{"id":10893,"date":"2015-05-21T09:20:16","date_gmt":"2015-05-21T15:20:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/?p=10893"},"modified":"2016-04-20T12:42:43","modified_gmt":"2016-04-20T18:42:43","slug":"what-does-it-take-to-have-music-like-that-in-my-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/2015\/05\/what-does-it-take-to-have-music-like-that-in-my-home\/","title":{"rendered":"What does it take to have music like that in my home?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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We bought this piano in February 2007.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Daniel and Paige played piano in public this week. Someone\u00a0leaned over to me and asked what it takes to have kids play music like that in my home.<\/p>\n

I deferred to Paige to tell the woman\u00a0how long she’s studied piano, and\u00a0I started thinking about “what it took” to get where we are now. My mind kept going back to the financial aspect of it as I drove away from the event in my 16-year-old van (which I love). Every month, instead of a car payment, we pay a\u00a0piano teacher. Can a person learn to play piano with a less expensive teacher? Of course! But we wanted the opportunities a professional teacher could offer. We invested in a grand piano in 2007. The kids love\u00a0this instrument and it is fun to play. This helps them want to practice. Can a person learn to play beautifully on an upright piano? Of course! For our family, having this piano in a music room\u00a0has been a symbol of our commitment to music and this commitment has become part of our family culture. As for incentives for practicing, we don’t allow media\u00a0time until the kids have practiced.\u00a0That’s been a great motivator for the boys.<\/p>\n

Besides the financial investment, there is an investment of time. By no means do I resent the money and time we\u00a0have spent, but I started calculating\u00a0how much time we have given for music study. Richard taught Paige for two years. I spend one afternoon a week shuttling kids to and from piano lessons. I’ve done that for 10 years. On piano lesson days, I don’t try\u00a0to do anything that requires focused attention. I’ll fold laundry between lessons or do little projects around the house, but then it’s time to get in the car again. I have no idea how many hours I’ve spent driving. Piano lessons always go over time, so I wait. Waiting 20-30 minutes a week for 10 years means that I’ve spent over 200\u00a0hours sitting in the\u00a0van waiting for the kids to finish piano lessons. Who knows how many hours I’ve spent waiting at ensemble rehearsals, judging events, and recitals. I read while I wait, so it’s nice. And then there is the time that I am home, monitoring practice, or making sure that it happens. I’m grateful that I am home to do this. Is our method the only way to produce great musicians? No! But every\u00a0hour, every dollar, and every sacrifice is\u00a0worth it “to have\u00a0music like that in our\u00a0home.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Daniel and Paige played piano in public this week. Someone\u00a0leaned over to me and asked what it takes to have kids play music like that in my home. I deferred to Paige to tell the woman\u00a0how long she’s studied piano, and\u00a0I started thinking about “what it took” to get where we are now. My mind … Continue reading What does it take to have music like that in my home?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,31,16,20,4,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10893","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventurous-kids","category-angies-memoir-project","category-art","category-life-according-to-angela","category-motherhood","category-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10893"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10893\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10905,"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10893\/revisions\/10905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.angelaross.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}