Lang Lang vs. Yang Wei

Nope, I'm not going to write about it, but I sure wish the press would!

The Olympics have renewed my fascination with all things surrounding child prodigies and, especially with the games being in China, I wonder why we haven't seen child prodigy athlete vs. child prodigy classical musician press.

Surely there are huge, glaringly obvious similarities: extreme focus on a singular pursuit from a very young age, supportive beyond-supportive-parents (or parental figures), intense training, legendary coaches/teachers, presence of natural gifts, all-consuming travel schedules, physical demands, careers potentially cut short by injury, existence just below the mainstream celebrity line for most....lots of interesting compare/contrast material there.  You can't swing a dead Chinese cat without hitting a human "interest" story in NBC's Olympic coverage, so I'm frustrated that there hasn't been a Chinese classical musician/Chinese athlete development piece. Commitment from a national level to developing young talent of all genre? Come on, that's gold! [pun...intended.] Every time the cameras cut to Mama Phelps, I think how intriguing a piece examining successful young athletes'/musicians' parents would be; similarities would certainly cross national boundaries, there. And what better platform than The Olympics to explore where and how prodigies in all areas materialize, since multiple studies have shown that neither geography nor ethnicity appears to matter in sports or classical music.

Wikipedia's List of Child Prodigies is comedy to behold. No Hilary, no Joshua Bell, no Michael Phelps! Gotta love Ruth Ann Kepple, though, "prodigy of facts". Hilary never liked being called a prodigy; in interviews, she often half-jokes that the word originally meant "monster".  Young, exceptional athletes aren't called "prodigies", though: the term seems limited to the arts, chess and academics. Why is that? There's also the question of which athlete/musician child prodigies become tops of their fields when they reach adulthood; athletes almost can't, for physical reasons, whereas classical musician prodigies can have forty-plus year careers.

I enjoyed the six minutes of my life that was spent watching a former tennis pro eat "weird Chinese food" in between beach volleyball and synchronized diving, but I do think that exploring the prodigy topic during the Beijing Olympics could potentially shed some really interesting light on both sports and classical music. As usual, in my absolutely performing arts-biased opinion.