Music adds years to your life and life to your years.
Dr le Roy B. Campbell
One of the most difficult problems set to the young teacher is that of how to teach those who have arrived at years of discretion without having acquired any considerable amount of musical knowledge, or without having had their musical faculties developed to any serious extent. Especially is this so with that large class who desire to obtain a certain ability with regard to an instrument. It is a problem that is rarely grappled with successfully.
Most teachers are too ready to treat their adult pupils in the same way as they treat children, adhering to a system of which the chief aim is to make the child think for himself. This is still necessary, to a certain degree: for the man or woman whose education in any certain direction has been neglected has to learn how to direct his or her thoughts towards the particular object desired. But this is entirely different in actual practice from that of arousing the powers of definite thought which is necessary with the child.
The other common mistake is made by those who realize that the reasoning powers of adults, though possibly not so acute as those of children, are greater and more highly developed, and who therefore content themselves with talking in an informal way about elementary technique, or in giving stiff and scholarly lectures with little rational and or practical explanation of the way to overcome the peculiar difficulties which beset each individual. They forget that, in spite of the common saying that men and women are only children grown older, radical changes take place in our innermost beings during adolescence, and that it is only in very few respects that the child and the adult have anything in common. It is for these reasons, probably, that there are so few formal systems invented for the teaching of music to adults. Yet systematic teaching is more rather than less necessary for the adult than for the child.
The great difficulty which affects all pupils whose studies have been deferred until later years is the fixed trend of thought and habit into which they have fallen. This varies very largely with individuals, according, not only to their personal temperaments and habits and their previous knowledge or lack of it, but also to their immediate and present surroundings. No opportunity should be missed of bringing into account whatever advantages the pupil may have in the way of association with those who have a wider knowledge or more practical ability, or who endeavouring to overcome the same difficulties. Parents may be aided by the interest they take in their children’s musical education, and older members of families by their interest in that of the younger members. Emulation of a right kind may be engendered between adults just as between children; and pupils of a similar capacity, or at approximately the same stage of tuition, may be brought into contact one with another for this purpose, as well as for the encouragement of mutual sympathy and even for direct assistance. The terrible plague of shyness which attacks most adult students is a factor which has to be reckoned with in this connection, and must never be ignored. It must be overcome by gentle and tactful measures, for force tends to increase rather than decrease it.
At the same time, the readiness with which junior grasp certain points which their seniors entirely fail to see may be very discouraging to the latter. Anything in the way of comparison which may be in the slightest degree disparaging to the senior should be avoided. Serious discouragement, even for the moment, is almost certain to be fatal to the teacher’s success with adult pupils.
Wrong ideas as to both the quality and the character of music and the physical conditions of its interpretation are common, particularly among those who have some little previous knowledge or ability. Many of this class are self-taught, or taught by persons who themselves have little knowledge of their subject, so that their methods of thought and practise are frequently based on wrong premises. Obtained in childhood, and uncorrected till manhood, these ideas are often very deeply rooted; and it requires all the teacher’s tact and sympathy, as well as a great deal of careful study, to eradicate them without causing unnecessary mental pain to the pupil. The new ideas must be planted sometimes merely by hints and suggestions, sometimes by plain speaking and by contrasting actual work as produced by the wrong and the right methods.
It must always be developed in such a way that the old may be displaced little by little, never suddenly, and if possible in such a way that the pupil in whose mind the change is being effected may be scarcely conscious of the process. This can be done very largely by the way in which the pupil’s music is chosen and introduced to notice. As far as possible it is wise to let the pupil have a certain choice, making only such restrictions as will prevent any detriment to artistic progress.
Physical difficulties are of much the same character as mental ones. They arise from the fact that the body as well as the mind has reached its full development. Each individual is affected by his or her peculiar physical conditions and circumstances, as well as by mental and psychological ones. These conditions and the attendant difficulties and requirements are consequently more varied with adults than with children. The woman who has a large amount of rough housework will have difficulties which are not only greater than those which affect her sister of more leisure and lighter labour, but which are also entirely difficult. Similarly, the blacksmith will have to restore the functions of muscles which have been cramped and stiffened by years of neglect, but which the man engaged in clerical work is exercising daily. And the person who for any reason indulged largely in general reading will have facilities and difficulties widely separated from those of the one who reads but little, or whose reading is of a highly specialized character.
One of two objects is usually sought by adult pupils. Either it is desired to increase and extend their social usefulness, or else the object is to acquire just sufficient knowledge to assist others – most frequently children or younger brothers and sisters – in their studies. Neither of these objects is an unworthy one, and in almost every respect pupils coming with either of them may be useful in various ways, professional and personal, to the teacher. It is by no means derogatory to artistic purposes to comply with a request for sufficient lessons to enable a pupil to play simple morceaux de salon, or accompaniments to children’s songs. Such desires may be turned to good purpose, if only the teacher apply to the work good sense and tact, as well as earnestness and artistic feeling.
These qualities are among the most important required for the teaching of adults; others being a strong, but not aggressive, originality, a ready perception of the characteristics and idiosyncrasies of each pupil, and a flexible system which adapts itself to the unbending and widely divergent difficulties which meet the late beginner. Without these, the teacher’s attention is best confined to children, leaving the care of their older relatives to those who more amply blest.
