
Learning the Cello as an Adult (1997) - JoeAcchino
http://ethanwiner.com/adultbeg.html
======
UweSchmidt
I played Cello for 3 years, starting in my 30ies. It's true that it's doable
if you've figured out learning in general, maybe know a few things about
music, or even better, have played a stringed instrument for that left hand
coordination.

But you know how good you'd like to play, and that is a massive undertaking:
Playing on a fretless neck, bowing, keeping high body tension throughout, the
sightreading requirement (tenor clef anyone?), the character of the instrument
and the relevant cello pieces expecting virtuous play, are all compounding
factors that make it really hard, with no clear goal:

Get some friends out of their musical retirement? Be the novelty instrument in
a alternative band? Find an orchestra or quartett that's beginner friendly and
...cool?

Meanwhile, the return on a minimal investment in guitar playing and a bit of
singing is almost comical. Also plenty of bands need a bass player and you'll
easily find a group of cool people to play with even if you're just starting
out and in your 50ies. Want more? Try the piano; moderate effort will enable
you to play all pop/rock songs.

~~~
nandemo
I'm learning the flute, and I know how painful it can be to struggle just to
play one note in tune and a good tone, compared to playing a note on the
guitar or the piano.

But it looks like you're comparing pop guitar/piano with classical cello. If
you can always take a cello and play jazz, or even pop music. Then the
comparison would be more fair.

Also, tenor clef is no harder than other clefs. It's just a different offset.
If you learn intervalic reading you can read any clef.

~~~
kzhahou
If you've read treble your whole life, tenor may as well be rot13.

Ditto treble -> bass, or any new clef.

~~~
scarecrowbob
Really depends on how you read. If you read "this note means this finger",
yeah. But if you're reading intervals and translating to "play the root, then
the third, while sustaining the fifth", then different clefs are just like
reading in different key signatures.

------
mbrock
John Holt's book "How Children Learn" uses the cello as an example. After
discussing what he's found by observing children play with a cello (some will
tire immediately; some will indulge in "total activity" of random exploration,
followed by attempts at synthesis and control), he writes:

> There is a special sense in which it may be fair to say that the child
> scientist is a less efficient thinker than the adult scientist. He is not as
> good at cutting out unnecessary and useless information, at simplifying the
> problem, at figuring out how to ask questions whose answers will give him
> the most information. Thus, a trained adult thinker, seeing a cello for the
> first time, would probably do in a few seconds what it takes a child much
> longer to do—bow each of the strings, to see what sounds they give, and then
> see what effect holding down a string with the left hand has on the sound
> made by that string

> That is, if—and it is a very big if—he could bring himself to touch the
> cello at all. Where the young child, at least until his thinking has been
> spoiled by adults, has a great advantage is in situations—and many, even
> most real life situations are like this—where there is so much seemingly
> senseless data that it is impossible to tell what questions to ask. He is
> much better at taking in this kind of data; he is better able to tolerate
> its confusion; and he is much better at picking out the patterns, hearing
> the faint signal amid all the noise. Above all, he is much less likely than
> adults to make hard and fast conclusions on the basis of too little data, or
> having made such conclusions, to refuse to consider any new data that does
> not support them. And these are the vital skills of thought which, in our
> hurry to get him thinking the way we do, we may very well stunt or destroy
> in the process of "educating him".

> But the greatest difference between children and adults is that most of the
> children to whom I offer a turn on the cello accept it, while most adults,
> particularly if they have never played any other instrument, refuse it.

He wrote about his own experience with learning the cello in the book "Never
Too Late: My Musical Life Story."

~~~
jfroma
Wow, that was very interesting, I will buy the book. I'm currently teaching my
daughter to code and I notice is quite different from when I learned alone, it
is very hard to not filter some boring stuff but I might be spoiling her.

------
paulpepper
I began learning to play the piano 3 years ago, when in my early 40s. I'd
never studied a musical instrument before, apart from messing about with
guitar a little in my teens. Having been a software dev all my professional
life, continuous learning (new technologies) is a part of what I do, but
learning to play the piano is somewhat different to the tech- and science-
related learning that I've been familiar with.

