Why do we review old pieces? Didn't we learn them already?!

"Build ability with a piece you can play."
Dr. Suzuki

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Dr. Suzuki was known for stating the above quote often because we don't develop knowledge and skills simply through learning new pieces. Yes, it is true we do learn new things in the new pieces but it is through playing the old pieces that we refine, deeply learn and build ability. The parallels to language learning are very evident - only through constant repetition of language do you become fluent. Music is no different. 

Many students (and parents and myself) are excited to learn the next piece in the Suzuki repertoire, especially once the current piece is 'learned'. But, the goal of practice isn't to improve or learn new things. Instead, the goal of practice and, more specifically, the aspect of practice we call review, is to make things easier. In fact, most of our time should be spent on review rather than the current piece. Here's why. 

To make it easy. Playing the correct notes and rhythms isn't enough. The goal of review - and learning any piece for that matter - is to achieve ease of playing. Ease of playing translates to skills that are easily executed and performed automatically. Ease of playing only comes from doing things over and over and over again. Riding a bicycle doesn't become easy after one or two rides. Only after riding a lot does it get easier. New skills are effortful and we want them to be effortless. Improvement is then a side effect of this ease which is only achieved through many repetitions.  

To keep it easy. Practicing an instrument is similar to running or any type of workout. You can't expect to be able to run a marathon if you haven't been running regularly, even if you completed one in the past. Running doesn't come easily unless you do it regularly. Same with playing a musical instrument. Perpetual Motion won't be easy and remain easy unless it is played often and regularly.

Ease promotes flexibility. When you know something very well, your flexibility with that skill increases. When flexibility increases, you can transfer that skill to new domains without struggle. You can also further refine that skill because the basic components of that skill are no longer challenging. 

Comfort. Comfort is important because we don't want to push the limit every time we play the instrument. Otherwise, all we do is reinforce the limit instead of reinforcing ease. Cello playing is supposed to be comfortable and easy. The goal isn't to be overwhelmed with difficult skills but to be comfortable with those skills. 

Previews. Very often, I use review pieces to work on a specific technique, especially if it's a new technique or skill. It's often too challenging to introduce a new technique in it's exact context so I often preview that technique with a review piece to make it easier. For example, when I teach extensions, which students first encounter in Book 2 in Minuet No. 3, I teach students how to play Aunt Rhody Goes to Arabia. The skill in Minuet No. 3 is just too difficult and students get bogged down with too many things. Go Tell Aunt Rhody is super easy by Book 2. In reality, it's super easy by the middle of Book 1. Adding an extension, while a challenge, isn't as difficult as the real deal in Minuet No. 3. To make extensions even easier, I teach Aunt Rhody Goes to Arabia in Book 1. Why not? Then when students encounter extensions in Minuet No. 3, it's not a big deal.

Upgrade! Review pieces are also great to upgrading a skill, particularly sound and tone. Trying to improve tone in a new piece likely isn't going to happen. Again, there's just too much going on and students cannot attend to their sound when they are occupied with a number of other skills. However, if you take French Folk Song with the intent to improve tone quality and depth, no problem. Students can play French Folk Song with relative ease and quite effortlessly. Students can attend to their sound quality because they are no longer intensely attending to challenging skills. Their focus and attention can be place almost entirely on the sound they are producing. Only then can we truly make lasting changes in the tone quality, or whatever skill is being addressed. 

Deep learning. When a skill is deeply learned, it is more easily transferred to other similar situations. For example, we spend a lot of time on the staccato bow stroke in Song of the Wind. That skill has been introduced earlier, in fact, in Twinkle but Song of the Wind presents a further refinement of that skill. However, Song of the Wind is certainly not the last time we will use a staccato bow stroke. It comes back in every single Suzuki book and is present in so much of the music out there, whether it be orchestra music, chamber music or solo literature. We review the old pieces to continue to review and refine the skills learned. Those skills then transfer to other domains on the instrument therefore making new skills easier to learn. When a student sees a staccato mark on the page, they can immediately produce the staccato bow stroke with little to no effort because it has been ingrained into their skill repertoire. 

Making Music. All of these things facilitate making music. Every child, every person has something to express musically. But musically expressive playing is achieved by ease of playing which comes from consistent review. Music isn't just playing the notes on the page. Music is so much more - dynamics, inflection, musicality, interpretation. These things can't be achieved when the notes or skills are a struggle. Only after everything is easy can we add the nuances that make music truly beautiful to listen to and enjoyable to play. 

