The little one and her Violin

Last week was a busy week. We also had the little one doing her summer recital as part of Galina Andre's music school. It was in a nice theater in downtown San Jose. 

She has improved a lot, now that she plays the violin every day in school. Before she was only taking lessons once a week and practicing twice a week. Now that it is a daily thing, she has more confidence and we can see the transformation from a shy hesitant kid to someone who goes for it!

She made me very proud. I am sure there will be videos from the music school.. I took a few videos of the final group perfromances and they are below.

Glad she likes the school and glad she loves to play! Makes my day to watch her practice on her own without me having to sit there and turn pages on the notebook or be the stand for no reason!

Let's see what one more year will bring!

Jr.'s dancing takes another step forward

Today Jr. performed at the Pushpanali Dance Academy's annual day. She has been learning for at least 8 years now and has been practicing when she gets a chance. She loves to dance and she has come to a realization that her performing is directly proportional to the practice!

She did pose for photos before the performance (now that I have studio lights set up!) and there were some good shots during her performance..

Kept thinking about my sister today because Jr. is a splitting image of my baby sister! 

Here is a video with a few snippets of the 10 minute Thillana performance..

and a few photos that were taken in between shooting video snippets!

My baby is a big girl now! As a dad it is not an easy thing to accept.. but I will go through the learning curve and hopefully get on the other side of that curve soon!

As long as this makes her happy, it is all good!

The little one and her violin

The little one has been learning the violin for one more year. She has definitely grown in confidence and has improved in spite of not practicing enough (we agree, her teacher agrees and most importantly, she agrees!) 

Here are some photos and a video snippet from the Winter Recital from the Music school.

There was a big surprise at the recital! Haik, who had come to the US to play on Sunday to a sold out concert came to encourage the students. 

Imagine you are warming up in your schools playground and suddenly the gym teacher says "kids, I have a little surprise for you. Usain Bolt happens to be a family friend and he is here to show you how he runs the 100m and will also answer questions on how he trains and anything else you might want to ask him and you can take pictures with him after the recital! " In violin terms, that is what happened !

The kids loved it. They also saw "how easy" it was to play like that if you practice for only 25 years! 

We enjoyed the evening with the little one doing her recital without mistakes and Haik's little cameo. Next year, if she practices well, the little one might be going on to doing more nuanced pieces. We wait with bated breath...