times. They were placed into "talented student's class" in my town's only music center. They got to take lessons from a young and beautiful teacher from Tokyo. She had a piano performance degree from a well known conservatory in Tokyo. My teacher was an old woman who was in charge of the rest of the students who deemed to be very average. She was very kind and patient but was very old school. I had to do those old Beyer piano books while my they were doing Burgmular piano pieces which was more musical and interesting than the ones on Beyer books. Anyway, when my brother who started 3 years later get ahead of me, I finally lost will to continue even though I like the music. We were constantly compared, it was too much to bear for my little heart.

Fast forward 30 years. Neither my brother or cousins are playing now I am old and matured and I don't care what other people say at this point. I like music therefore I do. Life is finite. We gotta do what we want to do. I am at least thankful that my parents sent me to piano lessons.

That's really interesting, FarmGirl. Most siblings take different instruments, so that probably cuts down on this sort of thing. One of my cousins was a child piano prodigy. She won regional competitions and played on TV before the age of 10. She played advanced pieces that challenged the span of her tiny hands as a kid. However, she's older than me so my parents used her as a role model to try to motivate me. It would probably be demoralizing if a younger cousin or sibling played better. My cousin is a very successful piano teacher now. Kudos to her!

Yes...Sometimes we're trying to prove a point. To defend our ego perhaps? Convicting myself as much as anyone else. Not an attack at you.

You really should look into Emily Bear.
The other post was wrong. All on her own. She started playing scales at 2 years old. Not 3.

Her mother is wise.... All she wants is for Emily to be a happy little girl.

Practice? Varies greatly. Also have to admit she's had some great teachers.

She writes music. Give her a word and she plays on the piano what it means to her musically. Probably at least in part due to her great teachers.

Last and most important. She says it comes from the heart. Which is one point most adults should listen to.

I do believe Emily is a true prodigy. I look forward to what she does with her favorite when she matures: Jazz.

Kids should be kids, and that includes adults fawning over them for what they're supposed to do. Maybe Emily wants to be a doctor, engineer, teacher, and not a pianist. My response to seeing videos on here was to say "interesting" and move on. Assuming the various news clips and youtube videos are actually "her", and not the result of careful editing, coaching, and marketing, I still have no interest in holding her up as some sort of example until she decides that's what she wants to do.

At some point these children have to grow up, until then, I feel more sympathy than wonder, awe, or respect. I've seen it happen before that the 7yo doing work of college students eventually becomes an adult, and at that point recognition for their level of skill becomes harder and harder to obtain, simply because they compete in the same arena as those with even more experience. At some point, mastery requires not only talent but experience.

Maybe my perspective is different, but seeing a kid play with such technique doesn't influence me in what I think of my skill much more or less than watching videos of other great players.

Frozenicicles, yeah, I wish my mom made my brother take some other instrument. But he wanted to take Piano since I was doing it. I also think it's fairly common that the younger one be successful - they have an advantage to listen to piano since when they are babies while the first one has to learn it from the scratch. My piano currnt teacher's solution is not to let two siblings perform the same piece for the recital and allow the parents to come to the performance portion of the annual recital. They can come to a little gathering after the performance. It may sounds a little extreme but she said that she was so shocked to see some parent's reaction (comparison, envy, etc)that decided to protect the children's self esteem. She says that kids knew when they did good and it would allow her to follow up with kids who did not do so well without having parents there.

I'm with the OP on this one