6.18.2016

The Piano Lesson

When our oldest son, Aidan, was just 9 months old, we noticed he could match pitches. He would repeat back to me whatever note I sang and would easily finish the musical phrase I left undone. My parents were so sure of his excellent rhythmical abilities that they bought him a drum set when he was two (a gift I am still pretty certain was some sort of revenge present....) It proved to be a hit (buh-dunt-dum) and he has since become quite the drummer. 

Fast forward several cellos, violins, pianos, and guitars later, all of which he or his siblings are currently studying, and you get to Solomon. 

Solomon has had a major propensity toward music, especially singing. For years, we have often heard him humming the main theme to Star Wars while immersed in his legos or singing along to whatever tune happens to be on. He, too, has very good pitch and around his 5th birthday he started asking when it was his turn for piano lessons. While I have sat with him a couple of times at the piano, teaching him some VERY basic things in effort to appease him, I decided last week that maybe he should get a trial run with the girls' teacher. After all, he is kind of needed to complete our "Family Band" ....(move over Jackson 5!)

Last week, I asked her to just try him out for about ten minutes at the end of Madeline's lesson and so into the practice room the three of us ventured. He hesitantly slid onto the end of the bench, as far away from the teacher as he could muster without falling off.  

"So, what do you know about the piano?" she asked, in her pretty thick Korean accent.

(Insert DEAD SILENCE.)

"So, let me tell you something about the keys that is pretty interesting," she went on. "You see, the keys come in two color: These are the white keys and these are the black keys," she said, pointing them out.

Solomon turned and looked her square in the face. 

"Um, that's not actually very interesting," he said in all earnest.

And so ended his first lesson. The end.

No, no, actually, she continued to try and grab his attention for nine more excruciating minutes until he finally told her:

"You know, I don't really want to take piano lessons after all."

And THAT was when she came out to tell me, "Maybe we should try again in a few more months.... or never...."

(Ok, ok, she is too kind to add the "or never" part but you could tell by her body language that she meant every word of it!)

Happy Father's Day to all you dads out there. (And happiest returns on the day to Lily, whose birthday not only trumps Father's Day this year, but also adds her to our double digit kids!)