“Go and practice your guitar!”
Should we spur our children on musically – or is that how we lose our impartiality? A mother on a parental dilemma.
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Well-intentioned but counterproductive: Pushing kids to get better at music rarely leads to more joy.
Foto: Getty Images
I started playing the violin when I was eight years old. I quickly fell in love with the noble wood, and when the annoying squeaking of the first attempts to play disappeared over time, the world of music was open to me. I attended a high school with a music profile, went to orchestra camps and played in the city youth orchestra. Years later, however, interest waned, I no longer practiced enough and eventually gave up playing altogether. The parting words of my wonderful, never forgotten violin teacher: «You should have just kept at it!»
As an adult, I then persuaded myself that I would have practiced more intensively, that I would have progressed if my parents had encouraged me instead of largely staying out of it. Maybe I would be playing in the orchestra pit of the Zurich Opera House now! Or something like that …
I supposedly wanted to do better than my parents.
In any case, I was determined to do everything right when the daughter wanted to play an instrument herself. We went to the music school open house, she fell in love with the guitar. We got the instrument and accessories and organized the lessons. But after a few weeks we had regularly reached the point where the guitar had spent the whole week sulking in the corner, despite all attempts to encourage it. I supposedly wanted to do better than my parents. Motivate you from the start to keep going. Instead, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had fallen into the performance trap with my strategy. Where was the excitement? Had the motivational attempts turned into pressure?
Music lessons as an investment?
While we still swung our hips together with the child in the ElKiMu course, in instrumental lessons they are on their own and the entire approach to music changes: It’s now about technique, reading music, practicing, deepening. And that’s also wonderful when it’s backed by your own intrinsic motivation. Often, however, there is pressure on the child early on, albeit unintentionally, to make rapid progress. Making music already feels like homework, and the impartiality goes away.
“When you’re in a state of enthusiasm, you don’t perceive the exercise as such. You make an enormous effort without realizing it.”
But making music is about balancing out everyday life, about immersing oneself in other spheres. After all, music is balm for the soul and good for development. But how often does teaching children music resemble an investment that needs to be turned into a profit? After all, something should come of it if you already pay for the expensive hours. In addition, there is often the thought that the child must first reach a certain level before it can enjoy playing. But can’t the path be the goal, at least in music? Are we letting our children learn instruments for the wrong reasons?
Pressure destroys enthusiasm
Driving children to get better and better at music is “well intentioned, but terrible,” writes musician and author André Stern in his book “Enthusiasm”. Because once again it’s all about performance. The enthusiasm is nipped in the bud. But our enthusiasm for music is one of the most intimate and fragile: “As soon as duty calls, it gives up.” But anyone who has ever loved an instrument knows it: If you are enthusiastic about playing, even the theory does not feel like work and you are in the flow: “When you are enthusiastic, you do not perceive the exercise as such. You make an enormous effort without realizing it, carried by the flow of the music, the emotions,” says Stern.
So what to do? In any case, we no longer persuade them to practice. There’s no stopping either, because the spark is there, the eyes shine after every lesson. But instead of keeping us completely out of it, the new strategy could be: pick up the spark, look for role models, go to concerts. Or be a role model yourself and follow the secret longing to finally start playing the violin again…
How do you see it? Do we often let our children learn instruments for the wrong reasons? And when do the parents’ attempts at motivation turn into pressure? Discuss with us!