Before we moved to Norfolk Island, Matilda and Harry were privileged
to have a weekly piano lesson with a wonderful Suzuki trained teacher, named
Ali. It wasn’t just the weekly lessons that made this routine so special. Ali is such a dedicated and caring teacher,
and one of the most patient people you could ever meet. Every year, all her Suzuki
students were given the opportunity to partake in eisteddfods, end of term
concerts and the occasional group lesson. We felt part of our local Suzuki family
and we loved it!
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| Harry with Ali - Harry's Book 1 Recital April 2008 |
Of course, the thought of giving this all away was rather
traumatic, to say the least. At our last
End of Term concert I sat and cried! After all the dedication we’d given to this
rewarding method of musical training, I couldn’t bear the thought of not
continuing.
And so, once we arrived on the island we went in pursuit of a
piano. See the above photo - well that's our piano, left behind in the care of friends. I MISS that piano, but I know it's well looked after and lovingly played! After a few weeks of searching (it wasn't easy to find one) we located a grand old dinosaur – an upright Beale
that had, in a former life, been a Pianola.
We have it on long term loan. It’s the ugliest piano I’ve ever seen, but I am grateful we have it at
all. The humidity can play havoc with
the keys here – almost anyone I know who owns a piano on the island complains
of sticky keys. Well, remarkably, the
old Beale has never skipped a beat, we’ve never had even one sticky key and it
stays beautifully in tune too.
Obviously we don’t have access to a Suzuki trained teacher
here, so that means Ben has taken on the role of 'piano teacher', with me chipping in from time to
time. Ben plays quite well himself but my poorly developed sight-reading skills hinder me, making it harder to accurately interpret Harry's increasingly more complex music. It has been tough at times – after
all, we aren’t qualified and we don’t have any experience teaching music. Some days we wish we could teleport dear Ali
into our kitchen!
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| Ben teaching Harry |
Harry has progressed under Ben’s tutelage, albeit at a slower
pace than if he’d continued under Ali’s direction.
He works hard and cooperates for the most part. Harry even flew back to
Sydney to play in the Graduation Concert at the Opera House earlier this year.
Ben and he spent several weeks in Oz, preparing for the big event (including
some special catch-up lessons with Ali). But teaching Till has been
tricky. For a long time, we just didn’t
seem to be getting anywhere. And it wasn’t
for a lack of enthusiasm on her part. She can barely walk past the piano without stopping to tinker on the keys. We
just didn’t have all those little tricks up our sleeve that Ali had acquired over
years of teaching young children. But
lately, everything has been falling into place. At last - phew. It seems her left and right hands are finally
in agreement – well more so than they were previously!
Last weekend, Till played for the very first time in front of a very large
and VERY noisy audience at the Norfolk RSL. The
event, which is held regularly, is called ‘Youth Rocks’. The concert is held to give any willing students
a chance to perform for an audience; in either dance, instrumental, or
voice. You can probably appreciate how important
such opportunities are for children living in a small isolated community, such as this. Anyway, Till did beautifully, playing every note correctly. We felt very proud.
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| Till played Cuckoo from Book 1 |
And so our Suzuki journey continues, despite all the odds. And maybe one day, we'll find ourselves living once again in the vicinity of an experienced teacher! Special thanks to my fabulous Ben - you do a great job!
Here are some videos. The first is of Till playing last weekend, and the second is of Harry playing at the Opera House, back in early May.
