Dear Alma, My kid wants to smash her violin
OrchestrasFrom our agony aunt:
Dear Alma,
I am mom to a precocious 11 year old violinist who is moving from a 3/4 size to her first full size. She has a talent show at school and she wants to play Meditation from Thais on her old violin and then smash it on the stage. As a classical musician this really rubs me the wrong way, but she is intent on it. The old violin is not expensive but also not cheap.
Mom to a Future Rock Star
Dear Mom to a Future Rock Star,
Historically, she would be in good company, from Pete Townsend’s legendary guitar smashing (deemed by Rolling Stones Magazine to be one of the “50 Moments that Changed Rock & Roll”) to Jerry Lee Lewisand Charles Mingus. Your daughter sounds pretty fun to live with, you must be a good mom.
I say go for it, with a couple of parameters. First – the instrument. I would suggest calling your local public school and asking who supplies/repairs instruments for them. Contact that person and see if they have a burner she could use (she could play her regular violin and do a secret swap out on stage). Secondly, I would practice and choreograph with her pianist, maybe adding a “ta-da” chord or something fun. I would also have a surface other than the stage to smash it on, maybe someone could wheel out a tool bench or she could even use a big rubber hammer. Lastly, not sure if you would like to alert the talent show people – it would be a shame if they put the kibosh on it, but it might also be tricky if they don’t know.
Mom to a Future Rock Star, this has all of the makings of a pivotal moment in her life. Help her succeed in this venture and you may truly have born a star.
Questions for Alma? Please put them in the comments section or send to DearAlmaQuery@gmail.com
What an waste of an obviously serviceable instrument. How disrespectful to all the memories and music that have been made with it over the years. What a symptom of our terminally- diseased, throw-away society. I’m sure that the child will look back on such willful destruction at first with glee, then with indifference, and finally with horror as they realize just how indulged, privileged, and coddled they were to be afforded the opportunity to perform and then literally destroy the tool that permitted that performance.
Thanks, Alma. I suppose you didn’t find out whether the child’s mother had asked _why_ they wanted to destroy the instrument, other than “I don’t know.”
Or, surely, “Whatever.”
And what exactly is the point of a musician wanting to take her audience into the realms conjured up by the Meditation on Thais and then smashing a violin? What exactly is this piece of performance art supposed to communicate?
Chris, if my mother had let me do this, I might not be a disgruntled and frustrated musician. Why not let the child get out her feelings, and as Alma says, replace the violin with a broken one from the public school repair shop.
How about giving the violin to a child that would be thilled to have it? Or donating it to a thrift shop?
And how about Dear Alma giving some thought to the question before answering?
Smashing an instrument on stage at a school talent show sounds fun and entertaining. Classical musicians need to lighten up.
Since your last sentence appears directed toward me, I should mention that I’m not a classical musician.
You are incredibly close minded. Alma said to get a broken violin from a shop, so your point is moot. Let the kid have some fun and burn off some energy.
Anmarie – how about actually reading the post? The advice is to not injure the working violin but to use one from a shop that is beyond repair. Alma has done her research into the history of destroying instruments on stage. Maybe you should do some research too.
Bad advice, Alma. And the mother should know better. The only reasonable thing to say is : “if you want to smash your violin, you will not play in the talent show.” Period.
And to want to do it after Massenet’s Meditation is just the cherry on top.
Oliver, you sound like a really fun parent. How about growing a pair and letting the kid choose their own path?
Mortimer, a “fun” parent can also teach good values to their children. Smashing an instrument is not choosing a path, it’s just bad behaviour. The kid could actually learn something by being told a simple word : no.
Classical musicians are very very close minded. Open your mind to the rest of the musical world. A simple “no” won’t open up your relationship with your child. Letting them express themselves will.
I don’t see the rest of the musical world queuing up to embrace classical to any degree, or any other genres for that matter. Probably less so now than several decades ago.
So far as the child is concerned, perhaps a life in the circus would suit her temperament.
The practice of destroying instruments onstage is one of rock’s worst legacies; I see no redeeming aspect to it at all. For one thing, it reeks of privilege: struggling musicians aren’t (or weren’t) likely to make a performance of sacrificing the tools of their livelihoods — only the biggest stars can afford to do so.
Which pianist made a bonfire of his piano? There was one, much discussed on this forum at the time, but I’ve (mercifully) forgotten his name.
Peter – the Townsend smashing is a huge moment in history, like it or not. It doesn’t mean disrespect, but rather artistic freedom.
“history”?
“artistic freedom”?
Pseudo artistic BS. A cheap stunt, nothing more.
When defining the word “artistic,” remember that Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin broke up over “artistic differences.”
I understand it as an example of exuberant rebellion; I still don’t condone it.
Fine, let her smash her violin, but the consequence is she has to pay (or pay you back) the new one. She sounds like a brat that needs to be taken down a peg or two. Don’t cave in. I don’t care how talented she is.
As a teacher of kids for the last 20 years or so, I read the daughter’s impulse as a way of communicating that sub/unconsciously she really doesn’t want to play the violin.
I totally agree with those above that the instrument should be given to someone in need — perhaps a Ukrainian kid whose instrument was burned to ashes when his/her home was bombed?
Is there any way of checking whether your reading of the child’s impulse is *true*?
Perhaps she is all avant garde and seeks to show contempt for an old marshmallow lollipop (yes, mixed metaphor) like the Meditation.
Maybe she thinks contempt for Western music is de rigeur in a performer, part of the collective apology for colonialism; something in the air she has imbibed.
