Watching this video makes me realize that I got ripped off as a kid.

Playing music is a long process full of ups and downs and requires a true passion to maintain practicing until you develop a working knowledge of the art. Unfortunately, I learned this way too late in life, as when I was a kid, my educators felt it prudent to give a barely functioning plastic recorder with which I should ignite my passion for music.

Needless to say it didn’t work, and it wasn’t until years later that I ever bothered to pick up an instrument again. I’d just assumed they were unwieldy to anyone but a chosen few who — as far as I could tell at that age — had a god-given talent for it.

Now, as I play around with all the digital equipment easily found online, I often wonder what it would have been like to have gear like this as an impressionable child. I think it would have gone something like this…

https://youtu.be/WMfk6LxhE0U?t=48s

That cover of Daft Punk’s “Something About Us” was performed by fourth grade students at Namsong Elementary School in Daegu, South Korea. Using MPCs and other electronic musical instruments, they delivered an amazingly easy-to-listen-to performance for anyone who’s ever been to an elementary school music recital.

Comments to it were a mix of optimistic joy for these kids and bitter resentment for our own experiences.

“Wow!!! Great work kiddos!! And what great teaching staff!!!”
“This is so cute!! Perfect work, congrats!!”
“We didn’t get to play cool music when I was a kid. What gives?”
“I wish I had a program like this in my school growing up. Music is so important to education and I am happy to see it is still alive and well.”
“They gave me a goddamn recorder in the 4th grade and made me play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.”
“They all look so happy!”

Of course mastering these instruments is far from simple, but their accessibility is far beyond the aluminum xylophones and plastic wind-powered keyboards my generation’s youth had to wrestle with.

Even better, such digital tools are cheaper than ever via smartphones and tablets, leaving even the most severe of school board budgets little excuse not to embrace this technology.

This would allow kids a gateway to music so that they can find the desire to study and learn more… so much so that they can eventually work their way back to playing so-called kids instruments like this:

▼ That Anpanman plastic drum
can really bang out some tunes!

Of course, not every child will fall in love with music thanks to these innovative tools. In fact, some may downright loathe it, but that’s okay! Any youngster who falls into this category can still grow up to be an overbearing music copyright enforcer.

Source: YouTube/s.s.kyo, The Awesomer via Sploid
Top image: YouTube/s.s.kyo