A Lesson For The Piano Teacher

     Tonight should have been my students' piano recital at Graves recital hall.

     It's hard to believe that a week and a day ago I was still thinking that our recital would happen. But I think I was still in denial - or at least partial denial - back then (see post from 3/13/202, "My Five Stages of the Coronavirus Epidemic"). It took a call one week ago today from the venue telling me that all performances were cancelled to escort my brain from denial to acceptance of the fact that our piano recital wasn't happening.
     Well, after all we'd been working for six months, my students and I, on this performance. But then we're always working on a performance. I'm a  performance-based teacher. In fact, I think I might have a hard time teaching piano if I wasn't  always aiming towards the goal of my students performing.
        Mayhaps this is because to me piano is an academic subject just like any other, and the students' twice-yearly recital is the test, as it were.

      Of course, as with any academic subject, the real goal of piano lessons isn't intrinsically to pass a test. (It's also not to make children better in math, as I've often informed parents who believe that knowing how to play the piano will make their child better in math.  I tell parents, "Well, I can't guarantee that they'll be better in math. All I can guarantee is that if they take piano lessons they'll know how to play the piano." And to myself I add, I mean, isn't that enough?).
       And, while I do not assert the proposition that piano lessons are for fun and relaxation initially, I do always tell my students (and their parents) that they are taking lessons so that they can have some music in their lives, and, if they stick with it, playing the piano will eventually be a fun and relaxing past time for them.

      But now, all of a sudden, after all my years of teaching and playing piano, the lesson of taking piano lessons - or lessons on any musical instrument - has come home to me in a new way that I never had reason - none of us had - to think of before.
        Because of the world-wide coronavirus outbreak, we are now in a time when all American citizens are expected - and may soon be ordered if our country goes into a lock down - to stay home as much as possible, leaving our houses only for the necessities of work, food shopping, or medical emergencies. This leaves a good number of us - including a whole country full of children home from the closed schools - at home full-time, or at least spending a greater amount of time at home than they've ever had to before.
       So here's my point: During this pandemic when we all must stay at home, if one has the availability of playing a musical instrument, one has something to do to help one pass the time productively and/or enjoyably. 
        And now, more than ever, we need good things to do to help us pass the time.