A good friend of mine (who just happens to be a great musician too) was talking to someone who had taken piano lessons at school but had stopped since for various reasons. My friend began to encourage her to start again (because musicians can't imagine life without music). One of the things he said to her was: 'Find a great teacher... one who loves you as a person and who is sympathetic'.
Wow, did that floor me! I suddenly realised that THAT was it! A great teacher is one who CARES about his students as human-beings first, and teaches whatever craft is to be learned from that point-of-view.
All of the great teachers in history - the ones whose lessons have stayed with us for centuries and millennia - had that approach in common. They did not just care about the material, they cared for the people they were touching with the material.
Music teachers, let's all try to be that way...
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