A difficulty I've faced as an adult learner of piano is finding the right
teacher. I'm interested in the learning process generally, but especially in
effective and efficient learning in the context of piano (practice smarter,
not harder). I expect I seek to question and discuss things with my piano
teacher more than a young learner might.

I suspect I'm also more anxious in performance (e.g. grading exams) than a
young pianist might be. Unlike the generally solitary process of writing code,
playing piano for others has an unfamiliar immediacy and demand on the more
extrovert aspects of my personality.

It's useful and encouraging to read the experiences of other adult learners in
these comments and I continue to look out for tips to help me along with the
'practice smarter' aspect of my musical development.

~~~
sigi64
I started learning piano a year ago. I'm 36 year old. Unfortunatelly piano is
my third instrument which I play. First instrument i started with was
accoustinc guitar almost 25 years ago. Last three years I'm trying to learn
how to play bass guitar. When I switched to bass guitar I took the learn
process very seriosly and study what ever I have found (music theory, notation
- sight reading). This book really helps me a lot with piano:
[http://www.pianopractice.org/](http://www.pianopractice.org/) since there are
not study pieces and notation but it describe how to learn and how to practice
smartly.

I'm self taught and I believe that you can learn on any instrument at any age
you start. You have to learn smarter not harder. There are so many interesting
videos and online teacher on youtube nowdays it makes learning easier.

------
cel1ne
Played the cello for 7 years as a kid. Gave it up and learned piano with 23 or
so.

Your skill is going to depend on how much time you want to invest practising.
In my experience, as a hobby musician, my most "efficient" practising schedule
was:

* 5 day/week: 30 to 45 minutes

* 1 day: 3 hours

* 1 day: nothing, don't practise

~~~
noname123
Hi, thanks for your schedule; was wondering if you can give more details for
what exercises you do during your daily regular practice (30-45min) vs. the
long practice (3 hrs), e.g., improvisation/repertoire/mechanics?

~~~
cel1ne
Hi, the exercises I do for the regular practise change according to the pieces
I play and they also change if I feel that I get tired of them or they don't
work. Many of them can be found here [0].

There are also days where I just "listen", not caring much for technique, but
rather playfully explore a piece or an idea.

The most important thing in my opinion is to not fall into the trap of just
playing something over and over again, hoping for incremental progress, but
instead find out what you can't do and work on improving precisely that.
Playing the bars of a piece in reverse is a good way to get around this.

During the long practise I take that principle even deeper and use the time to
work on the hardest parts (= the ones which aren't fun to play, because I'm
not yet able to play them properly).

[0] [http://www.pianopractice.org/](http://www.pianopractice.org/)

~~~
Xcelerate
> The most important thing in my opinion is to not fall into the trap of just
> playing something over and over again, hoping for incremental progress

My problem, in a nutshell. 12 hours at a time of useless activity, but it's so
darn fun and addictive...

~~~
cel1ne
I know, i can't say that I follow my own advice all the time.

If you do just one thing: play hands separated at least for a while.

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robhack
1997 but still relevant today, nice! (well, except maybe the very last part
about tapes and not being able to adjust tempo).

While this is pretty much a goldmine of information, one thing I would advise
of being careful about is about this « My practice hours are divided about
equally between works from the standard cello literature and highly focused
mechanical exercises ».

While I'm sure it's the the best solution if your only goal is to get better,
it is not a format I would suggest for everyone. I for one would have been so
bored if I had to to this that I probably would have quit. What I'm doing is
about 1/3 practicing scores with sheets, 1/3 mechanical exercises and scales
and 1/3 improvisation and just fun (which is very important to me for keeping
the motivation to go on, and I guess it could apply to other people). Just for
the record, I started playing violin at 24, a bit over one year ago (first
instrument), so obviously I can only say that as a total newbie, just keep in
mind though (:

------
rooster117
This is an excellent article and I can relate. I'm in my early 30's and I took
up piano a year and a half ago. Learning music has been a great outlet and
gives me something to study that has nothing to do with programming. I've
taken lessons the entire time and I've found the best help my instructor has
given me was telling me what I was doing wrong that I'd never be able to see.
It's fun to learn something new and I feel music is a mystery that was similar
to when I started down the engineering path. Even though its an escape I still
ended up making an iOS app to practice sight reading since I didn't like what
was out there. It's a shameless plug but its available and is free with no ads
or iaps: [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/music-note-sight-reading-
tra...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/music-note-sight-reading-
trainer/id874386416?mt=8)

------
ef4
The author is also the creator of this wonderful very-many-track original
composition:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ve4cBOnSU9Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ve4cBOnSU9Q)

