The First Teacher
John thought he’ll be able to see again after the surgery. Unfortunately, his nerves of the eyes are already terribly damaged. After suffering from a few fevers, he became blind again. Several days later, John started to talk again for the encouragement of his mom.
“Dad, can you buy me a drum?” John asked.
“A drum?” John’s father was delighted when he heard John speak. “Ok! So what kind of drum would you like to buy?”
“Didn’t the doctor say that my joints are withering? In order to recover, I need to play drum. Just buy a drum for me to play.” John replied.
When John said this, John’s mom remembered what the doctor told her. Now John’s willing to play drum in order to recover, which means John got hope for his life again. John’s mother was glad to see that, too.The next day, John’s father bought a set of Jazz tom-toms for John.
“Why are there so many drums?” When John touched the drums by his hands, he found that the drums are not what he thought. Actually, the drum that John imagined was just a drum for him to hit with his own hands in order to move (act) his hand joints. Unexpectedly, his father bought him a set of Jazz tom-toms.
“The Jazz tom-toms isn’t only played by arms but also stepped by your legs. So, you can act (move) both your arms and legs.” That was what John’s father thought.
“It’s OK if you don’t know how to play, I’ll ask the mate in the church who knows how to play Jazz tom-toms to teach you.” John’s mother said.
Hence, John started to learn Jazz tom-toms.
John had difficulties on life and learning because of his blindness. He had to get familiar with this world again. He even found he was unfamiliar with the place where he had been living for more than ten years. When John just started to play Jazz tom-toms, the situation was just horrible. For those who can see, it’s already hard for them to play so many drums with two hands at one time, especially for John, who’s blind at all. It would be much harder for John to play the Jazz tom-toms. He had to get familiar with the place of the drums, and then he would know where the drums were. Moreover, his withered and deformed hands couldn’t hold the drumsticks very well. While playing drum, the sticks would fly away for times. After learning for a while, John had conquered these problems and got interested in it. John hoped to learn more, but the person in the church could only teach John a little. John discussed with his mom and decided to go to professional music classes to learn Jazz tom-to ms.
John wants a drum kit from father
The Teacher in Yamaha
After enquiring, John’s mother heard that there’s a Yamaha music classroom near their house, she then joyfully signed up a lesson for John. On the first day of class, the teacher can’t help appearing to be reluctant to teach John when he saw John’s deformed joints. He said: “John maybe can’t hold the drumsticks well because of his deformed arms, then how does he play the drums?” But John’s mother still insists the teacher to give John a chance to “try,” the teacher cannot reject the request from a loving mother, so he acceded (agreed) unwillingly.
The Yamaha music classroom was a two-story building at that time, and a Jazz classroom was built up on the top of it. There were two lessons each week. John’s mother always carried John upstairs for the class. John’s mother had to climb up the steep stairs to the roof (in a fear of falling downstairs?) every time.
In class, the teacher took John’s hands to get familiar with the places of the drums first, and then explain the method of playing the drums. John’s mother would be recording the words of the teacher during the class time for John to practice at home. After class, John would place the drumsticks between his deformed fingers to play the drum and listen to the recording to practice at home. At last, he’s able to hold the drumsticks tightly and learned what teacher taught easily. With a high learning ability, John finished the Jazz tom-toms lessons quickly.
The teacher was shocked and satisfied with John’s ability. He told John’s mother frankly: “John has learned what he should learn and what I taught him.” Therefore, by the teacher’s introduction, John had another new teacher, Mr. Lin, the conductor of the army band.
John goes to Yamaha to study the beating drum
The Third Teacher
Mr. Lin went to John's home in person and continued instructing John how to play Jazz tom-toms. But Mr. Lin only taught John for two months because he’s busy at work.
I let the teacher study the beating drum
Continuing to learn
Through Mr. Lin’s introduction, John continued to learn the Jazz tom-toms by going to Mr. Jiang’s house. In the past, what John learned was only limited to the tempo. Mr. Jiang saw that John had already grasped the main point of the tempo, so he began to let John play the song with the tempo. Since there were new changes in the study of Jazz tom-toms, John had increased his interest in learning Jazz tom-toms. Now, John not only studied Jazz tom-toms in order to recover but also gradually found the method of playing Jazz tom-toms from his learning experiences. Moreover, he tried to write music with some changes in the tempo. The studying of Jazz tom-toms had become the only sound in John’s life.
I hope to hit the drum better