A long time ago, I was at a trade union weekend in a hotel, and a bunch of us were drinking in the bar, where an upright piano stood against the wall. After certain volumes of drink had been taken, our District Secretary, Mike, sat down at the piano and quietly began to play. With both hands, and using both the black keys and pedals - in other words, he was quite good.
After a couple of tunes, he had a word with the barman, and was given permission to carry on, seeing as he clearly knew what he was doing and he didn’t cost anything. Now, we were astonished, as he'd never given any indication of musical talent before. Mike played lots of well-known songs, and he had that gift of turning the end of one song into the start of another. At one point, I asked him if he knew any Gershwin, and he played "Rhapsody In Blue". From memory. Gaw.
Now, Mike was a bearded single geek, but that night he became Mr Cool, and was something of a hit with the women in the bar. He judged his moment right, when there was a lot of singing along happening, and went into a medley of Barry Manilow tunes. He finished playing, whispered something in a very attractive woman's ear, and they left the bar together. Such is the power of knowing how to play an instrument well.
I was reminded of this when visiting a couple of friends last weekend who are much higher up the social scale than I am. Put it this way, they used to have Charles and Diana round for dinner, and they now have Charles and Camilla round from time to time. ("It's not as much fun, though", mutters the husband.) Their youngest is learning to play the violin, so I asked him how it was going. "OK..." he said... but he can't play what he'd really like to play, which is Lady Gaga. (He also mentioned other beat combos, but they were as a foreign language to me.) I told him that I knew a violin player that he might like, and pulled up YouTube on their computer. "The Hiring Fair" seemed to be as good an introduction to the work of Ric Sanders as anything else I could find easily, and so it proved.
Now he wants to know how to play "The Hiring Fair", of course. He also wants to know how to play like Dave Swarbrick, Seth Lakeman and Phil Beer. Tempted though I was to respond with the old chestnut, "You gotta practice, kid", I had a look at the music he was learning instead. Friends, my heart sank. Where I'd hoped to find a merry sea shanty, a jig or a reel, there were only dry pieces, clearly composed for easy violin with all the compositions biased toward improving technique rather than entertaining the ear. Indeed, I was surprised not to find "Fairy Bells", so beloved of Molesworth Jr.
What was missing from that book of music was anything recognisable, anything contemporary, and, most importantly, anything that the new violinist could have fun with. And that, my friends, is not only truly wrong, it helps to explain why most people can't play an instrument, yet many have tried.
I took Music at school, and absorbed enough dry academic stuff to gain an O-Level in the subject. I didn't care much for Music, but it was easy enough. I also learned to play the piano for a couple of years. Again, I didn't care for it. And yet, when I was 14, a guitar-playing pal showed me the sheet music for the current chart-topper, "American Pie". (A pedant writes - "Actually, it only ever made No 2 in the charts. Nilsson's "Without You" held it off.") What the sheet music had was boxes to show you where to put your fingers. As I was mad keen on "American Pie", I bought a copy of the music, borrowed a guitar, and learned to play the song in two weeks.
I can still play the piano, in the same way that a walrus can operate a chainsaw. I can play the guitar quite a lot better, though, and it's a skill that's never left me. I learned a lot about playing the guitar through mixing with other guitar players, who'd pass on tips and tricks. I'm no professional, but I get a lot of pleasure from playing my guitar. What's more, I always have, even when I was clunking my way through "American Pie" with many buzzing strings and long pauses before chord changes.
There, then, is the driver for learning my instrument - pleasure. A driver that is missing from my young friend's life, and one that I fear will continue to be missing unless and until Lady Gaga pops into his dorm with some musical instruction. I'd say the same of Ric, Dave or Seth, but honestly, I think Lady Gaga might just have the edge.
