Barrage and Living Vicariously

Last week I had the opportunity to go see a performance of Barrage with my family while Brennan was at work. Barrage is a group sort of along the lines of Stomp. It is made up of several violinists/fiddlers, a drummer, and a couple guitarists. They put on a fun, high-energy show filled with great music, lots of dancing, and creative ideas. The group came to my hometown and spent the afternoon with most of the kids in the district who are in orchestra. Among other things that I am sure they spent their time doing, they prepared a number to perform with the students on stage that night. What a neat idea for these professional instrumentalists to spend time with kids who are just learning. I would have loved to do something like that when I was kid! The concert was lots of fun and I would highly recommend seeing this group if they are ever in your area.

So what does this have to do with living vicariously? Well when I was a real little kid I couldn't wait to play the violin. I had big dreams of becoming a really great violinist. I hoped to one day have an electric violin (not sure why, but I did). So in third grade I started taking lessons and I stuck with it all the way till.....sixth grade. Yeah, not too long. The biggest problem was that I didn't know how to read music until I had to take a music class in 6th grade. And by then I was so far behind everyone else that orchestra was just miserable for me. (And at that point I didn't really realize that the music reading was probably my biggest problem, I just figured I stunk at the violin.) Now I have some pretty fantastic parents, who never really tried to push their own dreams on me. But there were still a few times that I remember feeling like they were and accusing them of trying to realize those dreams vicariously through me. Well as I listened to Barrage, I thought to heck with it!! I have no problem living vicariously through my kids! I am going to force them all to play the violin! I just love the sound of violins, and cellos for that matter. And when people are good at playing instruments they seem to have so much fun doing it. So , really my kids might hate me for awhile, but they will thank me later, right? :) Haha, what a way to justify it. Okay, so I don't actually think I will force my kids to play a certain instrument, but I will certainly encourage them to at least try an instrument of THEIR choice. And I've been picking up my old violin and giving it a go every now and again, so who knows, maybe I will realize my own violining dreams and I won't have to rely on living vicariously through my children. :)