hi everyone.
I am a junior in HS & I have been playing cello for 6 years. My parents want me to quit because I haven’t won any competitions or done anything big like going to Carnegie hall. They said it’s not worth for me to do a college supplement because I’m not good enough/it won’t help me. They also said that if I quit cello I would have better grades which would help me more for college, but I’d rather play cello and have mediocre grades because studying all the time is…horrible.
If not, you might want to tell your parents that continuing to play cello will look good on your college applications even if you haven’t won any competitions. Colleges like people with a continuing interest in an activity. Dropping cello now would make you a less attractive candidate. (At this late date, you’re not likely to find a completely new activity in which you can shine.) You might even be able to strengthen your music EC by adding some other music-related activities. Is there a community orchestra you could join? Or some kind of volunteer work involving music that you could do?
If cost is an issue, could you get a part-time or summer job that would pay enough to cover the cost of your lessons?
As for grades, there’s not much you can do about them now. You’re at the end of your junior year. The GPA that colleges are going to see is pretty much settled. If your parents had suggested two years ago that you were spending too much time on music and that they thought this was bringing your grades down, it might have made sense for you to rearrange your priorities, but it’s a little late now.
If music is important to you (I know it is to me), I definitely think you should continue with it. Life isn’t all about getting the best grades to get into the “best” colleges. Unless you are getting very poor grades (Ds and Fs), no one should suggest that you curtail something that worthwhile that you enjoy, even if you aren’t a competition-level cellist. I’d be thrilled if my teenagers enjoyed playing an instrument. Beats spending hours watching YouTube videos and inane TV shows.
The cello will be regarded as a nice EC in any college application. I know my D finds playing violin in the orchestra both in HS and college to be a great source for both relaxation and friendships. However, your HS grades/standardized tests are important as well. I would suggest continuing with cello but maybe cutting down the amount of practice time etc. to be sure that you leave plenty of time to do your best in your academics. As with many things, a reasonable compromise is often a good solution.
How “mediocre” are your grades? Cello is awesome, and I don’t see any reason to drop it, but you should make sure that your grades are good enough that they are going to help you gain admission to colleges you want to attend and that your family can afford.
(And for colleges that accept supplemental recommendations, one from your orchestra teacher or from your cello teacher is an excellent idea – though you will probably also need one or two from academic teachers in math, science, English, social studies or foreign language. )
^ That’s the question I had in mind. How much does your cello time bring down your grades? If you’re in the 3.8 range play on. If you’re at 2.8 your parents have a point.
He might not have a better GPA without playing the cello. We don’t have a way to predict that and neither do his parents.
To the OP, if you love your music, continue. One of my kids was not a music major but continued to play her instrument all the way through college, and continues to play now. She loves her music. It never would have dawned on me to tell her to quit because she never won a national award…or because I thought it might improve her GPA. To be honest, I think her GPA was better due to her music involvement which she found very anti stress, and relaxing.
Keep playing the cello. You can play it for the rest of your life and derive huge enjoyment from it. I know people who have been playing in small chamber groups and amateur orchestras their whole lives.
Everything you do need not be for the purpose of enhancing your college application, although playing an instrument is a nice EC.
I cannot believe that playing the cello is affecting your grades, unless you play 10 hours a day or something.
It may or may not be worth your sending an actually arts supplement to schools–that involves making a good recording of yourself playing selections solo, and will be evaluated by the music department at the college–but it would certainly be worth getting an additional recommendation from your teacher. Despite the fact that schools are always going on about not sending extra recs, the kids I’ve known who were most successful in elite private U admissions ALL had additional recs from people such as instrumental teachers, coaches, or employers.
What you have is a sincere love for music, and that is so much more valuable in life than years of music lessons and competitions targeted only to packaging you as a desirable candidate for college admissions. Besides, college admissions officers have a pretty good nose for sincerity vs packaging. So continuing with the cello might pay off in that way too. But the crucial point is that you love it. No one should give up something they love.
