mmoa_writes

I've noticed that many of my posts are on the topics on Religion and Fanfiction and aren't so comprehensively written either, so here I am, trying to broaden my horizons. Read on if you dare...

Tuning an instrument is rarely mentioned. Very rarely, and yet it is so vitally important.

Within musical circles, it is 'common knowledge' that an entire orchestra has to be tuned to an oboe - which on one occasion, led to an oboe-playing friend of mine feeling rather slighted that our orchestra Mistress completely ignored her and tuned everyone to her piano - and for an amateur, like myself, that is where one's public (if you will) experience of tuning ends.

I was never taught how to tune my violin: in Primary school, my teacher insisted on doing it and in secondary school, my teacher was too busy marvelling at a black girl who could play a violin decently to really pay attention to my lack of tuning skills. The first time I tried to tune my violin, my E-string snapped, thus ensuing a mild phobia of tuning my violin, and particularly, the E-string: even today, I still hesitate and much prefer to have it tuned by a lady-admiring expert.

It is a weakness that betrays my inability: being something of a perfectionist, it is not something that I am especially proud of. To others, it barely matters, but to me, who grew up watching nine year old prodigies play faultlessly on beautiful violins, it is a constant thorn in my side.

But is also betrays more than that and wounds more than an elitist's pride.

A musician must - before anything - have a deep relationship with their instrument/s. Whether this is a love-hate duel as it is with me and my darling violin (who is sitting quite complacently and somewhat smugly in a corner to my left), or one of an adoring Jane-Mr. Bingley partnership (as with another friend and her cello), it doesn't truly matter. What does matter, is the understanding one has of their instrument/s and of the effects one has on it/them.

My inadequacy to tune up my own violin made me feel like a second-rater (which, as an amateur, I am, but I'm in denial...): a bad parent, a bad friend. This feeling was especially highlighted only yesterday when I asked my cello-playing friend mentioned above to help me tune up my violin.

Now, we failed completely; that's the way my violin works: sometimes, after an arduous journey using public transport, she's absolutely fine, sounding better than ever but yesterday, she went (as she sometimes does) to the other end of the spectrum entirely: the bridge managed to come out of place, we had to take out each string and attempt to tune them at least twice over: at least none of them snapped.

But the fact that we failed hardly mattered. It was simply the fact that for the first time since I had played the violin, I began to truly understand the depth of a musician's relationship with their instument: as I watched my friend coax the strings into place and observed her refusal to lose her temper - she had to in the end, and we managed to get the E-string done -  I was able to interprete something to the way I view my instrument:

As the tuner was a friend of mine, I felt a whole lot more comfortable - in the past, the tuners have often been wonderful teachers, but teachers nonetheless and my inadequacy (I realised) was simply my feeling uncomfortable with a kindly but authoritave and distant figure on intimate contact with my instrument. Am I odd? Yes, and so are the other amateur/professional musicians out there. It's a fact of life.

But it just goes to show. If we want children to learn how to play instruments (be it their voice or tin cans) we should at least show them how to 'love' the instrument: in many a way, the instrument isn't another entity of itself, but an extension of your body which enables you to show yourself on that particular day, at that particular time. As my cello-playing friend said yesterday, "You don't want to start playing Baa-Baa black sheep and end up with it sounding like Baa-baa crap sheep," all because you don't know how to tune up your insrtument: it's bad craftsmanship.