Now, I'm not saying that the young feller ought not to learn how to play "The Ancient Oaks", "A Sea View" or any of the other technical exercises in his book, he should. I'm hampered by my technical knowledge, I have to think both hard and quickly when transposing, or playing an inverted chord because it's easier to finger than the original, and the blues scale is a complete mystery to me. I am saying, though, that I learned to move quickly from one chord to another when playing easy music with other guitar friends. I'm also saying that technique is a fine thing, but having fun sawing away on the fiddle with other fun-loving musicians, no matter how terrible all of them are, is a finer thing.
So here's my solution. Like all my solutions, it's hare-brained and requires far more influence than I will ever have, but I reckon the Minister for Education, the Minister for Art, and a few high-profile figures in the music industry ought to persuade popular bands and artists to give away the sheet music for one or two of their biggest songs, rearranged if necessary to make them easier to play, like in the key of C, rather than F. Young people don't want to play along with the record, they want to play with their friends. Make the music a free download for schools only, and have music teachers hurl printed copies at their pupils, crying "It's not homework, just have some fun!"
You see, that's what most people learning to play an instrument want - fun. They're not daft, they know they have to practise, but they need a bit of fun, too, preferably with some friends who are about as good at playing as they are. The middle classes are pretty good at teaching deferred gratification, and my friend's sprog knows full well that he needs to work hard to get ticks for his sums so that he can progress to another good school, then go to Oxbridge so that he can make connections that will eventually mean that he's as rich and influential as his Dad. Nobody, though, seems to have explained that learning how to play "A Stormy Sky" is not an end in itself - because they're not raising him to be first violin in some orchestra, and they're certainly not raising him to be a fiddle-player. Therefore, while the little lad likes the idea of making music, he can't see the point of it unless he can make the music he wants to, and currently, he'll settle for scratching out the melody of a Lady Gaga tune. Or "The Hiring Fair". That, though, is not on offer.
I don't know if any of you have ever been backstage after a Fairport Convention gig and seen Ric talking to a young person who is learning to play the violin, and whose parents have brought their half-size fiddle along? You should, because Ric will get them to play him something from whatever music book they're learning from. Then he'll say "Can I join in?" and play along with them – as slowly as they need him to. Wow, they're playing with Ric out of Fairport! The best is yet to come, though. Ric will ask them to play again. This time, though, he'll weave some quiet counter-melody under what the tiny fiddler is playing and that's when The Penny Drops. It's no longer a child playing with Ric out of FC. It's two fiddle players together, and it's better than great, it's fun, it's us enjoying making music together.
When they're done, Ric will sign the music book with "From one violinist to another." He'll also say how much he wants to play with them again, next time FC are in town, so they'd better carry on learning, and you know what? I bet they do.
I might still be playing the piano if someone had shown me how to bash out some basic boogie-woogie when I was younger, or shown me how to play "Get It On" (T Rex, younger readers.) They didn't though, and probably for the same reason that my young friend's music teacher doesn't scribble down the notes to Lady Gaga. It's because it's "easy", because it's "not the direction we're trying to go in", because "it won't stretch him". Possibly all true, but it will be fun, and he'll probably practise like mad so that he can play it at the right speed with no bum notes. He'll also realise why he has to learn the technical stuff, and suffer mastering "The Lonely Forest" as a step on the way to playing the fiddle solo in "The Hiring Fair". (Assuming his parents will buy him a violin pickup, an amp and an Echoplex, of course.)
Talk to a top violinist who has just played, say, "Air On The G-String", though, and s/he'll confirm that playing it at the right speed with no bum notes is pretty much what they try to achieve.
If you've read this far, folks, hand it to every music teacher and Cabinet Minister you know. With luck, by Christmas, young people who are learning to play violins, pianos, flutes, recorders, guitars, sousaphones and who knows what else will hear their teacher say "Well, 'Goblins' Dance' is coming on very well, so why don't we have a bit of a blast through 'Poker Face'?" If nothing else, it'll please my young friend enormously.
