My friend Ms. M. who lives on the warm side of San Francisco told me she had a bird visiting her yard a few days ago, and she remembered two different songs it was singing and whistled them for me. I told her it had to be a mockingbird. I think at this time of the year they try to be mistaken for nightingales and almost succeed except when they change their tune.
Dona Nobis Pacem, followed by "Sing for your supper and you'll get breakfast, songbirds never starve."
But don't forget that the early worm gets eaten by the early bird!
Like you said more classical dudes defect to rock than vice versa. There is room for both. Sometimes progressive jazz is pure classical improv. I keep citing Tyner and Jarrett who everyone in the Oberlin Piano department loved when my girlfriend was majoring in straight classical.
I like the notion of a midi Piano Pedagogy thing. My friend Jeff and I were knocking around the meaning of that word pedagogy (ending like gohji). A pedagogue is a teacher from the latin of course. Add religion and the equivalent term is catechism (pr cat eh kism from the greek). The stuff you gotta know.
I'm a slouch myself. I missed an opportunity to buy a cheap cello. I really have no place to put it but it is where my sight-reading skills can find some continuity. A lot of the method exercises are from Bach and others and it always feels good to start on the easy works and move up to more challenging ones. I think you're on a good path that way. It's a real opportunity - just to let the living stuff immerse you by getting familiar with it. People who aren't trained to do it on some level don't what they're missing.
The place to begin is pure enjoyment of it even before one has touched an instrument. I think Peter and the Wolf was one piece that gripped me as child. After the Duck gets killed a reed instrument remembers him. That impressed me. I must have been about six when I first went to that. They had actors on the stage and a narrator.
I flash immediately on the theme. Music is magic. I know I'm preaching to the converted writing this to Teo. I figured I'd pick up the conversation in a semi-private place. Are we not most fortunate, those of us who had someone around who appreciated music literature?
Keep up the good work, Teo, and above all, have fun doing it.