You might want to post this in the music forum which is an excellent source of information and support.
You do not need to win competitions or awards to continue music in a worthwhile way. Many students don’t even enter these. Do you have a good teacher? Where do you play, mainly in school, or a conservatory prep program, or a local band or orchestra? Have you ever considered a summer program at all? (There are scholarships- too late this summer but you could try next summer.)
Ask your teacher if your supplement would be worthwhile. And yes, letters from music teachers about talent, work habits, or character can really help.
Would you like to major in music? Are you considering only colleges or also music schools/conservatories. I am guessing colleges only because of your parents’ feelings. Many colleges will not have a performance program at all, but will welcome you in extracurriculars. A BA music major is a general, academic major with music history, theory, ethnomusicology, that kind of thing but sometimes there is a performance element, and funded lessons too.
Good luck! Keep playing!
p.s. My mother made me stop piano so I could do homework and it is one of the biggest regrets of my life. I raised my kids quite differently!!
I am SO glad you asked this question here. Many parents get mired down in the “perfect grades” syndrome and totally forget that the purpose of college is to help develop a well-rounded citizen of SOCIETY. They aren’t looking to develop a bookworm or studiholic, or someone who spends 50% of their life performing and the other 50% practicing. They are looking for bright, curious, minds that are open to new ideas, that will explore the unknown and certainly the unproven or untried (even with the cello - how often do we hear a cello in rock music for example? You might write the next masterpiece for the cello and colleges are very good at seeing that burning pit of fire in your gut to go further. They KNOW who will be the leaders of tomorrow, who will INSPIRE the next generation to reach beyond the stars, deeper than the nuclei of a cell, who want to know what’s at the bottom and BENEATH the Mariannas trench. They know that someone in that mass of humanity applying to them might just be the ANSWER to world hunger, to clean sustainable water, to global warming or the next ice age, to the tumor growing in your interviewer’s breast. They just know … so list your interests and in you essay tell how those interests impact your daily life and how you plan to incorporate them into your daily life and explore them further ---- even if it is just the beautification of the world… we could ALL use a little beauty. There are a lot of good answers here but don’t take just one – take them in their totality on how they best apply to YOUR life situation and you will be just fine. It looks daunting but JOURNAL THIS keep a journal or blog that you BACK UP OFTEN – it will be VERY helpful when you have kids of your own… I PROMISE!!! GOOD LUCK AND GOD SPEED ON THIS, YOU NEXT AMAZING ADVENTURE!!!
Not a parent but I do emphasize that it is very important that college applicants have a continuing devotion/interest/passion in an EC. Sure, you didn’t make Sydney Symphony but you love what you do and you shouldn’t have to stop or change that for the world. You’ve done it for a long time and I’m sure you’ve learned a lot of things and life lessons through it. And also, not having a supplement isn’t the end of the world.
As long as it’s something you enjoy doing and would like to continue – whether you are a cello prodigy or not – by all means, continue!
Music allows you to demonstrate all sorts of quality character, but life is not only about your gpa, and as someone mentioned, there’s no guarantee quitting would i prove your grades. It is equally likely they could get worse if you have no source of joy.
Ask your parents what gpa improvement they would like to see – 1 more A? no C’s? ---- and be specific. Work towards that goal. But imho, the cello is off limits. I had a child who was not able academically, but has lots of musical talent. Playing music allows him to showcase his strengths, which increases his confidence, and helped him study smarter and better. Play on!
All the times my son was struggling with grades, we never cut sports or music. We did cut off video and computer games, sometimes to zero. But we would never cut off sports and music. He managed to buckle down and got into an excellent school, and still plays sports and music.
As for what to include on your college application, isn’t it up to you?
At least, I hope you’re not going out with your friends, playing cello while you do drugs, rob banks, have unprotected relations, and steal candy from babies. There are a lot worse things you could be doing with your time than playing cello.
