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August 15, 2003/Av 17 5763, Vol. 55, No. 51
Authors offer music advice to parents
BETH OLSON
Staff Writer
Remember those childhood hours begrudgingly spent practicing the piano (or violin, or clarinet), while watching the minutes slowly ticking by?
Or hearing your mom call, "I can't hear you practicing!" if you stopped for a moment to stretch?
However well-intentioned our parents were, this technique is not effective for teaching children to love music, according to Beth Luey and Stella Saperstein, authors of the newly-published "The Harmonious Child: Every Parent's Guide to Musical Instruments, Teachers and Lessons" (Celestial Arts, $12.95 paperback).
The book contains not only the "why," but the "how" to children's music lessons, from the best time to begin to choosing an instrument and teacher to practicing.
The idea for the book was conceived by Luey as her daughter - a piano student of Saperstein's for 12 years - was about to go off to college.
"I was thinking about the things I was going to miss - the weekly drive to Stella's and the hour of sitting in the next room listening, and I would actually miss her practicing," recalls Luey. "That got me to thinking about how important her lessons were to me."
While Luey knew she could write the book from a parent's perspective, she immediately turned to Saperstein as co-author for a teacher's perspective.
Saperstein's advice stems not only from her knowledge as a pianist and teacher, but from the mistakes she made with her own daughter, Ilona.
"I set the bar of my expectations so high that the result was nothing but tears of frustration and complete failure to master an instrument. ... I wish I knew then what I know now - and what I have tried to tell parents in our book," she explains.
Saperstein emigrated from Russia 24 years ago. A graduate of Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) Conservatory of Music, with an advanced degree in piano performance, accompaniment, and college-level piano pedagogy, she has owned her studio in Phoenix for 24 years.
Having grown up in a country where children dedicate themselves to one activity, Saperstein found herself frustrated with families who lacked dedication - but expected results. But over the years, she says, her attitude has changed and so has her clientele.
"I'm privileged compared to many teachers I know. My students stay with me for many years. They come when they're 4 and stay until they graduate from high school, for the most part," she says.
Luey, a graduate of Radcliffe College with a master's degree from Harvard University, is the founding director of the Scholarly Publishing Program at Arizona State University. She is also the author of several books about editing and publishing.
Her own love of music came from growing up with a father who was an amateur pianist and conductor who often took her to concerts. Luey, in turn, played piano, and spent her time in college hanging out with a music crowd.
"I cannot imagine living without music to listen to, and I cannot imagine raising a child without music any more than I can imagine raising a child without books and good manners," Luey says in the Preface of "Harmonious Child."
Luey's husband, Michael (also a piano player), is a retired lawyer. Her daughter, Nora, is now a senior at Harvard.
Saperstein's husband, Mark, is a dentist, and her now 30-year-old daughter, Ilona, is a teacher.
"The Harmonious Child" is available at www.amazon.com, Borders Books and Music, Barnes and Noble, Bookstar, and other major booksellers.
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