Tales from the Studio

If you teach long enough, you’ll collect some stories along the way.

Here are a few of my favorites.

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During a lesson, one of my young students and I got to talking about work. That led to this exchange:

He: “My parents work.”

Me: “So do I.”

He: “Really? Where?”

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Explaining musical range to one of my young students, I told him the same note name could be found in different octaves: C1, C2, C3, etc. When I mentioned C4, he asked: “Does C4 explode?” (If you don’t get it, just Google “C-4.”)

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I had a seven year old student to whom I was describing “sul tasto.” She mulled for a moment and then asked: “You mean like get tacos?”

Have to admit, that stopped me in my tracks for a moment.

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One of my young students tried to reassure me that I don’t look old: “I mean, sometimes you look old, because of your white hair and everything. But really, you look young enough to be in your 70s.” (I was 61 at the time.)

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I was demonstrating to a young student a better way to play something. Showing him how easy it was, I remarked, “See? Even a moron can do it.” To which my student brightly replied, “Yeah! You’re sure doing it!”

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When teaching students, I point out that the more you worry about mistakes, the more likely you’ll make them. To make this more vivid, I often use the white elephant mind trick. It’s an old ploy. You repeatedly say “don’t think of a white elephant.” Then quickly ask “what are you thinking of?” The answer, inevitably, will be “a white elephant.”

One time, however, that technique misfired with an eight year old student of mine. Here’s our exchange, verbatim.

Me: “Don’t think of a white elephant.”

She: (Eyes widen.)

Me: “Don’t think of a white elephant!”

She: (Eyes wider.)

Me: “DON’T THINK OF A WHITE ELEPHANT!!”

She: (Giggles.)

Me: “Now, what are you thinking of?”

She: “Um, my Dad?”

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I did a first lesson with a three year old. I asked her to show me her left hand. She raised her right hand. Okay, I thought, let’s start there. So we got that straightened out. What’s cool is that when she eventually learns to play, I can truthfully say I taught someone to play who didn’t know her right from her left.

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A young student was trying to play her assigned piece. It wasn’t going well. After a few aborted tries, I commented: “I’d like to hear this once before I die.”

“You’re not going to die!” she responded vehemently.

“Well thank you,” I replied.

Thinking a moment, she then said: “Wait, how old are you?”

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I was teaching a student who just turned 7. I showed him a list of pieces I’d be playing at an upcoming event. He went down the list, reading each title aloud. When he got to Guárdame las vacas, he read it aloud as “guarantee Las Vegas.”

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As a young student was setting up, I was humming a Christmas carol. “What song is that?” asked my student. “Good King Wenceslas,” I replied. Puzzled, my student said “Good King Coleslaw?”

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A nine year old student was trying to play something, but needed several tries to get it right. “If at first you don’t succeed, cut your throat and let it bleed,” I quipped. “Ew, I don’t want to do that,” he replied. I assured him that he didn’t have to. He thought for a moment and then said earnestly, “We could try it on you first.”

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A nine year old student arrived for a lesson and announced that he wanted to be a guitar teacher when he grew up. Touched, I explained that he not only needed to be a competent player, but that he also needed to understand how to explain things. I then went on to say that there was a lot that goes into being a teacher. At which point my student observed, without a hint of irony: “Well you do it, so how hard can it be?”

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I was observing a group lesson of young children. The teacher announced that he would begin the class with a review. He then asked the children if any of them knew what “review” meant. A little girl raised her hand. When the teacher called on her, she gave a perfect definition of the word “review.”

“That’s great,” said the teacher. “How did you know that?”

Replied the girl solemnly: “Well, I’m four and a half, and when you’re four and a half, you just know things.”

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I started online lessons with a five year old Chinese girl. I would send her an MP3 of whatever piece she was working on, so she could practice playing along with the recording. During a lesson, she showed me the MP3 player she used—it was shaped like a bunny rabbit. That prompted this conversation:

Me: “So you have a singing bunny?”

She: “Yes!”

Me: “You must live in a special place. Where I live, the bunnies don’t sing.”

She: “Maybe it’s because I’m Chinese.”

(Someday I have to visit China, if only to see the singing bunnies.)

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A six year old student began her lesson by telling me about how she was practicing Beethoven’s Ode to Joy at home: “I played it really well and didn’t make any mistakes. And I was so happy because it was so pretty.”

It’s nice to be reminded why I teach.