I’ve always loved music. Just about all kinds too. When I was 5 years old I asked my parents for piano lessons. This was a blessing and a mistake.
A blessing because I was only 5 years old and could read music better than I could read “Dick and Jane” A curse because my Mother also played the piano.
I loved the piano and my piano lessons. I hated my Mother’s interference. “Mitchell hold up your wrists” , “Mitchell you hit a wrong note”, “Mitchell you’re not counting”, “No Mitchell, like this Mitchell”, and “Mitchell let me show you.”
When I entered Middle School the music teachers evaluated all of us incoming freshmen to see if we had some for an instrument and possibly play in the school orchestra. Naturally they spotted me and asked me if I would like to play the violin. I said sure and they sent me home from school with a violin to practice at home.
I will never forget coming home from school and my Mother met me at the door and said, “What’s that?” I replied that it was a violin. She got so excited and said with joy, “that is so exciting because I used to play violin in the school orchestra too.” “Not only can we practice the piano, but now we can practice the violin together too. Needless to say that is the last thing in the world I wanted to do with my Mother!
I looked my Mother right in the eyes and said, “do you know how to play the double bass?” She said no. The next day I took the violin back to school and although was only 4’11” at the time I begged the music teacher to let me switch to the double bass.
Although I was now playing the double bass in school I continued my piano lessons. I studied with a wonderful piano teacher and musician, Oscar Waltzer.
Due to Mr. Waltzer’s schedule and my school schedule the only time he could give me a lesson was on Sunday mornings at 9:00AM. I soon discovered that if I showed up for my piano lesson early on Sunday mornings, like 8:45AM that Mrs. Waltzer would serve me pancakes and sausage before my lesson. My Mother still wanted me to wear that sign that said “Please don’t feed this child” but at 12 years old I knew what it said and meant.
I’d get home from my piano lesson about 10:15AM. My Father would be in the kitchen making Sunday breakfast. He made the best omelets. So I’d have my second breakfast and managed to get away with it until one day in the grocery store Mrs. Waltzer ran into my Mother and told her she couldn’t believe how many pancakes I could pack away in 15 minutes!
During this period of my life I had a Hagstrum Bass Guitar with an Ampeg B15 amplifier and was in a rock band. We were bad! …and I don’t mean “bad” in a good way! I mean we were BAD! We really sucked!