~~~
archagon
He's also done a lot of work in debunking audiophile myths:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYTlN6wjcvQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYTlN6wjcvQ)

Really interesting guy!

------
snowcrash
Interesting site, of particular note (:))

[http://exposed.ethanwiner.com/1280x720.htm](http://exposed.ethanwiner.com/1280x720.htm)

------
graycat
I started violin as an adult.

I'd liked _classical_ music a lot from the first time I heard it at about age
10 and still like it a lot -- it's one of the best joys of my life.

As I was starting in math in grad school at Indiana University (IU), a friend
of my parents played violin; his wife played piano; and he told me that for
learning violin age really isn't the problem and, instead, the main issue is
just time to practice.

So, right, IU has long had a terrific music department; in my second year my
dorm building was next to the music school; an Issac Stern protege and student
of IU violin teacher Josef Gingold put his old Italian violin under my left
chin and gave me a first lesson; and I was hooked.

I took a beginning course in violin: Good learning situation -- after the
semester was over the teacher went on to play the Brahms concerto in Toronto!

I continued, got a violin, later got a better violin, got a copy of Galamian's
book, listened to a lot of violin music, learned some about how to hold the
bow from pictures of Heifetz (he did it the _Russian_ way and not the _German_
way), worked on both exercises and also some of the famous pieces.

So, I actually made it through the famous, violin standard, the _Preludio_ to
the Bach E Major _Partita_. Also the _Preludio_ to the first Bach
unaccompanied cello piece -- just transpose the thing up to the corresponding
strings on violin -- it's got to be easier to play on violin than cello.
There's no end to how marvelous that piece is, e.g., with its ascending
chromatic (just in semi-tones) climax. It's really famous, and for good
reason. GrooveShark had a marvelous performance.

The Bach _Chaconne_ , of course, was harder, and I got through the central D
major section and parts of the rest.

It was also fun to be able to play Christmas music, parts, a few bars at a
time, of some of the famous concertos, the motives (amazing, especially
considering how simple they are) from Wagner, etc.

It was fun, lots and lots of fun. I was no good at it, but still it was lots
of fun.

Now I'm too busy with my startup, but I am eager to get back to violin. Else I
will use a computer, with whatever software, likely there is some; else I will
write some, to perform music (ah, the Nyquist sampling theorem!), learn more
about music, compose some, and have a computer perform that. Maybe the best
I'll ever be able to do is to compose yet another score of low grade movie
music, but, still, it should be a lot of fun.

Lesson: As an adult, it's quite possible to learn violin, cello, etc. The main
issue is time to practice. The _hobby_ can be a lot of fun even if the results
are not ready for public performance. No chance of being another Heifetz or
Rostropovich, but, still, it can be a lot of fun. E.g., a violin is an amazing
instrument, a beautiful hunk of wood, as sensitive, astounding, and difficult
to control as any human female!

If you like the music and want to try, then go ahead.

First piece of advice: An early challenge is learning how to hold a violin.
For this, f'get about what Heifetz did and, instead, do what nearly all
violinists do now -- use a _support_ between the violin and your shoulder. For
finding the right support, each time in a violin shop, buy at least one of
each support product they have you don't and try it. Eventually you will get
quite comfortable holding the violin appropriately, e.g., where it belongs and
being held in place by your chin and _not_ by your left hand.

