Once a week after school I would walk down Ash Street to Mrs. Castor’s house for piano lesson. I would let myself in the front door and walk back to wait in the dining room. The old upright piano was similar to the one I had at home. My “music room” was actually the front hall in our home on East Main Street. Lots of noisy notes rattled ’round that room; there wasn’t much fabric to absorb the sounds, just the coats hanging in the closet space next to the piano. [That’s where I hid to do my first experiments with matches. It’s a good thing that little kids are invincible, or so I thought at the time, because that could have been a disaster!] But back to my story… I’m sure the sounds coming from that room as I practiced drove my two brothers crazy!
We had our big recital at the end of the year, held in the Town Hall. Upstairs in the Town Hall there was a big stage and all the students would sit up on the stage, all dressed up, squirming in their seats until it was their turn to play. One year I wore a horrid stiff “party frock” made of pink crinoline that took on the shape of my seat when I sat down, and kept the shape when I stood up…awkward! Another year I played the William Tell Overture (…remember the Lone Ranger song…Hi-O-Silver!) What a noise that made bouncing around that huge wooden box of a room with the high ceilings. And it being a steamy hot evening in May the tall windows would be open, wouldn’t they? I’m sure the neighbors on Main Street loved recital night!
I took lessons from Mrs. Castor for seven or eight years and then Mr. Karlin, the high school music teacher (…think ‘Mr. Holland’s Opus’) suggested I switch to take lessons from Mrs. Nordstrom. Mrs. Nordstrom was a good teacher, but her methods were traditional like Mrs. Castor. One of issues that I have with traditional music training is that you’re always in limbo. You memorize a piece of music so that you can play it in a recital. When you move on to memorize another piece, the previous one is soon forgotten. So, if someone wishes to hear you play, they have only a small window to work with, right around recital time!
A second problem with traditional music lessons is that you have to learn to handle and play your instrument at the same time that you are learning to read a new language (music notation), a double whammy. Of course, thousands of people of all ages handle traditional music lessons successfully, a tribute to the endless versatility and adaptability of the human brain. We learn in spite of ourselves!
Music was a big part of my childhood, playing the glockenspiel in the marching band and timpani and percussion in the orchestra…I’ll never forget the time in “The King & I” I missed my cue to hit the big gong. I had to dive across the orchestra pit to reach it in time. People must have thought I was part of the show! I taught strings (violin, viola, cello) and piano for many years, got a couple of degrees in music and wrote a couple of musicals. But my favorite part of all the music has always been conducting, helping people put all their melodies together to make something that’s bigger than all the single tunes. I guess I’m still doing that. Thanks for getting me started Mrs. Castor!
Cheers,
Gus
