Practicing With a Pianist

Well, my son hadn't had a lesson for over a month. His teacher moved back to Florida and his new teacher can't teach him until her students' recital is over this weekend. So he's been practicing by himself. This gets old if you know what I mean. Especially when he is eleven, he doesn't know what needs to be done a lot of times. This week we arranged with the pianist who he worked with before to go through Mozart No. 4 he's been practicing. It is just refreshing to practice with an accompanist. You can't be selfish and speed up or down according to your agenda. You have to collaborate. And reality check..... Why is Mozart so difficult? Well, first of all, not that I am making excuse for my son, but the last time he had a lesson was the first time he was given this piece and they pretty much spent the whole lesson adjusting fingering and bowing. Tonight, the pianist gave him some pointers which he always welcomes. This concerto (1st movement), I realized that it is almost a conversation (chatting) between the violin and the orchestra (in this case, the piano). If you get into it, you get the hang of it. I was going to tape this and use it as a submission for his summer music camp. (They require a CD or tape to determining the placement of suitable orchestra) But I said at the end, "Let's not use No. 4. He is not ready. We'll do Mendelssohn and tape it next week." That's OK. We'll take time and make it better. On the fun side, my son's been practicing "Meditation from Thais" by Massenet. We asked the pianist to play along with him. Well, we worked on a few times. Around the fifth time we decided to tape it. It wasn't too bad for the first time playing with piano after practicing for a week. Of course at some point, we'll need to ask his teacher to teach him this piece. But it is a beautiful piece. I love it. My son enjoyed playing with the pianist today. We'll probably do it again maybe a couple times a month or so. I am so tired... from keeping our younger children quiet during taping. I think I am going to fall asleep in one, two, three......seconds:)