With a suggestion from a brilliant editor to consider re-framing my book as a prescriptive nonfiction, I started reading many that seemed informative in the process.
I remembered the controversy around Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua (2011), but it was only one of the seven books I picked up from the library. To start with, I meant to give each book a five-min glance. This one sucked me right in. Its introduction of simple sentences and easily relatable subject can be read on the now infamous articled titled “Why Chinese Mothers are Superior.” I expected it to be provocative, but not to this extent. She is unapologetic in her description of her predictably unpopular parenting style. She calls her daughter garbage for being disrespectful – just as her father had done to her. (P. 50) She threatens to burn her daughter’s stuffed animals, if she cannot execute perfectly at the piano. (P. 28) In her own defense, she criticizes the contrasting “American parenting style,” accusing them on dwelling on the pursuit of happiness, and to respect the children’s individuality, only to have the families fall apart. (“…all the grown sons and daughters who can’t stand to be around their parents or don’t even talk to them – I have a hard time believing that Western parenting does a better job with happiness.” P. 101) What I didn’t expect was how serendipitous my first choice was in its relevance to my book. Common threads my book and hers share are many.
- Classical music
- What classical music means to her, partially to resist the surrounding American trends in raising her daughters. In her own words, classical music symbolized “excellence, refinement, and depth,” and “respect for hierarchy, standards, and expertise. For those who know better and can teach. For those who play better and can inspire. And for parents.’ (P. 207) To her rebellious younger daughter, it symbolized oppression.
- Practicing: More the better. Sadomasochistic enforcement of “six-hours-a-day” regimen with heavy parental supervision in the process
- Competitions: virtuous vs. vicious circle.
- Music as an unprofessional pursuit for Pre-College students, partially to aid academic achievement and college admission process
- Being Asian in America
- The social stereotype of academically high-achieving “model minority.”
- The pressure to remain authentically Chinese – whatever that could mean in pursuit of excellence at everything, despite the author being American-born first generation.
- Inter-generational pressure, the fear of “family decline,” tainted by the American sense of entitlement to privilege protected by the U.S. Constitution. (P. 22) (“That’s one of the reasons that I insisted [on] classical music…[which] was the opposite of decline, the opposite of laziness, vulgarity, and spoiledness. It was a way for my children to achieve something I hadn’t. But it was also a tie-in to the high cultural tradition of my ancient ancestors.”
- Mother-daughter relationships and sibling rivalry
- Stage-mom, helicopter parenting
- “Difficulty as an aesthetic” tendency (P. 123)
- Religious note takings at every lesson (P. 124)
- Supervision of practice sessions w/ or w/o physical presence (P. 124, P. 163-165 on practice instructions left behind.)
- picking them up from school for practice sessions during lunch, gym, and other unimportant school activities
- practice sessions during vacations
- Driving them to lessons and rehearsals (P. 182)
- Stage-mom, helicopter parenting
The author states at the end of her book that she “showed every page to [her husband] Jed and the girls. ‘We are writing this together,’ I said to Sophia and Lulu…The truth is, it’s been therapeutic…” (P. 224) Understandably, they were looking for some kind of a resolution to their family dynamic, and a happy ending to the book. Therefore, the family accomplishments, especially the girls’ achievements in musical performances, are inflated. It was necessary in order to justify the sacrifices they had made, and the tensions their relationships had suffered. On the other hand, while Lulu was rejected, I got into Juilliard Pre-College without a six-hour practice everyday, without the aid of my own Tiger mom, after having just moved to the States from Japan. My own family went back to Japan, leaving me in the care of an older American couple when I was sixteen. I earned my own allowance by tutoring and babysitting, while struggling to reserve time to practice and keep my GPA respectable in my very new second language. Still, I was awarded the “Outstanding Senior” Award at my graduation from Pre-College. How would she explain that?
And what would she say to the assertions that I am about to make in my own book about classical music? While her assumptions about classical music as the symbol of “excellence, refinement, and depth…and respect for hierarchy” is not entirely wrong, its history had placed people like us – women of color – at its very bottom of its hierarchy: as second-class citizens incapable of understanding the great music written by the enlightened “Aryan” males. As performers, we would have been considered as unknowing/unthinking conduits. The hardworking marginalized populations have always aspired to classical music, as a vehicle for an upward social mobility. That’s why there have been so many Jewish musicians, and that’s why now, we have so many Asians in the field. But they – we – have all been oblivious to its underlying elitism, and white patriarchy.
And finally, do Sophia and Lulu still play their instruments today? Either way, what do they think of all the hours they’d dedicated as non-professionals? Do they love music? Do they attend concerts? Do they think – as their mother seemed to – that it HAD to be classical music, and not sports, marshal arts, or any other pursuit, in order to accomplish what their mother wanted in their academic and professional successes, and to pass down the traditional virtues of Chinese parenting?
Most importantly, will they force instruments on their own kids? Should they?
My book will be titled “WHY Piano NOW?: How it Hurts and How it Heals.” The process of book writing is time-consuming and requires an initial investment from the author. If you are interested in my book, please consider joining this venture by making a financial contribution here.