If you are fed up of your child's addiction to television, we have music for your ears. WHAT's ON hears out to a different drum that could get your kid jazzed up

What is Suzuki Talent Education? The basic tenements are to enrol kids as early as 3 years, and to surround them with an environment filled with music and lessons not graded by performance but as a collective effort to learn in groups. Music is taught mostly without tedious lectures and copious notes. Practice by ear is important.

One of the central beliefs of the Suzuki method of music talent education, is that music lessons must begin even before birth, if possible. Before you yelp Zen, all they want you to do is play some Schubert on your stereo while your baby is still in your belly.

If you thought that was far-fetched by any stretch of fertile imagination, it comes as no surprise that the Suzuki talent education movement has taken so long to gather storm since its inception during the Second World War, by Shin'ichi Suzuki in Japan.
u00a0
High School Musical: The road for talent nurture has been perilous ever since, though Zane Dalal, SOI's (Symphony Orchestra of India) Conductor-in-Residence, who has been influential in shoe-horning the project with National Centre for the Performing Arts in Mumbai, is optimistic about the technique catching on in India.

What makes him brim with joy? In the very first pilot project in Mumbai, 80 girls from Bai Ava Bai Petit High School at Bandra, enrolled for violin lessons under the guidance of two Japanese masters of the Suzuki technique. After just two months of violin classes, the girls performed last evening at a pre-concert presentation. Fifty students from various schools have already shown interest in joining the programme.

"Parents are keen that their kids join the programme, especially at a time when a Playstation is more expensive than this course. What you spend for the course is Rs 3,000, which is the cost of the violin that you get to keep; an investment for life." Music Director Marat Bisengaliev wants to take Suzuki to India's slums to tap talent early, but not before Dalal has covered schools across the city.

To get a taste of the musical discipline that young talents across schools in the country will learn, catch Marat Bisengaliev performing at SOI's closing concert on February 21 at the Jamshed Bhabha Theatre, NCPA, Nariman Point.
Call: 22824567.
Tickets: Rs 800 onwards.
To enrol, call Deepti Bellad on 66157387