I have been a musician my entire life. As a child, I was encouraged by my parents to study music at an early age. Piano lessons were mandatory in my house. By the time I started kindergarten, I had already been in lessons for a year. I was fortunate that music came easily to me, and though I didn't put anywhere near the effort into it that I should have, at least in my early years, I excelled in music. Many people said that I had "natural ability" and, whether or not that was true, music became my passion.
When I entered college, I became a studio music instructor. I thought that it would be as easy to teach music as it always had been when I was learning it. I got my first batch of students and, over the course of just a few months, succeeded in discouraging almost all of them to give up on their music. I was dumbfounded by this. I started asking each of them what their reasons were for wanting to quit and overwhelmingly, the response was that "I wasn't able to make music make sense to them." I further discovered that many of my students, especially my adult students, had decided to study music without any real belief that they could actually learn to play. Several claimed that they had no natural ability whatsoever and that they were simply there because they had always regretted not learning as a child.
After learning this, I gave a lot of thought to what my students were saying. I also recalled how my instructors had worked with me. While I had several music teachers in the course of my life, the one's that helped me the most were the ones that made no assumptions about my abilities. They were the ones who would break music down to the most basic fundamentals and push those until I had really mastered them.
I developed a theory. It wasn't that my students were incapable or that they either possessed or lacked natural ability, but that as an instructor, I had been making assumptions about their ability based on how I had learned music. I discovered that many music teachers did exactly the same thing and, as a result, if the student wasn't capable of learning at a pace or in a fashion that met the expectation of the teacher, it was generally assumed that the fault must lie on the student and they simply lacked the ability to learn.
I decided to test this theory with my own students. When I returned to lessons the following week, I cast aside my own teaching agenda and started trying to understand how my students were approaching their music. Almost universally, I discovered that I was either going too fast through exercises that they didn't fully comprehend or that I was trying to start them at a level that was simply too advanced for them. Once I stopped assuming "the path" they were supposed to take and allowed them to decide on it for themselves, the lessons became informative. They became productive. They became FUN.
In the many years since, I have had more than a hundred students, ranging from young children to elderly adults, and every student I've had who was committed to learning music did so. For some, it did come naturally, for others it was a little more work, but for every student that came through my door, progress was made and musical skills were nurtured and developed.
Over time, I categorized some useful guideposts to help in these musical journeys. They were tools that I knew worked from my own experiences both as a student and as an instructor. Outlined below are several of these tools and I share them here with the hope that other students out there who ARE struggling to learn the basics might find some encouragement here.
1.) Practice Makes Perfect-As obvious as this statement sounds, it is important to understand that playing an instrument is not a process that is learned overnight. Natural ability might make the process go more quickly for some, but regardless of how "talented" you are at an instrument, daily practice will guarantee growth. Also, learning music requires continual exposure to it to get better at it.
2.) Baby Steps-You pick up an electric guitar at the local music store. You bring it home, take it out of its case, and become frustrated when you can't solo like John Mayer. Relax. John Mayer couldn't solo like John Mayer when he started playing. The reality is that overnight success takes years. You will sometimes hear of musicians that just pick up an instrument and take to it without much effort. THEY ARE THE EXCEPTION, NOT THE RULE. Most of the greatest musicians amongst us started off learning to play notes, chords and scales. They stumbled along the way (just like the rest of us) and spent hour after hour honing their skills.
The key here is to start at a level that matches your individual ability and only progress after you've mastered that step. It might be as simple as learning the position of a note on a keyboard, or trying to figure out how to count rhythms in a single lesson. Whatever it is, do not go beyond what you are capable of doing until you are comfortable with where you are at. With time, patience and PRACTICE, you will get better and advance.
3.) Know When To Walk Away-The most common reason that people quit learning music is that they give up on themselves out of frustration. While music can be a source of great joy for those that know how to play it, it can be equally distressing for those that are learning to play it. Many budding musicians will fight their way through an exercise, fumbling badly along the way, and then go back and force themselves through it again and again, all the while growing angrier at the situation. While struggling is not a bad thing, getting angry while doing so is. Anger during practice is not a healthy way to learn. If your practice becomes even mildly frustrating, then it's time to put your instrument away and do something else. Come back to it later when you've had a chance to calm down.
4.) Never Say Can't-I hate the word "can't." It is a one word roadblock that does nothing but cause us to have doubt in our ability to accomplish the task ahead. When you look at an instrument for the first time, it can look completely foreign and terribly daunting. Similarly, when you attempt to read music for the first time, it appears as foreign as a second language-and with good reason, it is! By applying our earlier steps, we can eliminate "can't" from the equation all together.
5.) Set Goals-This is probably one of the most beneficial things you can do for your personal musical career. By knowing what you want to accomplish, you can begin to track your progress towards a foreseeable goal. Too often, students set about learning an instrument without really having any goals in place. It is important to understand what you want to get out of learning an instrument and to make that your goal as you set about learning it. For example, a former guitar student of mine wanted to learn the guitar to play alongside her teenage sons. She picked up the guitar, and we worked for the better part of two years learning all the appropriate technique she would require to be proficient as a guitarist. She now plays regularly with her boys and they enjoy music as a family! By keeping her goal in sight, she worked her way into becoming a very talented guitarist. (On a side note, during her first lesson, she made it very clear that she had "no ability whatsoever." If you could hear her today, you'd just shake your head in disbelief).
6.) Have Fun-Remember that music is not about perfection. It is not meant to be daunting. If done right, music should be something that provide years of pleasure. If you take a little longer to learn it, remember that you are still better than you were yesterday and not as good as you'll be tomorrow. Each day is part of the journey. If you keep these things in mind, you're bound to enjoy yourself a whole lot more.