Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Can a prodigy be "made"?

Will do! This is a very lovely website. The people on here are actually educated, unlike the numbskulls on yahoo answers.

Well not quite. Is it a joke that all of these performers have incredible charisma, a commanding presence on the stage? That can only be rehearsed up to a certain point, and one cannot take anyone off the street and bring them to that level.

In a more extreme case, it has been discussed here that one cannot take any pianist off the street and transform them into a Horowitz or Argerich... and I don't think the pop world is as different as one might think. The untalented ones are weeded out very quickly. Whatever you say about the Jonas Brothers -and it is not music I particularly care for- they put on a helluva fun show, they play beautifully together, they do more than justice to their material, and they convey a love for their audience. It is a wonderful chemistry, and I am grateful to see this in action. Talent? Well, yes.

Haha, what do I know? I'm just some THIRTEEN year old kid! Well, yes. Shouldn't people be focusing their attentions elsewhere? It reminds me of teenagers that waste all day playing Guitar Hero and Rockband, when, with that commitment and time, they could be taking up an instrument! And I've had plenty of obsessions myself, until it burns out completely. I try not to get too obsessed, beause I don't want to ruin it for myself.

Amusing.. Everybody has a different idea of what prodigy means.

The teeny boppers think Justin Beiber and Lady Gaga are prodigies, the pianists think beethoven and chopin are prodigies, the babies think people who can play with 2 hands are prodigies.


Everybody is a 'prodigy'.. in some people's brains.
And everybody is a 'non prodigy' in some people's brains.

And that's all that word means...

Of course, the most important thing is how you define prodigy in your OWN brain.

I completely disagree with you, hippymusicman. Justin bieber and lady gaga aren't prodigies. Especially lady gaga. She's what 20? I think your forgetting the age limit. In various definitions, I'll average it out to be, say 15. Lady gaga exceeds this limit. The reason she does not fit into the prodigy definition, is because she does not sing like a highly trained adult. She is an adult. She writes disgusting, meaningless songs. Justin bieber too. Beethoven was not a prodigy. However, His father exploited him to be one. His father was jealous of child prodigy Mozart, and all of his success. So when he made young Beethoven perform, he set back his age. Claiming he was. He was not. Because Mozart set different standards for Prodigies at the time. Chopin, WAS a child prodigy. You are abusing the word, and letting it's meaning go way beyond it's definition, and standards.

They do not fit into your definition of 'prodigy'.
It's unfair to say "they don't fit THE definition of prodigy" because there is no one definition of prodigy. Prodigy means whatever we think it means.

In your mind, Justin Beiber and Lady Gaga are not prodigies.

In your mind, Age is important and only people below 15 can be prodigies.

In your mind, Singing like a trained adult would contribute to your beliefs on becoming a prodigy.

You could very well share this belief with many other people.
But the fact that you and many others else think them, does not make them true to everybody.

So when you say, 'That person is a prodigy' you may as well be saying 'That person appears to be a prodigy to everybody who has defined 'prodigy' in the same way as me.'

Hippy (which is a fine way to be, by the way, less of a medical risk than carrying weight on the abdomen)

What kind of penny is this - English? Australian? could I use a dime? And how do I know which direction the penny drops? A penny dropping in China takes a different trajectory than in my county. Or.. does it?

Why do you tell me this penny drops when you know that all our pennies drop differently (literal and metaphoric pennies). Have you tried communicating without nouns. I think this would avoid the *----- altogether.

* = problem (in my mind at least).

hi brooke, you sound very enthusiastic and passionate - enjoy your music and piano playing. It is a gift

HP,

Is your definition of the indefinite integral whatever you want it to be? Are your feelings about the tensile strength of various metals every bit as valid as a metallurgists? Just because the concept of 'prodigy' isn't from mathematics or materials science does not mean that anything goes. Social scientists define terms so they can use them to communicate to each other and so that they can be sure that when they are measuring things, and trying to understand processes like human development, that they are talking TO each other instead of PAST each other. You may not like how the term is being used by these social scientists, though I suspect you have not really thought seriously about it, but your feelings really don't advance anyone's ability to understand anything.

In everyday speech, people often use words imprecisely, and they personalize the meaning in different ways. This does lead to communication problems. But it does not mean that people cannot rigorously study a phenomenon. Precise definition is the starting point for any serious study. Precise definition allows clear observation and comparison. Clear observation permits tentative conclusions about correlation and perhaps even causality. This is how serious people think about complicated issues.

yes yes that's what I meant!
Elegant, precise and accurate post P*Dad. And I liked your earlier one too.

Do you want pepperoni on that?

What really IS a pepperoni? There are thousands of types. I'm SOOO confused. My brain hurts.

Brilliant moscheles. Too funny!!

I'll buy that!

The post really was about pizza, before it was edited.

Liszt couldn't play Un Sospiro after 10 weeks, but that's only becuase he hadn't written it yet

If I eat too much pepperoni pizza, I'd be "hippy" too :P

Well put! I most pop stars today cannot be considered musical prodigies simply because they aren't very good at music. Autotune is very popular these days, as well as lip-synching. I recall when that sort of thing used to be scandalous to use (Milli-vanilli anyone?). Why bother practicing and learning to sound good when you can have computers fix your issues? Why bother if you are talented and have a good voice when you can doctor it up to make it presentable?

I wouldn't use the term "prodigy" with these people, but the term "charlatan" comes to mind.

Your both missing my point, which is, though they may make their living today as bubble gum artists, that doesn't mean that they were not "prodigies" as kids. Remember, the word does not reflect ones occupation, simply ones abilities. I'm sure that there are many "prodigies" doing things other than the activity that they were prodigies in, does that mean that they weren't prodigies? I think everyone here knows that being a "piano prodigy" as a kid doesn't necessarily translate into success as a concert pianist, so all those former prodigies are out there doing something to make a living, maybe even making millions of dollars dressing up in outlandish outfits and performing dance tunes.

You beat me to it!

I see your point. I'm not up on what experts define "prodigy" as, but it seems from this thread that there are different uses for the same word. Here's merriam-webster's definition:
"an extraordinary, marvelous, or unusual accomplishment, deed, or event b : a highly talented child or youth." So in the a. version it can refer to anything that is extraordinary, and in the b. version, it refers only to a young person who is highly talented.

So it seems that "prodigy" can refer to an adult as well.

I do find it interesting to know that many child piano prodigies end up not becoming concert pianists, or that it seems things even out later on in their lives (they don't keep progressing at the rate at which they began) so that other talented but non-prodigy children may in fact end up surpassing them later on.

It makes me wonder if all the attention given to child prodigies is harmful and only something that very few can overcome (Beethoven and Mozart, for example). I'd be interested in learning more about this phenomenon.