Tough Love:

The East German judge explains

There is a saying: “don’t complain, don’t explain”. At first it sounds so crummy; like your experience is not something we want to hear about. And I suppose that is the case, but not for the reason you might think. It’s because your experience is largely irrelevant, and also because you owe nobody an explanation. It’s because you are very unlikely to actually understand what the problem is, and it wastes time to expound on your theories unless you are being asked to do so as an exercise in self awareness. If you were really self aware, you would see that lessons like this are in turns difficult and frustrating for your instructor, who must sit in silence while you spend 1/3 of the time talking over them, apologizing, making excuses for why it was better before, blah blah. What you are missing is that a skill is not truly learned until you can play it competently in front of someone regularly. Your teacher is not expecting perfection. You are. And that’s ridiculous. The cello takes a long time to learn. Why do you think it should take less time for you? Are you a special genius? Do you talk over your teacher because you don’t want to hear them? Because that’s what ends up happening. You think you’re being meek, when you’re failing to see the arrogance of this approach. Be polite to your teacher and reasonable with yourself by showing up however you show up and not offering a running commentary on how terrible you are, or how you actually know something. You don’t. And that’s okay. It will be abundantly evident when you know it. Until then, stop asking “are we there yet” and get to work.

Gentle Touch:

Benevolent Hippie Earth Mother explains

There is a saying: “don’t complain, don’t explain”. At first it sounds so crummy; like your experience is not something we want to hear about. And I suppose that is the case, but not for the reason you might think. The East German judge says your experience is largely irrelevant. The part of your experience that is important is your relationship with yourself and the instrument. When you succumb to the urge to smother a moment of discomfort with apologies, you are abandoning yourself and all of the work you’ve done. You reject your work and the time you’ve taken in favor of harshness and humiliation. Let’s take a moment to consider what a lesson is, and what it is for. A lesson is an event where you have hired a skilled professional to evaluate your playing and offer suggestions to help you progress. The purpose can only be fulfilled if you play and demonstrate both your progress and your struggles. They must witness your whole effort on the instrument, and in order to improve, you will be critiqued and pushed. Now, if you have a mean teacher, fire them. You heard me. There are so many absolutely stellar teachers at every level who are also encouraging, warm, honest, and reliable. I hope my generation is the last one who accepted (and maybe even fetishized) cruelty disguised as necessary toughness in string teaching. It is possible to deliver critique without demolishing a student. You do not deserve abuse, no matter what your conditioning tells you. Take some time to learn new responses to critique. Use visualization to imagine your instructor offering a suggestion and practice just saying “okay, let me try that”.