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Do you ask me?

I did not focus on your shortcomings. Just pointed out that a higher level of commitment is probably highly beneficial here and certainly what he requires.

And no, the shortcomings of your teacher pale - in my opinion - in comparison to his obvious qualities as far as I could read.

You will meet many people with such "difficult" nature and will have to deal with them in your job, in your extended family, in your circle of friends.

From what I can see, it seems to me that his obvious deficits in communications skills are, by far, not such that they would justify the separation from such a teacher, unpleasant as he might be at times.

And apart from character question, his methods (I mean, his commitment, attention, love for what he does) seem to me absolutely outstanding. I think that you would lose much by losing him as a teacher.

If you asked me, of course.

When you have a job, you're paid to deal with difficulty. When it's family, you grin and bear it for peace sake. When it's the piano, there is no reason to have to deal with a difficult personality, especially one that leeches the joy out of the process and makes you feel inferior.

So far Elise has shown a maturity that I haven't seen in some people twice or three times her age. If she is firm in her belief that this is not the right teacher for her at this time, trust her.

I feel uncomfortable about any of us stepping into this situation and advising. It is too delicate and we are too far away.

I feel very sympathetic to Elise's point of view and the fact that it is so hard for her to be heard and understood by her support group is baffling to me.

She has the answers for herself, and is working on the ones not yet clear to her. Her parents should be responding to her needs in music. Instead the teacher (esteemed by older brother and Dad) receives more consideration than ever. Elise can expect more of the same.

I have a friend who was married to a man loved by the family and when they divorced, the family continued to welcome him to all family events (no children involved). My friend, who was the only one having a problem with this, had to stop going to family events for a while. Then her mother married his father. My friends 2nd marriage resulted in divorce with a young teen age son. Again, whenever family events gathered, there was husband number 2 right in the midst, getting along with everyone except the ex-wife who again had to stop coming to family events because it was so painful.

This story reminds me of families good intentions that produced a horrible outcome. My friend felt very uncomfortable with this family manuever to keep everyone (except one) happy.

It took more than a decade for the family to understand what the problem with that was. They had ostracized their daughter and made for a painful unsolvable situation.

Sometimes we don't see the forest for the trees.

I think Elise can make progress and help the family communication process improve greatly. She certainly doesn't want to be a victim and that is a critical stand she must take.

Unless I have misstepped or misunderstood the importance here, I think she is doing well in a very difficult situation.

Betty

Perhaps because some students with poor attitudes and a lack of willingness to practice need to be taught with such methods? I'm not a teacher (though my wife is a classically trained pianist and teacher), but I have been an organist/keyboardist for over 45 years, I had a teacher that could be very strict when I chose to not practice enough, etc. I started lessons at around 10 years old and I am thankful to this day for my organ teacher doing his best to make me a good organist. I ended up playing in a variety of bands starting in my teens, all those years of practice and theory paid off handsomely. Like the regular education system, piano/organ students today are too often "coddled" and allowed to do less than their best, it can be be a real detriment to the student if a teacher allows them to get less than the best lessons they can have. Yes, there need to be compliments on progress and basic civility, but it is after all an educational process, not a social event and not a time to be wasted. Just my two cents worth, I'm extremely thankful I had a strict teacher when it benefitted me the most.
Clyde

I cannot accept that anyone "needs" to be taught with threats, punishment and shouting. As a trained teacher I say this is simply poor teaching.

Wildpaws, I really do hear what you are saying about your gratitude for your teacher, who was "strict". I don't have a problem with "strict", if you mean insisting on certain standards. It's how the insisting is done which I take issue with.

So, Elise - best wishes! Take what you can from what people have said in this thread and try to understand that none of us can really know the situation but we're all trying to help in our own ways . Keep the music going!

"When you have a job, you're paid to deal with difficulty. When it's family, you grin and bear it for peace sake. When it's the piano, there is no reason to have to deal with a difficult personality, especially one that leeches the joy out of the process and makes you feel inferior."

Very fair points.

My personal view on that is, though, that if one takes the habit of going for the fire escape in a young age, this might become a pattern and the ability to put a "stiff upper lip" has never been developed as one was, before going to work, never "paid to do it". So that in the future one might, say, let a good job go because has not acquired the capacity to deal with a difficult situation, instead heading for the exit; I can think of many other situations where the reaction might be the same.

This is the reason why I have stated repeatedly that this situation, unpleasant as it might be, does have a good "teaching value". To take your example, a person who "tries to make me feel inferior" (I very much doubt that he does so, BTW) would force me to, well, *NOT feel inferior*, greatly increasing my self esteem in the process.

It is, though, obvious that we are here trying to give the best advice we can, because elise has come here explaining the situation and, more or less explicitly, asking for it.

If she had said "hey people, I did not come here to read things I did not want to read; I came hear to get solidarity and have people tell me that I am right" the thread would have long ceased to exist; again it is a credit to Elise that she did not take the situation this way.

It is understood that everyone of us can only give, provided he feels inclined so to do, his best advice based on the information he has received from Elise herself.

"Perhaps because some students with poor attitudes and a lack of willingness to practice need to be taught with such methods"

I see a certain difference between how Elise describes the situation herself (particularly in the first posts) and how this gets reflected in following posts.

I never had the impression that a problem of human rights, or of lack of basic civility, was involved.
This man is obviously highly esteemed by a lot of people, and has the unconditional esteem of Elise's brother and parents, so he is not a psycho with a disorderly behavior that one has to deal with.

Note please that Elise says she gets "scolding" from him; but she defines some of our advice to her as "more scolding" and I would not say that anyone here has shouted abuse at her. So I take it in the context of the unpleasant situation, which certainly is there, but not of openly aggressive behavior.

