Phoebe and Her Unicorn by Dana Simpson for October 02, 2012

Oct 1st, 23:40 MDT, strip is updated when it should be.(Miz Dana Claire gave ’em what-for, I betcha!)

It must be torture being a piano teacher, listening to untalented, unmotivated, uninterested little kids pounding away at the keyboard for a few hours a day, every day. (Maybe that’s why noise-cancelling headphones were invented!)

While some people do have a talent for music, much of music is a learned skill. What a person needs more then telent is a deisre to learn to play, a willingness to practice daily, and a fearlessness to perform. And Junkyard Cat, you are right. I don’t know how many times a parent would bring their kid in for lessons from me and they would sit and say how they wished they are practiced more or had taken piano a little more seriously. I need to get off my soapbox before I really get on it.

…actually, if they had a choice, most of them would drop out of school altogether at some point. I think they should be taught music for at least a couple of years, then they may choose to switch to a different instrument…even if they then give it up after a few years, they have a grounding that they can return to when they mature…

I remember playing clarinet in jr. high (the choice was band or shop class) I never did learn how to read music & was always “last chair” – I shiver thinking about it.--I love the LOOK!

I feel the same way I did things I wanted to not things my parents wanted to. What kids should be forced in to is socializing and learning to tolerate many different types of people. And they should be made to do so outside were they can run and stay in shape. I don’t get what kids learn from piano lessons or sports etc

Oh really?

You never know. I didn’t have any kind of career with the piano or in band or orchestra, but, although I never depended on anything but computers to make a living with, for thirty years I also had a side career as a semiprofessional opera singer, and these days I spend a lot of time playing tin whistles and related instruments at Renaissance faires. I occasionally write and arrange music, too. And without the long-ago piano lessons that I wasn’t much good at, none of that would have happened.

You are totally right!!

“The Look”? Her piano teacher must be Edda Burber.