He's a little too young, and his parents are too good friends, for me to mention the other reason for learning how to play the violin well, though - that being, if he gets good enough to play "Air On The G-String" really well, in a few years time, he might get the chance to take Lady Gaga's off.
After a couple of tunes, he had a word with the barman, and was given permission to carry on, seeing as he clearly knew what he was doing and he didn’t cost anything. Now, we were astonished, as he'd never given any indication of musical talent before. Mike played lots of well-known songs, and he had that gift of turning the end of one song into the start of another. At one point, I asked him if he knew any Gershwin, and he played "Rhapsody In Blue". From memory. Gaw.
Now, Mike was a bearded single geek, but that night he became Mr Cool, and was something of a hit with the women in the bar. He judged his moment right, when there was a lot of singing along happening, and went into a medley of Barry Manilow tunes. He finished playing, whispered something in a very attractive woman's ear, and they left the bar together. Such is the power of knowing how to play an instrument well.
I was reminded of this when visiting a couple of friends last weekend who are much higher up the social scale than I am. Put it this way, they used to have Charles and Diana round for dinner, and they now have Charles and Camilla round from time to time. ("It's not as much fun, though", mutters the husband.) Their youngest is learning to play the violin, so I asked him how it was going. "OK..." he said... but he can't play what he'd really like to play, which is Lady Gaga. (He also mentioned other beat combos, but they were as a foreign language to me.) I told him that I knew a violin player that he might like, and pulled up YouTube on their computer. "The Hiring Fair" seemed to be as good an introduction to the work of Ric Sanders as anything else I could find easily, and so it proved.
Now he wants to know how to play "The Hiring Fair", of course. He also wants to know how to play like Dave Swarbrick, Seth Lakeman and Phil Beer. Tempted though I was to respond with the old chestnut, "You gotta practice, kid", I had a look at the music he was learning instead. Friends, my heart sank. Where I'd hoped to find a merry sea shanty, a jig or a reel, there were only dry pieces, clearly composed for easy violin with all the compositions biased toward improving technique rather than entertaining the ear. Indeed, I was surprised not to find "Fairy Bells", so beloved of Molesworth Jr.
What was missing from that book of music was anything recognisable, anything contemporary, and, most importantly, anything that the new violinist could have fun with. And that, my friends, is not only truly wrong, it helps to explain why most people can't play an instrument, yet many have tried.
I took Music at school, and absorbed enough dry academic stuff to gain an O-Level in the subject. I didn't care much for Music, but it was easy enough. I also learned to play the piano for a couple of years. Again, I didn't care for it. And yet, when I was 14, a guitar-playing pal showed me the sheet music for the current chart-topper, "American Pie". (A pedant writes - "Actually, it only ever made No 2 in the charts. Nilsson's "Without You" held it off.") What the sheet music had was boxes to show you where to put your fingers. As I was mad keen on "American Pie", I bought a copy of the music, borrowed a guitar, and learned to play the song in two weeks.
I can still play the piano, in the same way that a walrus can operate a chainsaw. I can play the guitar quite a lot better, though, and it's a skill that's never left me. I learned a lot about playing the guitar through mixing with other guitar players, who'd pass on tips and tricks. I'm no professional, but I get a lot of pleasure from playing my guitar. What's more, I always have, even when I was clunking my way through "American Pie" with many buzzing strings and long pauses before chord changes.
There, then, is the driver for learning my instrument - pleasure. A driver that is missing from my young friend's life, and one that I fear will continue to be missing unless and until Lady Gaga pops into his dorm with some musical instruction. I'd say the same of Ric, Dave or Seth, but honestly, I think Lady Gaga might just have the edge.
Now, I'm not saying that the young feller ought not to learn how to play "The Ancient Oaks", "A Sea View" or any of the other technical exercises in his book, he should. I'm hampered by my technical knowledge, I have to think both hard and quickly when transposing, or playing an inverted chord because it's easier to finger than the original, and the blues scale is a complete mystery to me. I am saying, though, that I learned to move quickly from one chord to another when playing easy music with other guitar friends. I'm also saying that technique is a fine thing, but having fun sawing away on the fiddle with other fun-loving musicians, no matter how terrible all of them are, is a finer thing.
