Many people know that I have been teaching music to adults and children for most of my adult life. I don’t think I teach like most teachers because for me, it’s not about the subject matter as much as it’s about the student… my motto is “Better lives through music.”
I believe that learning
Each of my sons tried to learn a musical instrument, sometimes with me as their teacher, and other times from someone that I trusted admired. One by one, though, the eldest three bailed out in favor of other avenues of life. (And, understand that this is not a bad thing. It’s just the way it went.) Tory lasted in piano until he was able to sit at a grand with a bevy of beautiful girls around him swooning over his person and his skill as he played. Once that happened, all bets were off and he considered himself having reached his goal. Travis stayed with piano until he played in a televised piano competition (he could have been sooooo good… a teacher and parent’s lament) and then traded up to the saxophone which in college he sold for God knows what. Nathan (a left-handed artist of considerable skill) tried his hand at the violin… But when I passed his room as he practiced one night and heard him saying, “I wish this bow were a saw so I could cut this thing in two,” I knew he also was done with learning an instrument. (Now when someone asks Nathan if he is musical he recites, “I play the pencil, as an artist.”) And then there’s Nicholas.
Nick at a tender age, decided that he would like to play the cello. And he was quite good at it. He enjoyed it until Bill and I hit a terrible dry spell and couldn’t pay for his lessons… this was also coupled with the fact that his teacher wanted him to perform, and he was NOT interested in performance for others. He kept that instrument until our “dry spell” began to affect his life and he needed a place to get rid of his frustration. Nick asked to sell the cello for Hockey equipment! Now, I’ve been a musician all of my life and not that athletic. But when I looked into my son’s eyes and saw that there might be new life for him in hockey, it was clear that music had to die for at least a while in favor of the sport. So I took the instrument to a music store and sold it on consignment for the price of his hockey equipment.
When Nick was out there being slammed against the side of the rink or doing the same to someone else, I could hear in my mind’s ear the beautiful music that had come from the instrument when he played. I battled with myself, wanting to have him continue to play but I knew that I needed to let this lie still. I rationalized that at the moment I couldn’t pay for the lessons anyway… but then the devil would remind me that now he had no instrument so it might never ever happen again because the cello had been sold.
I let the music lie still in Nick.
It might as well be known that the reason we couldn’t pay for the lessons was because through circumstances too complicated to relate, we had lost our home, stocks, bonds, cars, savings accounts, checking accounts, insurance… we lost everything but faith, family and a few family heirlooms. We learned who was really our friend and who had been there just for free a ride. The two older sons were in college at this point; and Hubby and I sacrificed a lot to keep them there. That said, they never really understood the losses that were going on at home. Nick and Nathan? They knew… they lived through it with us.
Back to Nick. After a time, the hockey served its purpose and Nick asked me if he could learn to play my clarinet. I was thrilled. He was a natural. He didn’t like reading notes so I skated around that so he would at least understand the instrument. What a gift he had! And that ear of his… he really could play well by ear.
After a time, he wanted his own instrument… Again the issue of no money… so I made a pact with him that if he earned a certain amount of the price for the instrument, I would find a way to pay the rest and it could be a combo birthday/Christmas gift as well. He really wanted that instrument so he agreed.
Now in our house, a pact means, you do it! So he and I went to work making this happen. I took more students and he baby-sat and collected tin cans for money. When he finally opened the case of that new clarinet there was not a prouder boy. He did it! He discovered his own resolve through an adventure toward music; and he still plays it from time to time.
Next, Nick wanted to learn piano. Piano takes a lot of vertical tracking as well as horizontal tracking at the same time. I pretty much knew that reading the notes would not be his friend. So I set the books aside and taught him all of the musical scales. When he had mastered that, I taught him the basic chord progression from which most music is derived… I – IV – I – V7 – I … He learned this in every key. After he could do that I had him use his ear training to pick out melodies he loved, and taught him how to build an accompaniment. Now, Nick was off and running. He began composing his own music. And, that music is some of my very favorite in the whole world. It soothes my soul when I hear it.
He is a gifted musician. Very gifted. But he didn’t learn the traditional way and he needed to do it in his own time. Sometimes, as teachers and friends or even as parents, we have to wait on these loved ones. We have to give them room to think and decide how they feel. I think it’s this way in all things. God wants us to take time to listen to our hearts and grow at our own pace; then we enter in and water their souls with time and teaching and love.
I adore each of my sons so very much, as I’m sure you love your family the same way. They need us (and our friends need us) to stop having expectations and just take them as they are, not how we think they ought to be. God wants THEM to figure it out… not us.
I have never been sorry that I teach this way. I teach to the child or the adult’s soul. What I’m doing is I’m loving them for who they are. It is a pleasure to love them in their own space because at some point they might come back and use it in a way that feeds YOUR soul.
I take you to one more scene in the life of my sons. Number two son, Travis, had planned to move out immediately after graduation from high school. He told his dad about it three, maybe four months before hand. Hubby told him, “I’m not doing your dirty work here… you need go tell your mother and not leave this to the last minute, because you’re going to break her heart if you do that.”
Well he waited til the last minute. He just couldn’t, in all that time, figure out how he was going to say to the woman he loved first in his life, “I’m leaving.” So picture this scene.
I walk into the house. He and older brother Tory are packing a few things for him. I ask what’s going on and they tell me. Right away I leap into work mode and shove my heart so far down inside I’m not sure it’s beating. I say to him, “Well, if you’re really leaving, we are going through all of your belongings, and you will decide what stays and what goes… You will pack to store what you are keeping but not taking. ‘Cause I shouldn’t have to clean up your childhood… You should.” He agrees and we all dive into the work.
At some point in all of this, our eyes met as we were working and I just couldn’t stop myself. I drew breath and backed off. Then I turned on one heel and headed down the hall to another room. He knew I was going to “lose it.” Trav took off right behind me calling out, “Mom! Mom wait. Mom….” When I ran out of running room and was pretty much cornered, I turned with tears in my eyes and looked straight into his face…. this was the son who could never find the right words to express his feelings to those for whom he cared the most. And I was the mother who was now seeing all the illnesses I’d nursed him through, all the sacrifices I’d made to help him succeed, all the late hours I’d stayed up waiting for his rebellious tail to get home passed curfew through high school.
He sighed deeply and looked up at the ceiling. (“Yes, Look up. That’s where you will always find help, son, when I am not there to come up with the answer or the love.”)
And then it came. He stared back into my eyes and said, “Mom, I have always loved it when you played the piano!” I through my arms around his neck and we held each other. I knew he was saying in the only language he could find that I would understand, “I love you with all my heart and I always will.”
Travis found his moment through words that made my own heart sing. Nathan continues to give me back his music whenever I watch him sketch. Tory has such a gift for gab that every time he weaves a tale of what happened in his day, I hear the musical rhythm of his soul talking to me. And Nick? Well, he’s still giving back beauty on the piano whenever he plays his compositions for us.
Music is a great lover. It comes to us in a gentle yet powerful way if only we will let it. In return, music whether in notes or in some other form, always finds a way back home to those we love.
That’s it. May love songs be written on your heart and in your souls tonight.
Best… Carolyn Thomas Temple