What's the Best Way to Maintain Your Child's Music Interest

I once had a wonderful husband-wife pair working with me. He taught the accordion and she taught the piano. Both were extremely intelligent and communicative, but they were complete opposites when it came to professional teaching and sustaining the child's music interest.

The husband was a maestro of the accordion who drew everybody's admiration. But the wife always tended to stay away from the limelight. When I went to her lessons as a visitor, I saw that she couldn't even demonstrate a proper example of a passage to her students.

But surprise of all surprises, at the end of the academic year in which both teachers had begun with fourteen students each, the pianist had all fourteen still with her, while the accordionist was left with just two!

My music school was small at that time and I suffered financial losses. In spite of the fact that the accordionist was a real maestro, I sadly had to relieve him.

His wife worked with us for seven years and lost only one student, and that too because the student's family had to move. She often accepted students who were rejected by other piano teachers, and miraculously enhanced their music interest. Almost all her students graduated with an A or a B, and most of them even took up higher studies at conservatories and music colleges!

Many of her students did not possess high musical abilities when she enrolled them. But at the end of the music training, she had converted even mere stones into diamonds! She was an excellent music teacher and even other teachers learned a lot from her.

What was her secret? Her secret was that she understood each child's psychology and gave specific music education as per this understanding as well as age. She took care of her little students like a hen taking care of her chickens right from the time they were in eggs. She ensured that her students maintained their music interest. Every child and teenager loved her. Her style was unique - she involved the parents all the time and assigned them creative tasks. Looking at the wonderful results, the parents were more than happy to continue doing these tasks for the benefit of their little ones.

So, her apparent weakness of not being able to show the correct manner of playing a passage to her students was immaterial. Instead, she used her communication skills and attitude to deliver the right knowledge to her students and keep up their music interest brilliantly.

I often visited her lessons being the head of this music education institution. I was always awed with her ability to change her own personality to suit the age and temperament of the student. I was so lucky to have such an exceptional music teacher!

To sustain your child's musical interest, you need to play an important part in close cooperation with the teacher. The teacher will then take extra care to understand your child's personality and suggest the best approach for developing and maintaining his/her music interest both at music school as well as home.