Hello Minim Family,

September is when this question arrives. Camp is over, the new timetable is out, and somebody at pickup mentions that their four-year-old has started piano. Somewhere between the school gate and the car the thought lands: is she ready for music lessons, and should we be doing that too?

The version we hear at Minim is "what age should she start?" We understand why. An age is a clean answer. But in eight years of first lessons across Tokyo international schools we have taught settled four-year-olds and reluctant nine-year-olds, and the age has told us less than you would think. Readiness has, and it is something you can see at home, this week, without a teacher in the room.

The short version. A child is ready for music lessons when a few ordinary behaviours show up at home: they go back to sounds on their own, they can stay with a self-chosen task for about ten minutes, they can clap a rhythm back, and they have started asking to be the one who makes the noise. Age matters less than most families expect. Below are the seven signs our teachers watch for at a first lesson, what readiness is not, a two-week check you can run at home, and what to do if the answer is "not yet".

Why "what age" is the wrong question

Underneath "what age should she start?" is a question with two halves: how do I avoid starting too early and putting her off, and how do I avoid starting too late and feeling we missed it?

Starting too early looks like a specific thing. A child spends the lesson wanting to go home, a family spends the term negotiating, and the child learns that music comes with a fight attached. Nobody sets out to teach that.

Starting too late is the smaller worry, and the research we trust most agrees. A 2021 study in PLoS One by Nicolas Ruth and Daniel Müllensiefen followed 3,303 secondary school students in the UK and Germany and found that the likelihood of stopping music peaks between the ages of 15 and 17. The risky years are adolescence. Nothing in that data points at a child who started at seven instead of five.

Ready is a set of behaviours you can see at home, and none of them has a birthday attached.

The 7 signs your child is ready for music lessons

These are what our teachers look for in a trial lesson. You will see most of them earlier, in the kitchen.

1. They go back to a sound without being asked. A toy keyboard they return to, a song they hum for a week, a pot lid they keep hitting in the same rhythm. One burst of interest is normal at every age. The sign is the return.
2. They can stay with one thing for about ten minutes. A drawing, a puzzle, a tower, as long as they chose it. A child who can hold ten minutes on their own project has the attention a first lesson asks for.
3. They can follow a two-step instruction. "Put your thumb here, then press." This is most of the reason our Piano Academy takes children from around four rather than earlier. The fingers are fine before that. The two steps are not.
4. They can clap a rhythm back. Clap a short pattern and they clap it back, close enough. A child who can do it in the hallway is already doing music.
5. They notice a wrong note, and it does not wreck them. Hearing the mistake is the ear. Shrugging and trying again is the temperament. The second matters more in year one, because most of year one is wrong notes.
6. Their hands can do the small thing the instrument asks. For ukulele, one finger pressing one string and holding it there. For piano, a hand that can rest on the table in a loose cup rather than flat. Watch how they hold a crayon. A child still holding it in a fist is about a year away, and that is fine.
7. They ask to be the one making the sound. "Can I try?" is the most reliable sign of all, and the easiest to confuse with our own wishes. The child who asks to watch a sibling's lesson every week is telling you something. So is the child who leaves the room.

If most of these are showing most weeks, a trial lesson will tell you the rest. You are not scoring it out of seven.

What readiness is not

Four things families count that our teachers do not.

Age, first. A settled three-year-old and a distracted six-year-old can walk into the same trial, and the six-year-old can be the one who is not ready yet. Our group ukulele classes inside partner schools take children from three at Summerhill International School and EtonHouse International School, and from six at Tokyo International School (TIS) and Nishimachi International School.

Reading, second. A child does not need to read words to start an instrument, and does not need to read music for a long while after. Ear and hands come first.

Sitting still for an hour, third. No four-year-old can, and a teacher who expects it is the wrong teacher. Our Ukulele Academy lessons run 60 minutes. Nobody expects a four-year-old to sit still for all of them, and no teacher worth having plans as if they will.

A sibling, fourth. Children in the same family arrive at these signs a year or more apart, and the younger one who sat through the older one's lessons often arrives with sign seven long before the rest.

Age, reading, stillness and a sibling's timetable tell you almost nothing. The seven signs do.

A two-week readiness check you can run at home

Nothing to buy and nothing to enrol in. Try it for two weeks and see.

