Clarinet

When I was 10 years old a family friend let me play her clarinet and I was in love. Unfortunately learning the clarinet wasn't a dream my folks were keen on, convinced I wouldn't stick at it, they said I could learn the piano and if I stuck at that I could maybe have a clarinet next. I didn't love piano and unsurprisingly didn't stick with it. I still wished I could play clarinet and ended up asking my family and partner to go in together to buy me a second hand clarinet for my 21st birthday, which they did.

For a year I taught myself how to play using text books, then sought a teacher to help keep me motivated, source new music & ensure I played at least once a week at my lesson, specific clarinet time designated each week. It was awesome! Until my teacher moved overseas a year after we started. I went back to teaching myself with books and practicing less regularly, until I was 28 and suffering postnatal depression after the birth of my second child. I decided to find another teacher and devote time and energy to getting back into clarinet and got so much out of my wonderful mentor and the time we spent together and found myself practicing more and more on my own time as well. I fulfilled a few life-long dreams such as learning to read music, performing in front of a room full of strangers solo and performing a duet at a bar/lounge in front of strangers.

At the moment I'm not having weekly lessons as I near the end of my third pregnancy, but look forward to returning to them after bubs is born :)