A houseful of music

For some time now Calum has been interested in learning to play the violin and I've been on the lookout for a reasonably cheap 1/4 size violin. I wanted one with a decent enough sound, as early violin playing is pretty screechy sounding at the best of times, but I didn't want to spend too much money on it in case he soon lost interest in it. (I think he'll stick at it though, given his personality)

I finally found one on eBay for £20, including the case and a few books, and it arrived today. Calum was so excited.

To begin with I'm going to teach him myself, with some help from some on-line resources.

I studied music at University, my main instruments were piano and oboe (and I also chose to major in composition). I also played a little flute and trumpet. Then when I did my postgraduate teacher training we had to learn to be a sort of Jack-of-all-trades and play some guitar, bass guitar, recorder and drums.

So, although I know I won't get him up to Conservetoire standard on my own, I'm fairly confident we can get things started. I'm hoping to learn a bit myself too, so will need to start saving up for a full size fiddle!

James has been learning both trombone and chanter at school for about a year now, and is still really enjoying both. Tonight when he was practising his trombone he suddenly worked out how to play the tune below by himself. I'm impressed to see him trying out tunes by ear.

I won't tell you what it is, see if you can guess, but I will give you the clue that it is from something that is very popular in this house!

And to finish, Calum wanted to show off the first tune that he had learned today.

Tweet