My DD2 swam all 4 years of high school. She enjoyed it tremendously. It was her stress relief and also a social outlet. Could she get an athletic scholarship out of it? Nope. So what. She loved it. My opinion: keep playing cello.
My kid played instruments before college and continued to play instruments all the way through college.
Driving him to his music lessons over 12 (?) years was always a good “bonding” time for our family. I think his involvement with music before college and in college helped him greatly to have a more balanced life and helped him make many friends. Even as a college student, he would continue to pursue any opportunity to keep learning music in or out of campus. In two summer breaks after high school, I believe he took lessons at a local community college when he was back home (Actually, I think that for the second summer, he was actually invited back to the class just because the instructor and he like to play instruments together.) He just loves doing this and it has nothing to do with his grades at high school or college.
During a college interview, the interviewer and he enjoyed talking about their shared music-related hobby so much that they talked to each other for almost 3 hours!
OP, Do not stop playing your instrument if you like it. Even without private lessons, if your skill is above a certain level, you could still keep learning/enjoying it by yourself.
I once read that Sarah Chang’s late (maybe only “official” one?) teacher, Dorothy DeLay, very soon tried not to “fix” her problem during her lesson. She wanted her to identify any weak areas she needs to improve upon by herself. this is because she is aware that she, as a teacher, was unable to be with her when she needs her, e.g., when she was practicing on the road (more likely in the air these days) so she mostly needs to rely on herself to improve herself quite early on due to her “special” career development. (I could not imagine who could lead such a challenging life like hers since so young.) I think Dorothy DeLay was the teacher for several other violinists, according to a link, Itzhak Perlman, Midori, Cho-Liang Lin, Gil Shaham and Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg.
This is probably true. An instrument could be a good kicker to an otherwise good college application, but if your academics are bad then it doesn’t really matter if you play cello or not, especially if you’re not exceptional at it.
I don’t see a reason you need to sell your cello and quit on it forever, but if your grades are bad you should focus more on your grades and less on your cello.
@arabrab I do have high standards the last time I checked, I had a 3.71 UW GPA. It’s almost the end of the school year and I am most likely ending with a C in AP Chemistry but As in other classes . So my GPA won’t be a 3.71 anymore. Maybe a 3.65 not sure. My top school was Upenn Wharton, but I dunno anymore because sophomore and junior year just academically sucked…
I used to do lots of things like FBLA, science Olympiad, Red Cross etc. but I quit them in 10th/11tg grade due to grades. I kept cello because I had it the longest and it was my #1 activity among the others.
I talked to my teacher today, and she said my level is 85/100, 100 being conservatory material. So I guess I’m ok/“intermediate-advanced” she said.
I have yet to talk to my parents but I think the main reason why they brought up this is because I can’t focus. It takes a lot of time for me to focus on homework and studying etc because I always have some music stuck in my brain :-/ and I end up listening to that piece instead of studying. I’ve been trying to fix it since 10th grade, when it started getting really bad…however little progress.
Just saw more comments- I don’t practice that much. Depends on what’s happening at school, but probably half an hour each day- enough to run through my concerto. On bad days 10 min.
Maybe my parents think if I quit cello, all the music in my brain will disappear too. Haha…
“I’d rather play cello and have mediocre grades because studying all the time is…horrible.”
I have a feeling your parents are trying to get you to focus on all the responsibilities you naturally have, as a college bound kid.
You quit some activities, admit you have difficulty focusing, talk about distractions, etc. Anyone you can speak to about these issues? Perhaps there is help.
the last time I checked, I had a 3.71 UW GPA. It’s almost the end of the school year and I am most likely ending with a C in AP Chemistry but As in other classes . So my GPA won’t be a 3.71 anymore. Maybe a 3.65 not sure. My top school was Upenn Wharton, but I dunno anymore because sophomore and junior year just academically sucked…