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drcello
Registered User
Posts: 462
(7/5/01 4:39:22 am)
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Child Cello
Prodigies
This is a link to an interesting article, with a good quote from
Starker, and which mentions a good number of famous
cellists...
www.scena.org/lsm/sm6-2/poison-en.html
Marshall C. St. John
drcello@vei.net
Wayside Presbyterian Church
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ruthann
Registered User
Posts: 520
(7/5/01 10:38:39 am)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
Interesting article, Marshall. A couple of things struck me - the
bit about DeLay wanting her students to practice 5 hours a day was
presented as being a large amount, but I would guess that any
performance major is expected to give 5-8 hours/day to personal
practice, no matter who the teacher is. My point is that can't be
the "secret" to DeLay's success with students, nor is it a harsh
requirement. But the points about "regular" kids catching up to
child prodigies in adolescence is right on the mark, as was the
success on Asian students whose culture values accomplishment
through hard work.
cello_suttonr@hotmail.com |
SW
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User
Posts: 73
(7/5/01 10:57:47
am)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
There is a very interesting bio about D. Delay. I think it's called
"Teaching Genius" or something to that effect. The author was
invited to observe lessons and had pretty open access to Delay over
a ten year period. There are chapters devoted to the development of
luminaries like Itzhak, Sarah, and others. It opens the door to the
Juilliard pre-college and the prodigies and the parents. It also
goes into the catastrophic breakup of Delay and Galamian that
apparently shook the Juilliard violin pedagogical world at the time.
I enjoyed it...
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Bobbie
Registered User
Posts: 519
(7/5/01 11:03:56 am)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
What isn't clear from the article is at what age Delay expects five
hours a day of practice. What isn't excessive for a performance
major might be considered child abuse for a seven or eight year old.
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Lucy
Clifford
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User
Posts: 179
(7/5/01 5:29:11
pm)
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Practice
I very much doubt that the very young children would practice for
such long periods.
At the Menuhin School, 2 hrs supervised
practice per day is the minimum requirement. The children are
welcome to practice more if they wish, but great attention is paid
to making sure that their workload does not mean that young children
need to do more. Of course, the older they get, the more they will
do, but it is a natural progression.
IMHO it would be very
damaging physically for such young children to practice for 5 hours,
although I don't doubt that some (have to) do so 
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sarah
schenkman
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User
Posts: 423
(7/5/01 7:46:17
pm)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
Interesting article. Along similar lines - I've just started
reading "The Soloist" by Mark Salzman. Very interesting book written
by a cellist.
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RebeccaCello
Registered User
Posts: 80
(7/8/01 5:31:00 am)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
My teacher said to me that it is easy to make a prodigy as long as
you have a very gifted child; which is a bit of a contradiction
really!!! I guess only a very few progress to international level. I
just got Diana Yukawa's debut CD (violin prodigy)- she is something
extraordinary. Put it this way, my faveourite violinist WAS Chung.
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Paul
Tseng ICS Staff 
Administrator
Posts: 1431
(7/16/01 11:09:31 am)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
Quote:
Turovsky also believes that the study of classical music
continues to be a preferred route to Western culture. “The novelty
of it counts for a lot,” he feels. “We often reproach Asian
musicians for having astonishing technique while remaining
musically very superficial. I’m convinced that this is because
this type of music has not yet entered into their blood, their
genes. Yet they show a fantastic capacity for expression when
playing old melodies on folk instruments.”
Is it just me or does
this sound a bit Nazi like? I had a conducting teacher at Juilliard
who made a similar remark about a talented conducting student from
China. Many a jaw dropped.
Paul Tseng
My Website
Free Cello
Music!
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drcello
Registered User
Posts: 499
(7/16/01 3:07:50 pm)
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"in the
blood"
You are right, Paul. This "in the racial genes" business is a bunch
of nonsense. Take Yo-Yo Ma for example. Chinese ancestors, born in
France, naturalized American. Yet he has more music in just the
second finger on his left hand than just about anyone. Race has
nothing to do with it.
Marshall C. St. John
drcello@vei.net
Wayside Presbyterian Church
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Stefan79
Registered User
Posts: 317
(7/17/01 6:46:27 pm)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
I agree with you. But what I think that he might have meant to
say in the first place, was that maybe classical music is more
played in Europe than in Asia (I don't know, is it?) and that the
children get to hear the music from a very early age. I know that
Truls Mörk said that he wouldn't have made such rapid progress if he
hadn't been listening to his father practicing the Bach suites and
the Schumann concerto when he was a baby...maybe this is what he was
trying to say but it just came out the wrong way...?
I really
don't think that just because you're Japanese or Chinese, or
something else for that matter, you can't feel the music. We have a
fantastic horn player from Tokyo at my school...
One
other possibility is that the Asian way of teaching focus on
technique so much that they "forget" about the most important thing:
feeling the music, wanting to make phrases and so on...I don't
know...it's just a thought...
/ Stefan
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Paul
Tseng ICS Staff
Administrator
Posts: 1437
(7/18/01 10:46:20 am)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
Quote:
One other possibility is that the Asian way of teaching focus on
technique so much that they "forget" about the most important
thing: feeling the music, wanting to make phrases and so on...I
don't know...it's just a thought...
The flaw in this type of
thinking is that "forgetting about feeling the music, phrasing,
etc." is typical or even unique to Asian training. It's not right to
characterize or single out Asians for this when there are plenty of
players from all ethnicities and cultural upbringing who fall into
this "technique only" category. AND there are plenty of Asians who
do not fit this description at all.
To assume this and then
try to rationalize it by saying it's not in their blood is pretty
bigotted and displays a very closed mind.
Paul Tseng
My Website
Free Cello
Music!
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RebeccaCello
Registered User
Posts: 97
(7/18/01 11:53:20 am)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
How does all this "in the blood" crap explain the talents of
artists such as Kyung Wha Chung and Han Na Chang?
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zambocello
Registered User
Posts: 673
(7/18/01 5:29:42 pm)
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Far be it from
me to generalize, but...................
.......based on what my wife, Junko, tells me, there is a
difference between music instruction in Japan and the US. Junko got
her undergrad degree in piano at Toho Conservatory in Tokyo and did
graduate work at the Shepherd School at Rice University. She
observes that US teachers encourage students to think and interpret
for themselves, based on principles that are learned in lessons,
while Japanese teachers expect the student to learn through
imitation.
While I doubt there are genetic differences in
the music making of people from different societies, I think it is
predictable that differences in cultures -- different ways, means,
and goals for studying, growing up, working, etc -- will produce
differences in the outcomes of those endeavors.
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Stefan79
Registered User
Posts: 318
(7/19/01 12:06:52 am)
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Re: Child Cello
Prodigies
I really don't think that European or American musicians are
any better than Asian ones, in any way.
Perhaps I might try
and explain what I'm thinking like this: In Sweden, most of the
people speak English, and I guess that Swedes are considered as
pretty good at it. We wouldn't be so good at it if we didn't get to
start learning it at a very early age. Maybe, in Asia, classical
music isn't considered as important as other things (correct me if
I'm wrong) and that might be why some people thinks that Asian
musicians don't "have it in their blood".
I love Asian
musicians, I often find that they tend to play everything in a fresh
and new way. I've never heard anyone play the horn solos in
Schostakovich #10 as good as Taka, the horn player from Tokyo at my
school. She's not only a very technical musician, but she has this
way of phrasing the music that is just so perfect, you feel as if
everything is supposed to be exactly that way.
I've heard
musicians that are "technique only" from all over the world, I'm not
saying that there should be any more of those musicians from Asia
than from Sweden or somewhere else.
/ Stefan
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