Lesson Two!

Today was the Maestro’s second lesson with the Teacher. As I said, he had pretending to be her all week, and had been giving and receiving lessons everyday. I don’t think he had a regular practice all week. The Teacher thought that that might have increased the pressure he felt in actually going to see her and showing her what he had practiced, like she’s become some kind of rock star. She doesn’t eat wheat, and she plays the cello, so really, she IS a rock star. I think he’d feel the pressure regardless of whether he role-played being her or not. The pretending to be her is an effect of that, not a cause.

Apparently, he did a good amount of playing shy at his lesson today. A lesson, after practicing all week, is essentially a performance, and he has some performance anxiety. Hildegard said that this is normal, and that a child who can hold gaze well with someone at home can typically only hold gaze for half as long at a lesson. That sort of thing may be typical, but I think The Maestro is probably more extreme in this regard than most kids. He tends to be more extreme in almost everything…

Anyway, he got a bunch of new homework assignments. From what I gather, he got some more advanced stuff than one usually gets at a second lesson. I’m not sure what exactly, because he was kind of fried when he came home, like he was caught in the afterglow of being taught to pizzacado. The music really got his dopamine flowing, I think. I did gather that he was authorized to move onto plucking, which I hadn’t expected. He also told me that the Teacher has a small toy cello that he wasn’t able to borrow, and has ebony on it. That was the extent of his report to me. Oh, and he said it went “good”.

Riley told me that he is supposed to start singing Twinkle Variation A, and combine his bow into a sequence that ends with him sitting in the right posture. I’m sure that I will hear more tomorrow when it is time for him to give a lesson to Riley. It’s Sunday, so I will be around to watch.