Also please note that whilst this man certainly has a less than celestial temper, this was NOT what was first brought as main argument against him, the initial focus being mainly on matters pertaining with the teaching (no chewing gum; no shorts; more homework if not prepared; correction even when playing from a different room; accent on her needing to do more).

Mind, she has skipped a recital and he has not even kicked her out, so I would say that this is not an ogre at all.

Whilst I do not doubt that all this matter together do make for an unpleasant lesson in her eyes, when I read Elise's comments about her teacher it seems to me to be much better than how Currywong describes him , I think that here different people have a different "picture" in mind of what is happening and the currywong fraction sees a pretty rude and abusive bastard, whilst other people understand the man more as a very strict "drill instructor", hard for sure, but without crossing the line of acceptable civility (and the fact that he seems to be highly regarded by the very same victim's brother and parents is in my eyes a very good argument for this).

Then again, I am not there, Thank Goodness..

Folks, we are not there, we do not know all the dynamics, we are not there.

Yes, Keystring, but this did not stop Elise from posting.. , if one always "had to be there", there would never be a discussion or an honest advice about anything....

Sometimes there is just a *bad match* between student and teacher and it gets in the way of any potential for learning to occur.

Just because Elise's dad and brother get along with this guy does not mean that Elise will. I am not the only female poster to wonder how he treats other female students.

I went to graduate school in my 40's. As a motivated, good student (obviously I was a successful, non-traditional student or they wouldn't have admitted me) I was used to having a very good relationship with my professors. However, there was one prof I could just not please no matter what I did. She misinterpreted every comment I ever made in the worst possible way. It was devastating and had a very negative impact on my entire graduate career. And I was not the only one...although there were a very few 'golden' students who she just loved and who got along with her wonderfully.

It is not always the student's fault for being a screwup. I interpret some of Elise's behavior which is being picked out by some posters as evidence of her having a bad attitude...specifically her skipping a recital, and quitting lessons while her dad was away...as the response of someone who cannot face anymore and is being given no options but the most extreme.

And to those of you who point out that she's a kid and so assume she's a lazy whiner because of it. Yes, she's a kid, so the *adults* in this situation have a certain responsibility to make sure not to abuse their authority. Especially "old School German" adult males.

Edited to add: Before I get accused of being a bleeding heart...I'm one of the least permissive adults I know where children are concerned. I expect them to behave properly and I expect parents to enforce this (I am often disappointed). When I was a substitute teacher my students referred to me as "The Dragon Lady"...but they behaved.

I had wondered about this myself. It's possible that he doesn't like girls or women as students (perhaps even as people), or feels entitled to browbeat them as a power trip. It might be informative to know how his other female students feel about him. In any case, a young student who is continually made anxious, and is even intimidated, by her teacher will simply not learn up to her potential. I do agree that it's a case of a bad match. Edit: I hope that Elise can now find a teacher that reignites her love of music, and I hope she makes peace with her dad!

I have tried to stay out of the discussion. I do see, as Innominato has stated, that a teacher of great value may be lost and their might be regrets later. All kinds of theories are bandying about now and I notice that Elise is prudently absent. A couple of pages back she wrote that she preferred to hear from teachers, which is about when I stepped back. Or tried to.

rather exceedingly grounded for mutiny

Hi, Elise

Welcome to the dog house


If you're grounded, it could mean you have plenty of time with nothing much to do other than practice. Sorry this all had to even occur, and sorry your father could not bring himself to consider your emotional well-being of at least equal importance to his need to dictate with whom you would study piano. The way I see it, you stated your case pretty clearly and if you indicated that you just couldn't tolerate further exposure to someone who made you feel so bad, but would like to keep studying if you could try a new teacher, then punishing you for acting upon what you determined to be your own best interest is not very productive. In the adult world, if you came to such a decision and acted on it, nobody would ever question your absolute right (and probably your wisdom in terms of survival) to do so, although many might question whether you had adequate perspective and could ever recover the loss of a dedicated teacher who was so determined to bring out in you what he saw as vast potential - in fact there have been many posts to this effect and they are probably absolutely right. But this in no way would diminsh your right to make the decision, which might even be the correct decision. Who can tell?

FWIW some of us go most of our lives STILL under the parental thumb. My father still feels entitled to comment on my every move and decision, and to get irate if I don't follow his advice to a "T." This despite the fact that I've done quite well on my own and by this advanced stage I know a good deal more about most of the things I need to make decisions about than he does.....he just cannot accept this. I think this is true of many parents, though not all - but lots of adults, especially female ones, continue to have to put up with this. To their credit our parents (mostly fathers) think they know what is best for us and they think of it in those terms - trying to make sure the best happens for us. They do it because they love us, (and, yes, sometimes out of a misdirected control freak attitude) but it's still a bit annoying even at an advanced age.

What has dad said about the possibility of studying with a different teacher? Or is it the teacher he picks or nothing?

Prodigal, I'm guessing Elise has figured she should wait a little bit before rattling his cage just now on the subject. Hopefully once he calms down he might consider the possibility...right now you poke the tiger and he might bite. Not knowing her or her family I can't guess what capacity he has for stewing but it sounds like he was a wee bit displeased and maybe Elise figures that at this point, for awhile, discretion is the better part of valor? In my own case, in the household I grew up in, I definitely would have tried to fly below his radar for awhile.

I doubt very much that a father who believes he has access to an excellent teacher will back down to his still young daughter. Let's allow Elise to gather her bearings.

I'm sure we have no control over Elise's bearings . I merely said "I'm guessing" that she is trying not to upset the applecart any further at present. She is the best judge of when (or if) it might be time to broach the subject of a new teacher.

I guess, maybe I was trying to say something similar, but did not word it quite right, SataFe.