The stories you hear at Suzuki Teacher-Training is such a powerful example of the Suzuki method of teaching. Yep, I've officially drank the kool-aid. I realize more and more, that you really can try as hard as you wish, but you can't teach a student (or the parent of a student in the case of the Suzuki method), without first teaching about character development. In order to do anything well, you have to apply yourself in a disciplined manner. Look at anyone who is skilled at anything...I'm learning more and more that teaching discipline, respect, perseverance, and integrity is so much more important than how far they get in the repertoire and how quickly they get there. If I'm going to teach my students that they should strive to do things well no matter what it is, I need to step up my game this year. Regardless...be prepared... Winter is coming!! (lol...I had to.) Through the week, I've been taking examples of how committing to studying a musical instrument, teaches so many life lessons. Maybe by the end of the week, I'll summarize them all into a list to hang on my studio wall. We shall see.
The inspiration for this post came from one of the days I was in training this week, and after an 'institute' lesson (4 private lessons in one), a mother came up to our teacher-trainer and began to tell how the Suzuki method impacted her own life. As a teenager piano student she worked very hard and became very good at the piano. She told us the story of how when she was 19, her mother was walking along a street in the middle of the day and got struck and killed by a drunk driver. I immediately got angry at this irresponsible driver and had a negative judgement of them without even knowing what they looked like. I said "Of course!" Her face went from a very solemn one, to one instantly filled with peace, love, and forgiveness and she stated that the woman driving was eating dinner with her family. Her husband and her got into a very serious argument, and the woman had already had a bottle of champagne prior.
Now, that still didn't take away my judgement of this person, but seeing how someone whose mother was ripped away from them with no warning at a very transitional phase of life, had forgiven that person. She had obviously worked that out over the years, but how beautiful to live a life free from our constantly judging and negative culture.
She began to explain how after the accident, she fell apart and couldn't see up from down. She completely quit piano for many years. One day, she felt the inevitable call of any musician to their muse...she sat down at the piano, and the only songs she could remember, were her suzuki songs. She began playing again because of that day. Now, she is a certified Suzuki teacher and her daughter, who is roughly 7 years old, is a fine musician herself was playing piano in that class. Wow.
It may seem like a minor detail in her unfortunate story, but the joy on her face as she said "I only remembered my Suzuki songs" followed by her honest smile. Obviously, the philosophy behind the method changed this persons life, for the better.
There are many stories like this, that I wish I could remember and re-tell to my studio, so that they understand the great impact that teaching children how to become better people, helps those children for the rest of their lives.
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