Sandra Low
Confucius said " We have two lives, and the second begins when we realize we only have one"
For me, my moment of realization came about 3 months after my stroke (I suffered a stroke at age 51 on March 19, 2013) during my June appointment with my neurologist. I was feeling frustrated and was complaining to him "Why is my recovery taking so long? Shouldn't I be able to walk better? When will I be able to get back to work?." I will never forget his reaction and reply - he paused for a few moments and then said "Sandra, 80% of the people who suffer a stroke, they die - so I think you are doing pretty good." I had to hear him say these words before I realized the enormity of what I had gone through. But more important, was the revelation that was to come after. I was actually really lucky to have experienced such a huge negative health incident and recover with minimal deficits. And that, as Confucius said, was the moment my second life began.
Ever since I was a child, I had always loved music - I grew up watching musicals on TV and I sang all the time. I had always yearned to play the piano but never learned because our family finances were such that we were hard pressed to get the basics in life, much less luxuries like music lessons. But now, as a mature adult, it was a different story. I started piano lessons that same year in September before I was even well enough to go back to work. ( I would be off work for 8 months and it would be 10 whole months before I would be working at my 0.5 FTE pre-stroke capacity. )
My music learning journey started with the goal of learning to play music as a hobby. And it would have continued on this trajectory if it had not been for my second teacher, in my third year (September 2015 - June 2016) of piano studies. As an adult music learner, you come across many music teachers that believe that if you did not learn music at a young age that you will not be able to achieve excellence. I find these thoughts especially prevalent among classical piano teachers.
And I think my second teacher, like my first teacher, had this usual bias when he first met me. However, when he realized that I was committed to learning and that I was really willing to put in the time and hard work to achieve results, his attitude towards me totally changed. He started teaching me concepts of music that normally would not be taught to students learning level 2 and it was in this way that I was introduced to the wonder of music and why I started to love it. He was only my teacher for that third year as he moved away from Calgary in the summer of 2016.
I have learned piano from six different teachers and have taken levels 1, 2, 4 and 6 exams with my last level 6 piano exam completed in June 2024, I started learning from my current and 6th piano teacher, Kathleen van Mourik in April 2024. I realize that I am very lucky to be learning from her as there was still space left in her teaching schedule when I started my studies with her. Her schedule is now totally filled and she is a much sought after after teacher.
After my successful level 6 piano exam, I decided to gift myself the opportunity to explore another instrument. I have always loved the sound of the cello and wanted to explore learning this instrument. So in Sept 2024, I started private cello lessons with David Morrissey. In addition, I also decided to explore the learning required in ensembles and joined the Westwinds Green Strings ensemble taught by Heidi Behrenbruch in Sept 2024. In September 2025, I graduated to Blue Strings which is also taught by Heidi.
I also love singing! I sang in a community choir for 8 years (2004 - 2011) but started concentrating on solo voice in April 2017. My leaning is towards jazz and have taken jazz vocal lessons in the past but these are on pause for now.
In 2025, due to some events in my personal life, I realized that I needed to have the endorphin rush that choir singing gives me. So in Sept 2025, I joined the Westwinds Mixed Choir taught by Justin Macosky. I am happy to be singing in a choir again although this meant life got really busy in September 2025. And of course, life is busy if you are invested in five music learning streams: music theory, solo classical piano, solo cello, group cello and group choir. When I wrote and passed my level 4 music theory exam (for level 8 piano) in Nov 2025, it freed up both time and money which I was very thankful for.
Because I fell in love with piano and music learning early on in my music journey, I wanted to meet other adults like me who loved music learning too. I looked for a few years but could not find the group that I was looking for. So I decided to create one: I conceived of ‘ Adults Learning Music Support Group’ in December 2017 and our first group meeting was realized on March 11, 2018. Now, we are in our 7th anniversary year and our membership keeps growing which is a testament to the need of a group like this for adult music learners.
updated Dec 7, 2025