Saturday 22 December 2007

Good things happen

Good things happen, I know this for a fact, and this week we had some really good news, youngest son, known here sometimes as third son has passed his grade 8 piano exam. Well done, congratulations I hear you say. So do I, I am one proud Mum. So here’s a tale, not about quilting either.
When this son of mine was about 5 years old, he asked if he could learn to play the piano. There were certain things that prevented us from letting him do this, a piano teacher we consulted about the proposition suggested we waited until he learnt a little bit of music while learning the recorder and the financial aspect of not being able to afford a piano with the fact of not having the space to put it. The recorder was successful up to a point but no more. When he was about nine years old his school offered instrument lessons and his best friend was going to take trumpet lessons. Youngest son asked once more, ‘could he have piano lessons’, we again inquired about the possibility and the answer was no, not in school. Youngest son quickly said, ‘OK, so can I have clarinet lessons then’. This quick reply led us to believe that it was a childish whim of wanting to learn any instrument, gave in and the clarinet lessons began. Now although here I should say he was a star and the best thing that had blown a clarinet, I won’t because although he was good, he wasn’t that good. We will move on a few years now to when for want of a better idea for a Christmas present when he was twelve, I suggested an electronic keyboard. This is what Santa brought along in his sleigh that year for our youngest son.
Having this instrument to play was very exciting so when youngest son asked if he could have lessons we agreed and in a very short time we had fixed these up through the school. Everyone was happy, youngest son was playing a keyboard, we didn’t have to buy a piano and he was very happy with the latest Christmas present.
That is until we went to the school for the music parents evening and had our bubble burst. We sat in somewhat stunned silence whilst we were told that the keyboard was certainly the instrument of choice for our son and while he was not a genius he certainly was gifted and the sooner we moved him on to a piano the better as he was wasted on the keyboard. So here we are four short years later with one very large piano in our front room and a son that plays so beautifully it makes you want to cry and the pride that this week he passed his grade 8 piano examination with a Merit Pass.
The add on to this is he has also passed his grade 7 on the clarinet, plays the bass clarinet, the alto saxophone, the baritone saxophone, takes singing lessons and has just made arrangements to start lessons on the church organ in the New Year.
Guess after all he is musical.
I was going to talk tags and quilting here, maybe tomorrow, after all Christmas is a family time.

1 comment:

Fannie said...

Congratulations to your youngest son and your family. Great job! This was an inspirational read. Thanks for sharing.