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You are never done with Twinkle. I am not done with Twinkle even though I've played and performed it thousands of times. Many of my students have heard this story: in 2012, I went to Chicago to take the Suzuki Cello Book 1 training course for the second time with Dr. Tanya Carey. First, I already have my Book 1 training - I completed it in 2006. But I thought I could use a refresher and review my Book 1 teaching. Even I am reviewing by re-taking the Suzuki courses. Part of every Suzuki course is demonstrating the ability to play through the entire book from memory. We had a separate Twinkle test in which everyone in the class had to perform Twinkle and all the variations in front of the class. In addition to playing through all the Twinkles, we each had a short lesson on Twinkle and things to improve on. Now think about this, here is a class of professional cellists, all of whom have degrees and years and years of experience playing, performing and teaching the cello. These are fantastic, accomplished musicians some of whom were Suzuki kids themselves. Yet Dr. Carey found things in all of our Twinkles that needed improvement. Things like posture, position, tone, bow hold, etc. Things we discuss often in the lessons with students. Even this group of professional cellists wasn't 'done' with Twinkle because there were aspects of our playing that needed improvement and refinement! 

Every great performing musician is playing a review piece. Sure, they add a new piece or a few new pieces every concert season but the bulk of their repertoire are pieces they've been playing and performing for years. Yo-Yo Ma has been performing some pieces for over 40 years. 

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As you go forward with your review routine, keep one important thing in mind. Review with a purpose. Review without focus or a goal in mind often results in sloppy playing. Consistently sloppy playing reinforces sloppy playing. And no one wants to listen to sloppy playing. Practice with a goal in mind. If you don't have a specific goal, simply make it "play French Folk Song beautifully" or play Chorus from Judas Maccabaeus with a beautiful, sustained sound. Adding focus to review pieces gives them a purpose and reinforces all the skills we are trying to make easy, effortless and automatic. 

Happy reviewing!

Why the Suzuki Method works, why I love it and it's benefits

Why the Suzuki Method works

In my opinion, one way is because the method is based on the simple language learning premise. All children, Dr. Suzuki observed, learn to speak their native language with ease. This happens through constant repetition combined with constant immersion in the language, encouragement and reinforcement. This makes so much sense to me - music is a language so why not teach it similarly to the way we learn our native language? I believe it's a brilliant premise and has been proven successful for decades since the founding of the method. 

Also, the Suzuki Method is a highly organized, methodical and thoughtful approach to learning an instrument. The repertoire is sequentially presented and begins with developing, solidifying and refining the foundation skills needed for students to be successful long-term. Then the method builds on those skills as the repertoire progresses. The Twinkles take so long to get through because there are so many skills that need to be learned and automatized before moving on. Twinkle IS the foundation of the student's cello playing. From there, skills are layered on top of those that are already solid. Much like building a house, you don't want to start on weak foundation or everything will come crashing down sooner or later.

Also, the Suzuki Method de-emphasizes the notion that children need to be "talented" or show promise in musical ability or aptitude.  Not only is every child is capable of learning a musical instrument but every child also has the capacity to truly excel at learning a musical instrument. Ability is learned, not innate. 

There has been much research on the topic of developing ability and is most commonly known as the 10,000 Hours of Practice or the 10,000 Hour Rule. Granted, my goal isn't to make master cellists and there are many other facets needed to achieve excellence in any field but the point is: practice and repetition of skills, not natural talent, yields progress, improvement and ability. 

Parent involvement has been shown in a number of studies in general education to be extraordinarily beneficial for students. The same goes for music. Parent involvement is a big component in the Suzuki Method because it works. Parents are the home teacher and act as a second set of eyes to help guide the student through the practice. The parent knows what to fix, how to fix it and deeply understands the music learning process at any given level. Also, the time spent in lessons and in home practice is arguably some of the highest quality time spent between parent and child. Though there may be many tense moments, the teamwork between parent and child is beautiful and creates a stronger bond and relationship. I am in awe whenever I see that teamwork unfold in the lessons and get to witness first hand what parent and child can do together.

Students taking Suzuki lessons learn to sing and play beautiful music from the beginning. Additionally, surrounding the student in beautiful music, immersing them in the qualities that move us and constantly honing the ability to recreate those qualities reinforces creating beautiful music. The lessons aren't focused solely on building technique and skills with scales and etudes. That isn't to say students do not do scales, etudes and all the wonderful technique builders, but the focus is never solely on those aspects. The focus is always on playing beautiful music with a beautiful sound all developed from within the child and nurtured from an early age.

Why I love it

I love it because it’s an organized, sequential method that still leaves a lot of room to do supplemental pieces or technique. It's a structured yet flexible approach. But the emphasis is never taken away from learning to play beautifully. 

