by Mara Shea

Created on: October 14, 2008   Last Updated: January 30, 2009

After a recital (or what I call a "music party" so as not to scare off the adults) for my fiddle students last year, one of my younger ones came to her next lesson with a very direct question: "How come the adults who played at the recital shake so much?"

"Excellent question," I replied, wondering how to sort out all the answers that came to mind. "I used to hate recitals. I always felt like I was going to throw up before I had to play. I still get nervous getting up in front of people."

"No way. Why?" she asked, spinning around so fast that the violin she was holdiing just missed hitting the edge of the music stand, but her bow connected with it and fell to the floor. "Oops. Sorry. But I like playing in front of people, and I don't get nervous!"

I picked up her violin bow, trying to hide a little smile, and handed it back to her. "I think adults are afraid of making mistakes, especially in front of kids."

"Why?" The shoulder rest attached to her violin slid off and bounced across the floor. "Oops." She looked a little sheepish. "Sorry. My mom always yells at me because I'm clumsy."

I retrieved the shoulder rest and helped her put it back on the fiddle. "It might be because grownups are afraid of criticism, or of failing."

She put the fiddle back under her chin, as if to finally play that A major scale she'd started 10 minutes ago, then changed her mind and swung the violin down and backwards, just missing the bookcase behind her, and peered at her feet for a moment as she wiggled her toes in her flip-flops. Then she stood up straight and looked straight at me, tilting her head to one side. "Well, that's just silly. Adults criticize kids all the time, and kids get used to it. Grownups just have to get over it."

She was nine, and she already had a pretty good idea about how some of the world works.

Truth is, adults are a lot more nervous about trying something new than kids are. They're afraid they'll look stupid, or do it all wrong, or make horrible noises, and get laughed at.

So learning a new instrument, whether it's a fiddle, or a piano, or banjo, or tuba, takes some courage. We all have an inner judge that's constantly telling us how bad we look, how stupid we sound, how we should have done better, how we messed something up, how we're going to mess something up. When you learn a new instrument, the first rule is to firmly check that inner judge at the door. You're going to learn to play an instrument for fun, and nobody was born knowing how to play that thing. We all have to walk the same path.

Of course, there are always people who skip along that path at a high rate of speed, and some who amble. As one of my music teachers told me a long time ago, "There's always someone who plays better than you out there. Don't let that stop you."

And the funny thing is, a lot of those better players make mistakes, too.

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