Shinichi Suzuki

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Shinichi Suzuki 鈴木鎮一
Background information
Birth name	Shinichi Suzuki
Also known as	Shin'ichi Suzuki
Born	(1898-10-17)17 October 1898 Nagoya, Japan
Origin	Japan
Died	26 January 1998(1998-01-26) (aged 99) Matsumoto, Japan
Genres	Classical
Occupation(s)	Musician, violinist, pedagogue, philosopher
Instrument(s)	Violin
Spouse(s)	Waltraud Prange

Shinichi Suzuki (鈴木 鎮一, Suzuki Shin'ichi, 17 October 1898 – 26 January 1998) was a Japanese violinist, philosopher, composer, and educator and the founder of the international

Born in 1898 in Nagoya, Japan, as one of twelve children, Shinichi Suzuki spent his childhood working at his father's violin factory (now Suzuki Violin Co., Ltd.), putting up violin soundposts. A family friend encouraged Shinichi to study Western culture, but his father felt it was beneath Suzuki to be a performer. However, in 1916, at the age of 17, Suzuki began to teach himself to play the violin, inspired by a recording of Mischa Elman. Without access to professional instruction, he listened to recordings and tried to imitate what he heard. It wasn't until a few years later that Suzuki began taking violin lessons from a teacher in Tokyo.^[3]

When Suzuki was 26, his friend Marquis Tokugawa persuaded Suzuki's father to let him go to Germany, where Suzuki claimed to have studied under Karl Klingler. Suzuki also claimed to have spent time there under the tutelage of Albert Einstein.^[4][5] Several of Suzuki's credentials, such as educational background and endorsements, have been under scrutiny. For example, official school records were found that indicate that Suzuki, playing a Handel sonata, failed his conservatory auditions for Karl Klingler.^[6] While in Germany he also met and married Waltraud Prange (1905–2000).

On returning to Japan, he formed a string quartet with his brothers and began teaching violin at the Imperial School of Music and at the Kunitachi Music School in Tokyo, and started taking an interest in developing the music education of young students in violin.

During World War II, his father's violin factory was converted into a factory to construct seaplane floats. It was bombed by American warplanes; killing one of Suzuki's brothers. Suzuki and his wife eventually evacuated to separate locations when conditions became too unsafe for her as an ex-German citizen, and the factory was struggling to operate due to a shortage of wood.^{[1][page needed]} Suzuki left with other family members for a mountainous region to secure wood from a geta factory, and his wife moved to a "German village" where Germans and ex-Germans were sequestered.

Once the war was over, Suzuki was invited to teach at a new music school, and agreed on condition that he be allowed to develop the teaching of music to children from infancy and early childhood. He adopted into his family, and continued the music education of, one of his prewar students, Koji, on learning that Koji had been orphaned. Suzuki and his wife eventually reunited and moved to Matsumoto, where he continued to teach.

He was a National Patron of Delta Omicron, an international professional music fraternity.^[7]

Suzuki died at his home in Matsumoto, Japan, on 26 January 1998, aged 99.

Contributions to pedagogy

Suzuki's experiences as an adult beginner and the philosophies that he held during his life were recapitulated in the lessons he developed to teach his students. Schools of early childhood education have combined his philosophies and approaches with pedagogues such as Carl Orff, Zoltán Kodály, Maria Montessori, Émile Jaques-Dalcroze, and Glenn Doman.

Evelyn Hermann believes that the Suzuki method "can be a philosophy for living. He is not trying to create the world of violinists. His major aim is to open a world of beauty to young children everywhere that they might have greater enjoyment in their lives through the God-given sounds of music."^[8]: 37

Suzuki developed his ideas through a strong belief in the ideas of "Talent Education", a philosophy of instruction that is based on the premise that talent, musical or otherwise, is something that can be developed in any child. At the 1958 National Festival, Suzuki said,

Though still in an experimental stage, Talent Education has realized that all children in the world show their splendid capacities by speaking and understanding their

intelligence test of any kind, have almost without exception made great progress. This is not to say that everyone can reach the same level of achievement. However, each individual can certainly achieve the equivalent of his language proficiently in other fields.

— Shinichi Suzuki, (Kendall, 1966)^{[full citation needed}

]

Suzuki employed the following ideas of Talent Education in his music pedagogy schools:

1. The human being is a product of his environment.
2. The earlier, the better – with not only music, but all learning.
3. Repetition of experiences is important for learning.
4. Teachers and parents (adult human environment) must be at a high level and continue to grow to provide a better learning situation for the child.
5. The system or method must involve illustrations for the child based on the teacher's understanding of when, what, and how (Kendall, 1966)^{[full citation needed]}.

The

• Order of the Rising Sun, Third Class (circa 1970)^{[8][page needed]}
• Honorary Doctor of Music, New England Conservatory of Music (1966)^[10][11]
• Honorary Doctor of Music, University of Louisville (1967)^[10]
• Honorary Doctor of Music, University of Rochester Eastman School of Music (1972)^[10][12]
• Honorary Doctor of Music, Oberlin College Conservatory of Music (1984)^[10]
• Honorary Doctor of Music, Cleveland Institute of Music (1990)^[13]
• Honorary Distinguished Professor, North East Louisiana University (1982)^[10]
• Nobel Peace Prize Nominee (1993)^[14]

Bibliography

Suzuki wrote a number of short books about his method and his life, several of which were translated from Japanese to English by his German born wife, Waltraud Suzuki, including Nurtured by Love, Ability Development from Age Zero, Man and Talent: Search into the Unknown, and Where Love is Deep.

References