1. Leave an instrument in reach and say nothing. A ukulele on a low shelf, a keyboard on the floor, a borrowed one is fine. Count how many times they go to it unprompted. Three or four visits in two weeks is a yes. Zero is information too.
2. Play the clap-back game at bedtime. Three patterns, thirty seconds, four or five nights. You are watching for whether the copy gets closer over the fortnight.
3. Time one self-chosen task each week. Not a screen. Note how long they stay with it before looking for you. You are looking for ten minutes, once.
4. Ask which song they would want to play. A child with an answer is telling you what the first lesson should contain. A child without one is not failing, and a teacher can supply the song.

If the answer at the end of the fortnight is "not yet", you have lost nothing and you know what to watch for.

If the signs are there and your child says no

It is about the shape of the lesson more often than the music. A one-to-one lesson with an adult they have never met is a big ask for a five-year-old who plays the pot lids all day. Some children want to arrive sideways.

A group class is the sideways route. Our Minim Afterschool ukulele classes run inside the school day at partner schools, with classmates, in a room the child already knows, and nobody is watching one child. Our older piece on group versus private lessons covers where each format wins. For a child who wants you in the room, Family Ukulele runs on Saturday mornings at Nishimachi in Azabu and takes anyone from three upwards, parents included.

And sometimes no means not this term. From our experience, the children who start on their own request keep going longer than the ones who start on ours.

If the signs are there and the child says no, change the room before you try to change the child.

Which instrument the signs are pointing at

Often the child has already chosen. Where they have not, a few honest patterns we have seen.

Ukulele suits the smallest hands and the shortest attention spans. Four soft nylon strings, and a first chord comes quickly. It is the instrument almost all of our three-to-six-year-olds start on, and the one we would pick for a child who is strong on signs one and seven and lighter on sign two. Our guide to the best starter ukulele for kids covers what to check, and the Minim Ukulele Set is the soprano kit our teachers use in lessons.

Piano suits a child who likes the sound more than the holding, and who is strong on signs three and six. Voice suits the child who has been singing since before they could talk, and who is strong on sign four. Violin is the honest exception: it sounds rough for longer than any other instrument we teach, so it wants a child who is strong on sign five above all.

Pick the instrument the child keeps going back to, and let the trial lesson confirm it.

FAQ

What is the best age to start music lessons?

There is no single best age, and readiness matters more than the number. Our Piano Academy welcomes students of all ages, typically from four and up, because that is when most children can follow a two-step instruction and hold a hand shape. Our group ukulele classes inside partner schools start at three, in a room full of classmates, where the demands on any one child are smaller. A child who is not there yet at four is not behind.

Is three too young for music lessons?

For a private one-to-one lesson, often yes. For a group class, often no. At three, most children are ready for sound, rhythm and singing alongside other children, which is what our preschool ukulele classes at Summerhill, EtonHouse and ASIJ ELC are built around. Few are ready for a full private lesson alone with an unfamiliar adult. Start with the group, or with Family Ukulele on a Saturday, and let the private lesson come later, when sign seven arrives on its own.

Have we left it too late at ten?

No. A ten-year-old beginner reads faster, understands rhythm as counting from the first lesson, and can practise alone from the first month. The one thing to handle with care is that a ten-year-old can hear the gap between how they sound and how they want to sound, and a five-year-old cannot. A patient teacher and a song they chose themselves close that gap. The research puts the risky years in the mid-teens, well after any starting decision.

What does a trial lesson involve, and what does it cost?

A trial lesson at any of our Music Academies is ¥4,950 and covers the first lesson only. Regular lessons after that are ¥14,960, excluding materials, with five, ten and twenty lesson packages. You fill in a short questionnaire, we match you with a teacher on goals and location, and the lesson happens at your home or at our studio. For piano, we can lend a small keyboard for the first few lessons if you are not ready to buy. The trial is where a teacher checks the seven signs for themselves.

If you have been counting signs this week

If you have read this far with a particular child in mind, you already know. Our Ukulele Academy and Piano Academy both begin with a trial lesson at your home or at our studio, with a teacher matched to your child through a short questionnaire. Our teachers hold ABRSM or Trinity College London qualifications, and they will tell you at the trial if they think your child needs another six months. Either way, we would love to hear which of the seven you are seeing.

Love, all of us at Minim.