So here's my solution. Like all my solutions, it's hare-brained and requires far more influence than I will ever have, but I reckon the Minister for Education, the Minister for Art, and a few high-profile figures in the music industry ought to persuade popular bands and artists to give away the sheet music for one or two of their biggest songs, rearranged if necessary to make them easier to play, like in the key of C, rather than F. Young people don't want to play along with the record, they want to play with their friends. Make the music a free download for schools only, and have music teachers hurl printed copies at their pupils, crying "It's not homework, just have some fun!"
You see, that's what most people learning to play an instrument want - fun. They're not daft, they know they have to practise, but they need a bit of fun, too, preferably with some friends who are about as good at playing as they are. The middle classes are pretty good at teaching deferred gratification, and my friend's sprog knows full well that he needs to work hard to get ticks for his sums so that he can progress to another good school, then go to Oxbridge so that he can make connections that will eventually mean that he's as rich and influential as his Dad. Nobody, though, seems to have explained that learning how to play "A Stormy Sky" is not an end in itself - because they're not raising him to be first violin in some orchestra, and they're certainly not raising him to be a fiddle-player. Therefore, while the little lad likes the idea of making music, he can't see the point of it unless he can make the music he wants to, and currently, he'll settle for scratching out the melody of a Lady Gaga tune. Or "The Hiring Fair". That, though, is not on offer.
I don't know if any of you have ever been backstage after a Fairport Convention gig and seen Ric talking to a young person who is learning to play the violin, and whose parents have brought their half-size fiddle along? You should, because Ric will get them to play him something from whatever music book they're learning from. Then he'll say "Can I join in?" and play along with them – as slowly as they need him to. Wow, they're playing with Ric out of Fairport! The best is yet to come, though. Ric will ask them to play again. This time, though, he'll weave some quiet counter-melody under what the tiny fiddler is playing and that's when The Penny Drops. It's no longer a child playing with Ric out of FC. It's two fiddle players together, and it's better than great, it's fun, it's us enjoying making music together.
When they're done, Ric will sign the music book with "From one violinist to another." He'll also say how much he wants to play with them again, next time FC are in town, so they'd better carry on learning, and you know what? I bet they do.
I might still be playing the piano if someone had shown me how to bash out some basic boogie-woogie when I was younger, or shown me how to play "Get It On" (T Rex, younger readers.) They didn't though, and probably for the same reason that my young friend's music teacher doesn't scribble down the notes to Lady Gaga. It's because it's "easy", because it's "not the direction we're trying to go in", because "it won't stretch him". Possibly all true, but it will be fun, and he'll probably practise like mad so that he can play it at the right speed with no bum notes. He'll also realise why he has to learn the technical stuff, and suffer mastering "The Lonely Forest" as a step on the way to playing the fiddle solo in "The Hiring Fair". (Assuming his parents will buy him a violin pickup, an amp and an Echoplex, of course.)
Talk to a top violinist who has just played, say, "Air On The G-String", though, and s/he'll confirm that playing it at the right speed with no bum notes is pretty much what they try to achieve.
If you've read this far, folks, hand it to every music teacher and Cabinet Minister you know. With luck, by Christmas, young people who are learning to play violins, pianos, flutes, recorders, guitars, sousaphones and who knows what else will hear their teacher say "Well, 'Goblins' Dance' is coming on very well, so why don't we have a bit of a blast through 'Poker Face'?" If nothing else, it'll please my young friend enormously.
He's a little too young, and his parents are too good friends, for me to mention the other reason for learning how to play the violin well, though - that being, if he gets good enough to play "Air On The G-String" really well, in a few years time, he might get the chance to take Lady Gaga's off.
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