The Suzuki Method offers students a unique experience from the very start: social interaction with their peers in a musical setting. Some of my favorite moments throughout my years of playing the cello are being with friends in an rehearsal or getting together and playing music before dinner. Additionally, students learn from this social interaction; they learn by observing other children learn, just like they learn language from their parents as babies. 

Also, the principle of repetition falls perfectly in-line with behavioral psychology. Learning and repetition of a skill until it is automatic changes the brain physiology so I am literally changing your child’s brain, which I think is so cool! 

Lastly, Suzuki isn't all about teaching your child how to play the cello. It's about teaching your child. Suzuki has given me the amazing and wonderful opportunity to work with your children, struggle with them and watch them grow into amazing little human beings. Margaret Rowell, a well-known cello pedagogue, was known for saying “I don’t teach the cello because the cello can’t learn! I teach the human being.” She taught not just cello technique but also encouraged her students to be vibrant, interesting and engaged people. I love being able to teach the instrument and the required skills needed to play it, but more importantly, I relish in being able to teach skills necessary for lifetime of learning. The benefits of the Suzuki Method are extraordinary. Which leads me to...

The benefits

Hard work, Character and Grit. 

Arguably, students can gain this from many other domains, such as sports or other arts. But it is amazing to struggle with a student and work together with the parent on 'getting' something - a skill, a musical phrase, a concept - and then see it just click. The epiphany, the relief and the joy is such a rewarding experience not only for the student, but also the parent and myself. The lessons learned from pushing through and working hard even when discouraged are priceless. Developed from that is an aspect of character called grit, or the ability to sustain interest in and effort toward goals, especially those that are long-term. Additionally, there is a fair amount of research on grit and how it is a better predictor academic performance than IQ scores, which again further strengthens Suzuki's character development philosophy.  

Self-Discipline & Self- Motivation

Related to grit is the self-discipline and self-motivation students develop as a result of this long-term process. It's a beautiful moment when I get to see a child motivated to fix a problem and the self-discipline and perseverance to keep at it and see it through. This discipline and motivation doesn't come naturally immediately. Just like we are developing ability through regular lessons, we are also developing these aspects of character throughout the whole process.

Focus

Learning to play a musical instrument is no easy feat. I'm asking your child to do an incredibly difficult thing. The attention span and focus needed for learning an instrument is enormous. In addition, there are a number of different ways I'm asking your child to focus. Performing for an audience requires a different kind of focus than getting that darn first finger in place 7 times in a row. Not only does your child learn how to intensely attend to one task for varying amounts of time, your child also learns how to focus in a variety of different capacities. 

Most importantly, learning an instrument requires both quality focus and full, deliberate attention. Daniel Goleman, an influential psychologist, writes that "paying full attention seems to boost the mind’s processing speed, strengthen synaptic connections, and expand or create neural networks for what we are practicing. At least at first. But as you master how to execute the new routine, repeated practice transfers control of that skill from the top-down system for intentional focus to bottom-up circuits that eventually make its execution effortless. At that point you don’t need to think about it - you can do the routine well enough on automatic." 

Focus is needed at first. Intense, deliberate and quality focus. But then it becomes easier, easier and eventually automatic. Just like learning how to hold the bow. No part of holding the bow is natural, but after a period of very deliberate and focused practice, it becomes easier. Down the road, picking up a bow is very easy, natural and automatic.

Expertise & Accomplishment

When most musicians graduate high school, they are experts in their field already. Think about that. How many 18-year-olds go to college already an expert in their field? How many have logged thousands upon thousands of hours of practice, have experienced the professional world first hand and have a lengthy C.V. and list of accomplishments? Not many. But musicians do.

Even children experience this level of expertise from a very young age in Suzuki lessons. By the end of Book 1, your child is an expert at Twinkle. At the end of Book 3, your child sounds no different from the Suzuki recordings of Twinkle - the differences are imperceptible. Every skill at every stage is mastered. 

Related to expertise is the level of accomplishment a student experiences from the completion of a task, whether it's from a successful recital performance, from overcoming a challenge or practicing Go Tell Aunt Rhody 100 times. Students get to witness firsthand the direct relationship between their hard work and their resulting accomplishments.

Problem-solving skills

One very valuable aspect of learning is muddling through problems on your own. Students learn deeper and learning is strengthened by working through problems independently. I structure and facilitate moments in the lessons often for students to work through a problem and try to find a solution while I help guide them in the right direction, mediate frustration and, sometimes, soothe tears. Those often uncomfortable moments are priceless in the grand scheme of learning and life experiences for students. Those moments stick with them for a lifetime. 

I could write much more about all of these above topics. In addition, there is so much great literature about there topics in other domains and multiple domains. I hope to return to many of these topics more in depth at a later time, so stay tuned!