Scraping Away

It has been almost two months now, and I’m still practicing my viola with a good deal of fidelity. My bow still scrapes and squeaks and makes ungodly noises that I’m sure make my neighbors cringe, but the flubs are becoming more infrequent.

Returning to the beginning of musical training has been an enlightening experience for me. All of my piano experience can only take me so far when it comes to the nuances of this instrument, and I have had to force my brain to revert to beginner mode. Plodding away on my viola, the effort summons memories from my early childhood, when I struggled with controlling the volume, phrasing, and fingering of the piano. I remember practicing right hand exercises on the old upright piano in Mrs. Sample’s basement, clacking away with the rhythm sticks, and using red plastic disks to play a sort of musical bingo on the treble and base clefs. I also remember the proudest moment of my second year of lessons, when I mastered the two-hand version of Scarborough Fair (I still love that song).

Thanks to these memories, I am able to control my impatience and frustration during practice. As I slowly go through Frere Jacques for the umpteenth time, traces of Mrs. Sample’s patience and wisdom float up from my slightly unreliable mass of memory, and remind me that mastering any instrument takes years and years of dedication, no matter what your background may be.

So, in addition to my list of unattainable dream jobs, I can now add:
- Violist at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan

(By the way, my list also includes:
- Writer for Encyclopedia Britannica in Chicago
- Etiquette consultant in Washington DC
- Medieval manuscript specialist at the University of Leicester
- Assistant to the United States Ambassador to Brazil
- Marine biology journal editor for CSIRO publishing in Victoria, Australia
- Agent for a luxury goods exporter in Istanbul)