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| Posing afterward |
Hi Sidra,
I'm writing this a week after your latest performance but calling you the performer is a title that refers to more than your recent piano recital. And watching these two videos doesn't begin to tell the whole story of the recital.
The recital was last Sunday. You were to play two songs, a duet with your teacher and a solo. Your mom and sister were not in attendance as they were at Sunday school. It was you and me on this mission. There were about 15 other students also performing and three of them were your school chums. It was held in a church sanctuary and there were probably around 60 people in attendance.
The story really begins the night before. We had had a long day. You and Shira had been to a birthday party at the Tae Kwan Do dojo. That's pretty physical with board breaking and other feats of strength. We went from there to Costco, then a bike shop and finally went out to dinner at Red Robin. When we finally got home I suggested you practice the two songs you would be playing the next day.
You couldn't play them. Well, you played Channuka fairly well but just couldn't get through one part of Dreidel. I don't know if it was just fatigue, but you just got frustrated and eventually broke into tears. I decided not to press you any more and we would try again in the morning after a good night's sleep.
The next morning you did better but really only got through Dreidel once without a stop. We weren't sure what was going on because you had played it well dozens of times. I'm not sure where you were emotionally at that time but I was already getting nervous for you.
I let you watch a movie on the Kindle on the way to there because I didn't want you to stew about the performance. We got there early and took our seat in a pew about in the middle. I knew that the procedure would be that I would be able to sit in the front row while you played so there was no reason to try to get a closer seat. Soon your school chums arrived and the three of them shared our pew while their parents sat nearby.
The program revealed that all the duets would be played first and the solos would follow. You were 13th on the list so you had some time to watch others go first. In fact, your three school chums opened the program with a trio, all three of them playing on the same piano. As your turn became closer you seemed to get more tense. You pressed closer to me and leaned on me.
When we walked up to take our place in the 'on deck' pew you seemed to pull against me as I held your hand. My last whisper was about deep breaths and going slow. You played well. I hadn't heard you play that song with your teacher before and it sounded fine to me. So as we went back to our seats I whispered that you'd done great.
Back in our pew, you gave yourself some distance, going to the end so your school chums were between us. After a couple more songs had been played you worked your way back over to me. You said, "I made two mistakes." I said I hadn't heard them and not to worry.
Soon all the duets had been played and the solos began. Your friends played theirs pretty well. Lily did a good job on a song that I thought was pretty difficult. I should note that all of the other songs were Christmas songs. You were the only one playing anything else.
Your tension certainly went up as your turn approached. You were really leaning on me and frantically watching the list of players ahead of you dwindle. You expressed anxiety. When you said "My heart is burning I'm so scared," I thought you might say you didn't want to do it, but you never did. I kept encouraging you to take deep breaths and go slow when you played and told you I believed you could do it.
Well now that you've seen the video you know that you nailed it with no mistakes. There might have been some slight hesitations in the rhythm but you hit all the notes in the right order.
Afterwards I told you how proud I was that you went through with it. It took a lot of gumption to put yourself in front of a crowd knowing that your practice had not gone well leading up to it. It was like Big Papi stepping in batters box with one hit in his last 12 tries and hitting a game tying grand slam. Ok, maybe not quite like that.
I do believe that this was an experience that will serve you well later in life. This time there was no one but yourself counting on you. In the future there will be times that others will be depending on you to come through in unfavorable circumstances. It's a really important quality and you've shown yourself that you can do it. It will really boost your self confidence.
I feel like I should compare this to your Bike derby win last summer. I think that showed that you are coachable. This showed you have a grittiness I wasn't sure you had. The grittiness is hard to teach so I am glad to learn that you can show it.
This wasn't your only performance this fall. You had a leading role in your school's Thanksgiving program. You were the "Governor" of the pilgrims. You also recited a funny poem with your friend Esa. In that performance you didn't seem nervous at all.
You also won a talent contest at the Mountain Festival last summer. You sang the "Fifty Nifty United States" song. I think that singing is your first love. Some of the students in the recital sang and you said you'd like to do that some day. You love getting to stay up late to watch 'The Voice.'
Before signing off on this post I should report on our conference with your teacher.
She said that at the beginning of the year you were pretty squirrelly and off task quite a bit. Now, she calls you the 'workhorse.' That was music to our ears. She said she likes your sense of humor. She said that you get her jokes and are able to explain them to your classmates. She confirmed what we knew- that you are an out of this world reader. And she said generally you are a step ahead of all your classmates.
You did have a pretty good year in soccer, too. You had five goals in one game. It was nice to see you as the oldest in the age group. Next year you will be the at the young end of the span again. You got to play on the same team as your sister! I took you to a Portland Thorns game. They are the local women's pro team. You loved it. The chants and all had you enthralled. They ended up winning the league championship but didn't have any more home games so we will wait until next season.
Next stop- 7 years old. Only 8 more days to go.
Love, Aba
