Push-button access just doesn't work between people. Perhaps this is why, in my emphasis on familial aspects of music, listening to one another figures as a skill--perhaps a more important skill than playing well (according to some arbitrary abstracted standard).

One of the families from whom I have learned about this includes two children of very different proclivities and needs. They have grown in mutual respect and understanding by respecting one another's musical space. I dare say they have learned this from me: By not imposing an external standard on their activity, I have learned to respect that they each bring their own terms to their need for music. The full concentration that I bring to their playing gives them a working model.

They, in turn, furnish a model to the other families in the group. Nothing simple about it.