Debra Li

debra_lidan@163.com

FANS of Lang Lang will know the anecdote of when at 2-and-a-half, the pianist was inspired by an episode from the “Tom and Jerry” cartoon where Tom the cat plays the Liszt “Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2.”

Such stories have always inspired Chinese parents, some of whom might have dreams of their own kids growing up to become a professional musician, and some realistically hope that music can become a lifelong hobby for their children. Unfortunately, many of them will end up disappointed.

A report issued by www.baogaobaogao.com puts the turnover of the music training industry in China at 80 billion yuan (US$11.9 billion) in 2017, and the number is continuing to grow.

Music classes are supplementary in the system of compulsory education in China. Those who have taken extracurricular training in instruments or singing find the courses taught in public schools elementary and uninteresting; others brush them away as trivial and unimportant since the courses don’t help them get into a better high school or university.

The demand for better music education has given rise to the flourishing market of training centers. Of the 50 kids in my daughter’s grade-one class in a local public school, 10 took music classes with training centers. Most play the piano or violin at small training institutions near their homes, whose teachers may have graduated from a third-rate college with a degree in music. When I was in high school, it was a norm that students with poor academic performance would take intensive training in music and fine arts and try their luck with university majors such as music education, which accepts lower scores in academic exams. So it’s not a surprise when you come upon a kid who has taken piano lessons for a year but never gets the rhythm right. Contrary to the common belief that beginners don’t need high-level instructors, a bad tutor will ruin a child who might have had potential.

The more serious problem with a large number of the training centers is that similar to the exam-oriented teaching system in public schools, the training institutions center their courses around the requirements for various exams, the most widely known of which is the 10-level piano exams authorized by the Chinese Musicians’ Association (CMA). Three parts out of four in that exam test the skills of the player and a 15-minute (at most) piece is required to evaluate the player’s music expressiveness.

To serve the purpose of such exams, training institutions push their trainees hard to practice difficult pieces, sometimes beyond their abilities, but neglect the teaching of music theories, backgrounds of the works required to play, and fail to guide students to resonate with the music works and encourage students to interpret them.

Pedagogue Shinichi Suzuki believed that every child, if properly taught, was capable of a high level of musical achievement. He also made it clear that the goal of such musical education was to raise generations of children with “noble hearts” as opposed to creating musical prodigies. Hungarian musician Zoltan Kodaly also underscored the importance of guiding students to express themselves through music and to take joy in music training, so that students will develop a true love for music.

Some will argue that prestigious international competitions, similar to exams, also require the contestants to perform certain difficult pieces within a given time period. However, it’s important to remember that not every competition winner has a great career later on. What carries them forward, in the instance of pianist Zhang Haochen, is their profound understanding of music, supported by large volumes of reading in literature about the composers, and other related or seemingly unrelated topics.

Those with a CMA level-10 piano certificate may end up not being able to perform a Czerny etude many years later, if they don’t keep up practicing. Without a passion for music, a certificate is just something you can show off to others.