Any Suzuki Method former scholars out there?

[;ivlunsdystf]

Am I the only Suzuki Method trainee around here? For those who don't know, it's a method of music teaching to little tiny kids; it's all based on ear training and repetition with very little concern about reading music. Usually the kid starts on violin and then migrates to some other axe. It's very popular in Japan but still pretty common in the US too.

Thanks to early exposure to Suzuki method I can easily pick out the chords from any song without even thinking. I kind of suck at reading music, but everything else about hearing and playing music is pretty effortless.

Any other Suzuki kids out there?

[JeffStrong]

Yep, I did violin Suzuki for three years. My sight reading could be a lot better, but my ears are top notch. I still hear those pieces now that I played nearly twenty years ago and could probably still pick up the violin and play them from memory. It's pretty amazing.

[marqueemoon]

Yep. I started playing violin when I was 3 1/2 and gave it up when I was 17. That ear training always stays with you. I can't say the same for the discipline.

[wrenhunter]

I used the Mooney Suzuki method, i.e. screaming & clanging. Now look at me.

[Noah]

i guess my niece is going to be getting Suzuki lessons for her 3rd birthday. it can't hurt to have music in your life, i say.

[inverseroom]

My son's been doing it for about a year. It's stressful for him, but he's really learning how to concentrate and listen. Ultimately I think it'll be useful, though it's not for everyone. It is VERY RIGID, and a good musician has to learn someday how to compartmentalize it and put it in a more fluid context.

Interesting question....

[marqueemoon]

My son's been doing it for about a year. It's stressful for him, but he's really learning how to concentrate and listen. Ultimately I think it'll be useful, though it's not for everyone. It is VERY RIGID, and a good musician has to learn someday how to compartmentalize it and put it in a more fluid context.

Interesting question....

Yes. It's really fucking rigid. I have to admit I resent my parents more than a little for making me go through it. There is no question in my mind that it made me a much better musician than I would have been without it, but it took me a long time to get to the point where I could enjoy playing music on my own terms.

[seeabove]

HA! I've repressed years of Suzuki on the piano and all the memories are flooding back to me!

Yeah, my brothers and I hated the rigidity and it drove me from the piano. However, it really did teach us concentration and how to trust our ears and we all rebeled by playing non-repetitive and free-form songs (and picking up the guitar).

I swear to god one of the requirements of my teacher was to play "See my little fingers jump jump" 10,000 times on the piano to move on to level 2. I even got a t-shirt. That SUCKS when you're 8.

[CKD]

I remember listening to those LPs with the little red designs on them while I went to sleep...every...single...night. I think it drove me crazy after a while. Around 3rd grade I said I'd had enough with piano and asked to start playing guitar. Dad made me take classical guitar...looking back I can see he was trying to keep me from being the burnout rocker I was destined to be.

Suzuki taught me to play anything by ear, but I never learned to read music properly. So if you don't follow through on it, it turns you into a bit of a misfit. I remember all those guitar lessons, I'd pretend to be reading the music, but really I just watched the teacher and copied him, memorized it, and pretended to look at the page. So I have great technique, but ask me to play a scale or improvise and I'm helpless.

Weird memories...

[Shawn Simmons]

I played violin with the Suzuki Method from age 7 to around 11 or 12. The ear training was great but goddamn, to this day I can't listen to "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star". I played that song sooo much it drives me crazy. Luckily, at age 12, I promptly told my parents that I was quiting violin and going to take up the electric guitar. The even crazier thing is they said "ok".

shawn

[flatcat]

I was a Suzuki violin student.

I started in 1965, when I was four years old. My second teacher, who was my teacher for a long time, was Anastasia Jempelis, who I think is now 'revered' as one of the Founders - that is, one of the original half-dozen Suzuki teachers in the United States.

There was a big Suzuki convention in my home town when I was really young, so I actually saw Dr Suzuki up close.

That I remember, actually, the proper name for the Suzuki method is Talent Education. At least it was when I was a kid.

I will always be grateful to my parents for letting me take lessons, and making me stay with it. I played violin into college, really finally stopping seriously when I was in my early 20s.

Eventually I moved off the Suzuki program and into regular private lessons. I was never that good of a reader, but I improved some with diligence. What I couldn't read, I faked. Ah, I was a teenager.

But the ear training...man, that has been a very big part of my musical life and what little success I have is due largely to my one good ear and the training I got from Suzuki's method.

[bigtoe]

yep 3 1/2 at piano and violin. i see those method books with the circles on em and i start weeping involuntarily.
Mike

[inverseroom]

Yes. It's really fucking rigid. I have to admit I resent my parents more than a little for making me go through it.

Well, the cycle of resentment continues!

The weird thing is that our son doesn't ask to quit. He'd be allowed to if he did, and he could certainly take up something else, in a household containing eight guitars and seven synthesizers. We've even said, "Do you want to give it up?" But he doesn't--yet. My family was here a few days ago, and for the first time ever he whipped out his violin without being asked and played it for them. And his little brother was so jealous he cried. It's interesting--there is definitely a connection here between the way he's learning music and the way he's developing emotionally and psychologically--I think, on balance, it's good for him, and he knows it.

Though that doesn't make it easier when the girl who could only drool on her bow three weeks ago can now play "Perpetual Motion" while our son looks on in horror...always a heirarchy, always a contest, which is not, in my opinion, a healthy way to look at music. So, we'll see...

[NewAndImprov]

Yes. It's really fucking rigid. I have to admit I resent my parents more than a little for making me go through it.

Well, the cycle of resentment continues!

The weird thing is that our son doesn't ask to quit. He'd be allowed to if he did, and he could certainly take up something else, in a household containing eight guitars and seven synthesizers. We've even said, "Do you want to give it up?" But he doesn't--yet. My family was here a few days ago, and for the first time ever he whipped out his violin without being asked and played it for them. And his little brother was so jealous he cried. It's interesting--there is definitely a connection here between the way he's learning music and the way he's developing emotionally and psychologically--I think, on balance, it's good for him, and he knows it.

I didn't do the Suzuki Method, but I did take piano lessons continuosly from first grade on. I wanted to quit any number of times, but I'm really glad my parents made me stick to it. By the time I realized that being a musician could be cool and impress girls, I actually had the skills to appear semi-competent.