She also does dance, ice skating, Girl Scouts, and Chinese school Friday evenings. Eight years old. The other families in my street are all on the same treadmill. Piano, karate, step dancing, piano, gymnastics, violin, pony club, piano. The English writer Fritz Spiegl, who is also a bassoonist, once told me that if you can play the bassoon, you will never be hungry.
Every orchestra needs a bassoonist, and there aren t enough to go round.
In a way, of course, all this pressure to achieve and excel is a wonderful thing. How often have I wished, sighing, that these programs had been around when I was a kid, and that my parents had had the time, money and inclination to sign me up for them. They didn t want us around much. So out we went to play. We played in the street.