Second Advice: Learn how the _scales_ and _keys_ work, major and minor, all 12
of each, the connection with _key signatures_ on the staff of the music (they
look complicated but actually are simple -- mostly you don't pay any
attention, note by note, to all those sharps and flats and, instead, just play
in the associated key), the _circle of fifths_ , etc. Learn the connection
with 2^(1/12), e.g., 2^(7/12) is close to 1.5 and, thus, a _perfect fifth_.
You need to know this stuff. Learn why the _triad_ is so important -- the
overtones line up really nicely, thank you J. Fourier and L. Bernstein (on
YouTube watch his Harvard lectures).

Second Lesson: Learn how the tuning is based on ratios of small whole numbers
and get to where you can hear those, e.g., via bowing two strings at once and
listening to the beats of the first overtone in common to the two notes
(derive the trigonometry of beats if you didn't get it in physics class).

Then learn to hear the notes and intervals (especially major third, fourth,
fifth, sixth, octave) just one at a time.

For your _intonation_ , from those ratios can actually can pick out and
confirm (that is, check yourself) the whole major and minor scales. In the
end, for all your intonation and tuning, all you need is just a simple tuning
fork at A = 440 Hz.

Finally, work enough with the scales so that you can hear them -- quite
generally _hear_ a note in your head just before trying to play it (makes it
easier then actually to play that note instead of something else).

Singing is a great way to learn the notes -- you _will_ learn to hear the
notes one way or another, in singing you can apply to violin or in violin you
can apply to singing.

Go for it.

But, it's 300 year old technology. Really, the future of music composition and
performance is software on computers!

More advice: In many ways piano is a better start into music than violin or
cello. There's no law saying you can't do both.

For a little of how some famous violin music can be arranged for piano,
there's

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOFflFiLlT8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOFflFiLlT8)

Of course, also listen to violin version, say, by Heifetz, Hahn, Ibragimova,
others, on, say, YouTube.

Yes, that's the Bach _Chaconne_. Playing that can be one of the greatest joys
in all of life (better than a lot, although not all, of the sex I've had!).
With a violin, or, sure, the piano version, can have own voice of the human
spirit just scream out to the universe. So, you get an amazing voice for
"Listen up, universe: On life here, I've got some reactions for you".

If really like that music, then you are one of the ones who should get
started, with piano, cello, violin, or two of those or all three! Then, later
computers!

Go for it!

~~~
shadeslayer
As someone who's been learning the violin for the past year and a half, I
completely agree that one can pick up the violin as an adult.

One of the first things I did was to get a teacher to guide me through it, and
that has helped enormously. While I do like western classical music, I find
compositions from modern Japanese composers such as Joe Hiashi much more fun
to play.

------
gtani
from this:
[http://ethanwiner.com/music.html](http://ethanwiner.com/music.html)

    
    
         I also played lead guitar in a band with John Scofield
    

this jumped out (Sco was the rhythm guitar??). Anyway, i also started learning
cello as an adult, til my dad dropped it and cracked the peghead (it was his
cello).

------
hoopd
[http://ethanwiner.com/adultbeg.html](http://ethanwiner.com/adultbeg.html)

> HTTP Error 400. The request is badly formed.

edit: google has it cached, it's a good read

------
fiatjaf
John Holt's book "Never Too Late" is about his experience in learning the
Cello as an Adult.

------
agumonkey
> "PRACTICE SMARTER, NOT HARDER"

This is key (sic).

~~~
falcolas
Not just smarter, but on real problems, and the really boring parts.

It was a really good read, and applies to more than just learning the Cello. I
particularly loved the bit about how it's easier for children to pick up new
things, because they don't know (or care) how bad they are. I know feeling
self conscious about things definitely impairs my ability to learn things I
really love from the outside.

~~~
agumonkey
Alright, but it's a crucial thing to approach 'real' or 'boring' with a smart,
lazy, peaceful and patient mindset.

The kid psychology is great, I abused it as an adult to keep doing things even
though I failed. But it's only part of the solution, otherwise you diverge and
never progress really. Kids do progress (beside a natural libido and brain
state eager to learn) because they aim at things at their level (with other
kids of their level), and have good tests to ensure quality (real life like
balancing on a bike, or teachers). To me this is the process that breed
internal change.

With time you learn to balance not caring too much with moments of diligent
precision so you feel good without wasting time.

