Covid, music schools come back to life: “The live lesson is irreplaceable”

by time news

“La la la la laaaa la la la la la” “Tun tun cha tutututun cha”. Crossing the threshold of a music school one is gradually invaded by different sounds, chords, notes, voices, vibrating strings. Muffled sounds, melodies muffled only by the soundproofing of the rehearsal rooms. Rooms closed for a few months, but the music never stopped, it didn’t even give in to the lockdown in 2020. And the kids who used to frequent those same rooms found their teachers at home, through a computer screen. The online lessons have thus catapulted teenagers and taught in an overturned music school: no longer the pupil who goes to the rehearsal room, but the teacher who – for the first time – sees the student’s bedroom, kitchen, living room . “We often found ourselves talking much more than playing – says William Cavalzani, singing teacher of the Lizard from Empoli – entering their homes was like having a window open to a piece of their lives, which led us to know them even more. The reactions were different, those who were a little more closed in some cases fell silent, while others felt safer, within the walls of the house, protected, and let themselves go, even knowing more ».

An object, a poster, a photograph, which reveal passions or similarities precisely with the teacher, who in some cases, becomes not only the one who explains how to make a string or a note vibrate, but an older brother, to whom you often tell even the difficulties of the lockdown or the red zones, without the possibility of seeing friends or playing sports. “Relations have intensified, the unease has brought out things that would never have come out before. Emotions, behaviors, which also mix from a human and didactic point of view – says Gianluca Bonomonte, piano teacher – back in the presence, everything has changed: I happened not to even touch the piano, and spend hours talking about their passions ” .


A moment of listening, an older person but not too much, a teacher, but not of mathematics or Italian, to deal with in a difficult period. «The live lesson is irreplaceable – says Andrea Lucchesini, teacher of the piano master classes at the Fiesole school – during the lockdown I would have the boys send me the videos playing through the school portal, and then I would send them the corrections. But without the comparison, the example, it is not the same thing. Then this also gave me the opportunity to realize what kind of instruments they had at home, and how much I had never asked myself what piano they had. We also decided to virtually meet all together once a week, with all my students, and talk, discuss, which was useful for them to let off steam but also for me to get to know them more ».

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Tuscany, the return to life of music schools

The difficulty of not knowing when everything would start again, from lessons to performances, also led some students to give up the music. “Not having a real goal, a date, seeing the concerts always postponed and then realizing that it was almost a ‘never again’, made it difficult for me to play the piano too,” says Lucchesini. «Last year we started immediately with the online lessons, we only had a week off – explains Lorenzo Pini, guitar teacher and director of the Empolese school – the Lizard has made available to us a portal optimized for music, a kind of Meet but with also the metronome and the possibility to control the sounds. So we stayed close to the kids, we went through the months of isolation together. There and then it was also fun, it was a new thing, to experiment, which led some guys to want to equip themselves with technological tools that perhaps they would never have taken into consideration, asking us for advice. But it was clear that we missed seeing each other in presence, playing together. In fact, then there was the rush to return to face-to-face lessons: human relationships can never be replaced by those via the web “.

“Some of my pupils didn’t want to hear about singing at home – says Lucia Sargenti, of the 4Quarti school in Florence – perhaps because they are a little older, and they were ashamed to be heard by roommates and families. But especially with the red areas, many students who had abandoned in recent years, have decided to return to class. Sport was at a standstill, music has become the only outlet ». Music against isolation. Individual face-to-face lessons are allowed in Tuscany from November, thanks to an ordinance of the Region. So the schools organized themselves, as they had already done at the reopening in June 2020: tracking of entrances, temperature measurement, sanitizing gel. In the rehearsal rooms, pianos sanitized at every change of student, singers with their personal microphone cover, sanitized rods, air fans. And, of course, distancing. “It was also a creative period, many young people developed original projects, they had more time, and they dedicated themselves to music as perhaps they had never done before,” says Lucia. “I really advised someone to take advantage of this time to create something personal, original – explains Vieri Prati, drum teacher, perhaps one of the instruments most penalized even by online lessons – and I too, not often being able to teach. , I thought of a way to use all this time. I set up the recording studio of the Musik Farm in Empoli, with the aim of helping the boys, when they return, to elaborate their ideas and arrive at a professional production. We found ourselves with Lorenzo Pini writing a piece with a vocal track of a pupil sent via whatsapp “. Music as resistance, music to try to move forward, isolated but together, with the aim of being ready, when the lights and amplifiers of the live stages can turn on again.

April 30, 2021 | 16:03

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