Ian Stock
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I’m not sure whether this is a success story, but here at least is someone else who can relate to your experience. Perhaps it depends on what you mean by “later in life”… I play Irish music. Since my teens, it was on the mandolin (taken up more by accident than intent). I got to my late forties and finally started going to sessions. The feeling that I had buried, that I needed to play one of the core instruments of the genre surfaced again, assisted by the fact that I could hardly hear the mandolin in that setting. So I switched to the fiddle, aged 47. Luckily the left hand issues were largely taken care of, but the bowing was a whole new skill to learn, and one I am still having to work at – mostly tone issues, like you. Not helped by the fact that several of my family peers are classically trained and rather looked down their noses at the music and noise I was making….It became apparent that the violin is an instrument with an entirely higher magnitude of demands…
Since the spring I have finally been going to an Irish fiddle teacher. Teaching in this genre is strange, and mostly works round learning tunes, There is not a lot of specific work on technique. But through him, I have been exposed to players of an entirely higher order. I found this both exhilarating and depressing – but now it is becoming clear that he himself is a much more accomplished player that I realised. I have found this quite a struggle – I felt I was getting to the point of being a reasonable fiddler, and now that has been questioned all over again. I have even considered giving up. (I wonder how many others have been there too….) Then I realised that the comparison I was making was perhaps not valid. I do still make a reasonable noise for someone who has only been playing what by violin standards is not a terribly long time.
But there is only one way – which is up. I really enjoy playing the fiddle, and finally making something like the ‘proper’ sound of Irish music. But it is a long struggle. I am now 58 and realising that another 20 years work to get really good will mean I will (hopefully) peak rather late in life. On the other hand, my teacher himself is 79 and still going strong, so it can be done!
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