n 1937, the father of Teiichi Tanaka wanted Shinichi Suzuki to teach his 5-year-old blind son the violin. But Suzuki wasn't so sure. Can one properly teach the delicate instrument to a blind child?

Suzuki needed time to reply. The slender man from Nagoya, Japan, believed every child could develop skill in music. Still, Suzuki worried that if he failed, he might wreck the boy's confidence.

One night, Suzuki got out of bed and felt his way to his violin case. He took the fiddle out and played some notes in the dark. The answer struck him like a thunderbolt. Without his eyes, Suzuki became more aware of the tip of his bow, all four strings, his finger positions and the bow's distance from the bridge. He realized a player could sharpen his sense of hearing and touch to overcome a lack of vision.

" 'Yes, I will make little Teiichi see the violin, strings and bow,' Suzuki told himself," David Collins wrote in "Dr. Shinichi Suzuki: Teaching Music from the Heart." " 'He doesn't need physical eyes if I can teach him to use his spiritual ones.' "

It took weeks getting Teiichi to learn how to hold the bow correctly. Later, the boy could lift his bow to the right spot on the strings five times in a row. A year later, Teiichi performed a Seitz violin concerto in Tokyo's Hibiya Hall. Suzuki and the audience wept for joy together.

One Student At A Time

Suzuki spread his love of music and learning throughout the world, one student at a time. Through hard work, unlimited patience and a unique vision of education, he showed that children as young as 3 or 4 could achieve skill in the arts if given proper instruction and encouragement.

Today, millions of young musicians in 46 countries learn the violin and other instruments such as piano, cello and flute via the Suzuki Method. In the U.S. alone, more than 400,000 students have learned his concepts, says the Talent Education Research Institute.

Suzuki's family thrived on innovation. In the early 1900s, his father, Masakichi, adopted Western production techniques and boosted his violin factory's output tenfold.

After being mesmerized by a recording of Schubert's "Ave Maria," Suzuki began to seriously study the violin at 22. Despite the late start, he sought the best teachers possible.

The young man traveled to Europe with a marquis from Japan and was impressed by the playing of Karl Klingler, who led a quartet in Berlin. Suzuki persuaded Klingler to give him private lessons, and the maestro taught him about the importance of learning about a composer's background before diving into the music.

Over time, Suzuki's European hosts praised his ability to capture the human spirit of Bach, Brahms and Mozart in his playing. Meetings with Albert Einstein, also a good violinist, and other scholars opened his mind to new ways of thinking.

The violin used to be a closed-doors pursuit. Professional fiddlers who served the elite passed skills on to their children. Before the Paris Conservatory was founded, little was written on violin technique and instruction.

Suzuki spread popularity for his craft by taking a new approach. He and his brothers formed the Suzuki String Quartet after he married a German woman in 1928. The group played in cozy settings such as dinner parties. These gatherings put Suzuki in contact with those of all ages who liked classical music.

One day, the parents of 4-year-old Toshiya Eto asked Suzuki if he could teach the boy. Suzuki never had such a young student before, but he accepted the challenge. Suzuki reasoned that if children could pick up language from their parents at a young age, they could learn fingering, bowing and rhythm too.

"Musical ability is not an inborn talent but an ability that can be developed," Suzuki wrote in the "Principles of Study and Guidance" section in the first book of his Suzuki Violin Method series.

Suzuki asked his brother to produce tiny violins at the family factory. He then carefully mapped out his method for preschool children. First, they learned how to play a simple song such as "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" by memorizing the fingering, not by reading music. By teaching variations of the same song, new skills could be taught.

Constant Support

He stressed constant attention by teachers to help the student achieve accurate intonation, correct posture and the right way to hold the bow. He urged parents to give constant support so a child would practice consistently. In the past, parents were rarely involved.

"One major strength of the Suzuki Method was his rote note approach. At an early age, one learns not by reading notes but by ear," said Brenda Brenner, an Indiana University associate professor and assistant director of the IU String Academy. "His teaching was based on respect for students and working together with parents. A parent or teacher would play, and a child would learn by modeling. Suzuki was a great model."

At his "Talent Education Institute" in Matsumoto, Japan, Suzuki asked his students to develop a musical ear by listening to recordings over and over. During classes, he gently asked the young fiddlers to repeat a hard passage in a song dozens of times until they mastered it.

Critics believed this method made a child's play sound robotic. But the pioneering pedagogue argued that it helped build a sophisticated sense of music. Suzuki also created method books that gave players a way to gauge their skills and set goals.

Suzuki kept his students' interest by mixing work with play. To help students improve their bow speed, he asked them to put their violins down and see how fast they could touch their head.

Suzuki made the process exciting for children because they could play in groups and thus learn from more experienced peers. In 1955, he held his first nationwide recital, and 2,000 students performed inside a Tokyo gymnasium.

At a typical concert, Suzuki first stood in the middle of a ring of his top students. As the songs became easier, more children joined the growing circle of players until the group reached the hundreds and even thousands, all of them playing "Twinkle, Twinkle" in unison.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Suzuki led a group of his students on tours to the U.S. and Europe. Their success encouraged music teachers to visit Japan and learn more. Yet Suzuki always stressed that his goal wasn't to produce brilliant musicians but noble human citizens.

"A true artist is a person with beautiful and fine feelings, thoughts and actions," he said.

BY DAVID SAITO-CHUNG