Posted by Klaus on May 08, 2001 at 08:02:36:
In Reply to: Re: Deaf kid playing brass in school band posted by Bill on May 08, 2001 at 06:58:04:
As mentioned in my original posting, I was never proud to have refused that student. The not so short version of the sory is this:
The boy in question had an older brother, who was quite bright on guitar in the fields of folk and rock. The younger brother seriously tried to enter the same music scene despite his hearing handicap, which was very severe. Over a number of years he had tried drums and percussion. But he eventually was rejected because he played very loud. And worse: he was consequently out of rhythm, because he could not relate to his musical surroundings.
One day I was approached by the head of the music school and asked if I would accept that boy as student on cornet. Guitar and string teachers had refused him, because he would never be able even to tune up the strings. Woodwind teachers had no-thanked as well.
Because I was the only music teacher, who actually had learned to teach all students with problems (most of behavioral nature) ended up with me. But I saw no chance to help this boy.
The only student I had given up on until then was a boy with a hole in the bone/cartilage structures between his oral and nasal cavities (there is an English term for that, only I do not know it). Even if the instrument I taught him was the lower (than brass) pressured recorder, he had no chance whatsoever to control wind speeds, which is just about everything in recorder playing. But that boy ended up as a happy drummer.
I guess that the deaf boy would not have been very talented in music, even if he had had his full hearing abilities. He just wanted to play because he could see how successful his beloved brother was.
One of my numerous first cousins, a girl born 25 days before me, is born without the nerves connecting the inner ear and the brain. Any attempt to help her through hearing aids are doomed to be in vain (even if the official policy of her childhood era had it, that she should carry a very clumsy and bulky apparatus).
When her "konfirmation" was celebrated in the rural communityhouse with its wooden floor construction, her father had ordered the drummer of the dance band to leave the bass drum at home. Instead he kicked the rhythm in the floor. And my cousin danced happily along all the night.
Sorry for expanding a bit too much, but a few of you will know, why I generally take a very forthcomming attitude towards handicapped persons.
Klaus