Maybe she wants to show that classical musicians can be badass like rock stars, too.
Maybe she wants to make some sort of obscure protest against the elitism or capitalism or whatever of classical music; like pianist Duchable.
Maybe she envisages it as a way opf getting a name for herself in the business, the one who destroys an instrument after her performance.
Etec, etc.
À chacun son goût.
Ah, yes, Duchable. None of your proffered alternative readings justifies the act, either.
Allow “not expensive but not cheap” today and tomorrow it could be a Strad or a Guarneri.
Alma claims to be in the problem-solving business. I would think it better advice to explore the impulse behind this destructive action. If she wants to signal her maturity in moving up to the full-sized violin, and thinks that this action symbolises that she is “putting way childhood things,” she is definitely going about it the wrong way.
This issue of the actual violin is not the primary thing here – the decision to ask for an already damaged one from a shop takes care of that. The child wants to express something and she also wants to play in the talent show, which has humour and all kinds of activities. Mixing Meditation with smashing a violin will be great entertainment – might be the best thing on the program.
She’s 11 and this is a talent show. What sort of audience do you suppose it will contain? People who are PROUD of their kids’ efforts, and supporting them. They will also warmly support other kids. Who is this exercise of hers aimed at?
Back in the day when I was an aspiring rock star (!!) I used to watch my idol Jimi Hendrix do this. I was appalled. A good Fender then cost the same as my father’s modest salary. I could only dream of owning one.
It was wrong then and even more wrong now. PLEASE don’t do it.
I think this is a bad idea whether it is a child or a rock guitarist, but at least the rock star is nominally an adult. Time, skill and materials went into the instrument even if it is a “factory fiddle,” and oh-so-glorious “artists” who can make their way through the Meditation from Thais would be hard pressed to demonstrate the skills needed to build even a crappy instrument.
I was also not aware that being able to play the Meditation at age 11 was being precocious.
Plus there are enough YouTubes of “funny” people smashing instruments that it wouldn’t even have novelty/shock value.
No — all it will do is convince those who see her do it that she is an ill-raised, bad-minded little brat.
I have that sometimes with my keyboard but the look of my employer stops me in my tracks. With a violin it’s so much easier.
Sally
But the child is merely following a respectable tradition in contemporary music. A couple of years ago the German conceptual performance clown Johannes Kreidler had an ‘ensemble’ destroying a number of violins on the stage of the Darmstadt Summer Course.
Has she ever smashed a violin before? The violins they smash in movies are props made to break easily.
A real violin… she’s just going to be an awkward spectacle after the first several whacks fail to do much.
And it’s not something to do without eye protection anyway. Seriously.
Don’t do it.
Horrible advice, as usual.
A violin always has possibilities for becoming a better instrument if repaired in a thoughtful way. This could be quite extensive, with rebuilding parts, replacing various components. It could then be rendered serviceable for a beginner.
Smashing any instrument is not a way to go forward if one wants to be a great musician. If one only wants fame, then there are so many ways to lower oneself to baseness. And how much will that cost in the value of a human soul?
Legitimate fame has to be earned by being excellent at what you do to the point that you are recognized as a genius. You can’t pretend to be one.
Where have you been for the last decade? Excellence is SO last century. Fame is ALL these days. Kids do not want to grow up to be “the best” at things that require study and effort and, God forbid, competition. They want to grow up to be marketable. To be “influencers,” based on what they call “content” — which is usually any vacuity that occurs while the camera is on.
I think this mother is confusing “precocious” with acting out.”
What a load of tiresome self-indulgent rubbish. Smashing instruments was a statement when Townsend did it – and even more Hendirx (a black man smashing a white guitar was quite something in the 1960s USA….) but it has always been more about the performer than the music. Since Hendrix only pathetic performers do it because they have no idea about what they are trying to play.
If your apparently rather thoughless correspondent and her equally thoughtless child stopped to think for one minute they would appreciate this and also more importantly that however much they may have tired of the ‘training’ instrument – there are plenty of kids out there today who probably have more talent, but will never get the chance to find out because they cannot afford to hire or buy an instrument – however ropey – and most people start on pretty ropey.
Have some brains and insight and if you want rid of this instrument donate it to a charity or a music school – or even a private teacher who may be able to lend it out to prospective students. And grow up.
When I was growing up, my family always said any fool can destroy, but building something takes intelligence and hard work.
Alma really dropped the ball on this one. She should have said to the parent, “Be the adult in the room. Don’t say yes to a child whose desire is to be willfully and needlessly destructive. Trying to be your child’s friend by giving in to this foolish whim is bound to backfire; your kid will end up losing respect for you.”
I am reminded of the children and people of Paraguay who, wanting desperately to make music and having no instruments, used garbage to make their violins and other instruments and created The Recycled Orchestra. There are children all over the world, and plenty in our own country, who would love to learn to play the violin but their families do not have the money to provide an instrument. What would make this child a “Rock Star” would be for her to donate that 3/4 violin to a needy child. Perhaps instead of her shallow play for “attention” in front of her school after her performance, she could announce in front of her school that she is donating her instrument and encourage others to do the same with instruments they have outgrown or no longer wish to play.
When my daughter was learning the violin I often wanted to smash it. We later learned the poor kid had a hearing problem which certainly didn’t help her pitch.
As a thought, tell your kid she can smash the violin if she gives you the money for it.
As an unreformed punk rocker, I would allow it – but only with an unfixable instrument! I have a dreadful mandolin she can borrow if a violin can’t be found.
I wonder whether the comments (most of them) are from people 55-years-old at birth.