Why you shouldn't teach your child music

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Five years ago, I picked up a hammer and smashed the piano. Truth. I have never been so happy in my life. And I want to tell you why you shouldn't force children to play music.

Music schools are inexplicably popular with parents, as are dance clubs or art schools. The benefits of dancing can still be found (after all, physical activity), but there is trouble with drawing and music.

Once upon a time, the ability to play an instrument and sketch in albums was a pass to "decent society." Apparently, since then, people are sure that teaching a child to play the cello or trombone is a great way of education.

It's time to rethink this approach.

The main question is why

Parents think that music school will help develop hearing and voice, so you need to enroll your child in classes. Stop.

The first question: are you sure that you need to develop something that does not exist?

An ear for music, a sense of rhythm - all this is acquired over time, but if a child did not have the inclinations, a great musician will not grow out of him. Mozart may have been taught to play almost from infancy. But since then, so many mocked anyone, and Mozart was alone and remained.

Bring your child to the audition, let the teachers tell you if it makes sense to study. Just keep in mind that some teachers are ready to be filled with a nightingale and tell you what a genius kid you have, if only you would give money for classes. So choose a counselor who is not financially interested in your child.

Second question: why does your child need hearing and voice?

Think about where the child will sing besides the reporting concert at the music school. Okay, let's say, will participate in the show and become the winner of Eurovision (although this is a dubious achievement). Where will he play the French horn?

How many people graduated from music school, but did not even become karaoke stars. Their ceiling is to play "Dog Waltz" and three thieves chords if they see the instrument.

And for the sake of this it was necessary to spoil posture and vision every day for several years? Seriously?

There are not so many musicians in demand, their life is not the easiest one. Pulls the child into music - choose instruments that will somehow come in handy in musical groups (they say, with good drummers, tension).

4 unconvincing reasons why your child should be taken to music school

Sometimes parents send their child to a music school without understanding why they are doing it. And they even find amazing explanations for this.

1. The child needs to develop musical taste

It is necessary, but for this it is not necessary to play on something. It is for aesthetic education that listening to music is enough.

The music school is for those who cannot help but play music. Calling, if you like. Taste has nothing to do with it.

2. Do you have some kind of tool

Do not take your child to the music school just because you have a piano or accordion from the old days. Someone has had “Swallows” and “Seagulls” for years, from which they are carefully dusting them once a week. It is impossible to sell them, because no one needs them at all, these are not the works of great masters. And it's a pity to throw it away: here Yulia and Petya will grow up, they will study. Yulia and Petya, of course, are not asked.

Don't mock your kids because you don't have the heart to throw the trash away.

3. You have to be the right parent

The music school is still considered a sign of "correct" all-round development.

This trend has already got tired of the order: if you do not take your child to the music school, to dances, then to English and draw, then you are a bad parent, you are lazy.

The fact that a real parent himself can tell a lot, and will not push the child to the teachers, is diligently ignored. Just as diligently as the fact that a good parent listens to the child's wishes and not to the mass hysteria about early development.

4. You dreamed of going to music school

This is already trite, and everyone knows about it, therefore, in short: if you dreamed about something, but you did not grow together, do not force the child to live your fictitious life. Otherwise, your child will also dream, but in vain: there will be no time to pursue a dream, the music is waiting.

There is only one reason to bring the child to the music school - he himself wanted it.

What happens if you insist on continuing classes

It also happens: the child was interested in music, but then decided to quit school. It is not surprising: music schools abuse children with classical music, which few people are interested in (let's just not be snobbish). This is necessary to develop the technique, but the teachers do not adapt the main theme from "Game of Thrones" for the fourth grade of the music school. Guitarists have at least tabs that are clogged with the Internet. The rest do not have this either.

I do not argue that sometimes you need to show firmness if a child is going to quit the music school because of a whim, but at the same time he has talent. Sometimes you need to figure out why the classes are boring, and help to move forward: change the teacher, change the repertoire.

But when the problem is precisely the unwillingness to play, then there is no need to push. You can get your child to learn and put a tick in the box "ensured all-round development." Only your child will then live with it.

If a child wants to study, he does not have to be forced. And if you have to forcefully drive him to the instrument, the most unpleasant consequences await you.

• The child will hate music. You can't love out of hand. And if you force a child to play music, most likely after graduation he will happily forget everything that he was taught.
• The child will harbor a grudge against you. Parental tyranny is a shaky foundation for building trust.
• The child will become overgrown with complexes. He will be afraid of the instrument and performances, destroy self-esteem, acquire a neurosis and, in general, a whole bunch of psychological problems that appear in too responsible and sensitive people when doing something other than their own business. This is a difficult case, but it also happens.
• The child will waste time … This is a sparing option, if he has a stable psyche and he knows how to treat such trifles as a music school with philosophical calmness.

Roughly the same can be said about the art school. Someone's drawing skills will come in handy if a child becomes a designer or architect. As a rule, children who want to paint are unstoppable. But if a child drags on with difficulty to the lesson in order to sadly copy the next still life, then the whole result of these efforts will gather dust in the daddy of "Petina's work". Although this time could have been spent on something more useful.

If the child is not interested in anything, let him go in for sports. Modern schoolchildren need movement more than aesthetic education.

Music and art education is not a road for everyone and everyone. It is better to quit an uninteresting business in time and find that circle that will bring at least some benefit, than to finish school and dream of making it to graduation.