European Suzuki Association - Teachers Newsletter Vol 38 2018

18 O n a rainy day in 1970, when I was a student at Gothenburg State College of Music, a very active mother paid the school a visit. Her name was Elisabeth Samuelsson and she had just returned back to Sweden from the United States, where she and her two children had been in a teaching pro- gram, where they had been taught the so called “Suzuki Method”. Elisabeth asked the headmaster if he could gath- er the violin trainees to listen to her telling about this. Her ambition was to get someone interested to be a teacher for her children and some other chil- dren in the neighborhood where she lived outside Gothenburg. The more she told us about this way of teaching, the more excited I was. After she fin- ished she eagerly asked “ Anybody in- terested to be our teacher? ” I raised my hand and already the next week we had a meeting in Elisabeth´s house with the families and 10 students – students that became the very first “Suzuki stu- dents” in Sweden . Professor John Kendall Teaching started with the help of the Suzuki Violin School books and records that Elisabeth had. We were very care- ful to have individual lessons and group lessons every week. The individual lessons were given in a neighbor´s basement recreation room and the groups in a nearby parish house. Elisa- beth also provided the contact with professor John Kendall – one of the most important persons to introduce the Suzuki pedagogy in the United States in the 1960´s and 70´s. Long before internet and e-mail, doz- ens of questions were written down on a paper, that mostly every week was mailed to Mr. Kendall, who very help- fully returned letters with many an- swers – always in a very encouraging way. We kept doing this until Kendall came to Sweden in 1971 on “sabbatical leave”. At Universities and other insti- tutions he lectured about the Suzuki pedagogy. In Gothenburg (the second largest town in Sweden) he found our still very little, but quite hard working, “Suzuki group” who he could use to demonstrate in his presentations. I still remember how, on the morning he was to continue his travel northwards, we were sitting in his hotel room going through the first books of the Violin School. I wrote until my pencil start- ed glowing – such happiness not hav- ing to use the somewhat tedious letters. At the same time Mr. Kendall invited me to come to his university – South- ern Illinois University in Edwardsville – to be one of his graduate assistants there. What a joy! I got permission from the Gothenburg University to go and study with Kendall. After my time at SIUE I came back and finished my studies in Gothenburg. The year I graduated I applied for a position in the Gothenburg Opera Orchestra – and became an orchestra musician for the next 20 years. I remember how I thought “Wow! Here I sit and play wonderful opera, ballet and mu- sical music and I get paid for it as well..!” The orchestra employment was not only great fun – I was also able to support my growing family and work with the Suzuki Approach. After my visit with Mr. Kendall, many more Swedish teachers went to study with him. Mr. Kendall took the trip to Sweden 10 times during the latter part of the 20 th century to help us structure our growing Swedish Suzuki movement and also to help all inter- ested teachers to get info and train- ing – usually in the form of summer workshops. This was before the ESA organization was established. There was always a number of for- eign string teachers from all over the world studying with Mr Kendal at SIUE—we called ourselves “The Ken- dall Club” and every one of us never ceased to be amazed with the skill and knowledge of this brilliant peda- gogue. Such intellectual sharpness in combination with violin skills, knowledge and honest decency is extremely rare. If someone out there still hasn´t read John Kendal´s “Recollections of a Peripatetic Peda- gogue” – please do! A great book is waiting for you! Many ways to skin a cat! The Gothenburg Suzuki Group was founded and became a “study group” for many teachers who came and observed. Soon there were more groups and gradually we started to organize common summer workshops – both for students and teachers. In 1983 Swedish Suzuki Association was established – one of the first national organizations in ESA. My first visit to Matsumoto was in 1976. The main reason for this trip was to get answers to the many questions I had collected in my translation of Suzu- ki´s book “Nurtured by Love” into Swe- dish. This was a somewhat tricky job, as the book was first translated by Wal- traud Suzuki (whose native language was German) into English and as such was then translated into Swedish. I sat down and translated for one hour every night, after coming home from the Opera. My plan was to stay one week at the Institute, but Dr. Suzuki talked me into staying a month. Everyday we had lessons and tea together, when we went through all my questions. I felt so privileged. Dr. Suzuki was always so friendly and never in a hurry. The next visit for me was in 1985. I got leave of absence from the orchestra and overjoyed to once again be one of the many foreigners studying with Su- zuki at his institute. This was when he was 87 years old. In the later decades of the 20 th century Dr. Suzuki was annu- ally teaching all over the world – not least in Europe. Of course I had been to most of those conferences but to experience him “at home” – the Talent Education Institute – was truly unique, almost mesmerizing. It was also inter- esting to realize that this great peda- gogue constantly implemented experi- ments in his search for “the even better teaching”. He was famous for his “new ideas”, which he presented and tried out with us teacher trainees at our three hour long Monday group lesson. Some of them simply didn´t work at all, some were OK, and some of them were fantastic! This is how someone works, who really wants to find results, who really wants to improve. The fact that 90% were not working so well didn´t stop him to keep looking. I often think about this, when the discussions go wild about what “Real Suzuki” is – if something really is “Pure Suzuki” etc. A very good sign of health in any move- ment or pedagogy is that the perpetra- tors constantly look for higher quality, better ways and any other improve- Suzuki—Tools for Life Sven Sjogren