Most 12-year-olds find it challenging remembering classroom lessons, let alone a 23-minute concerto by one of the world's great composers.
But for Ngaru Martin, music - and particularly the violin - has become a way of life that has seen her rise to standards that adults struggle to achieve.
The home-schooled Whau
Valley girl is an exponent of the Suzuki method of learning that encourages children to play by ``ear'' and memory when they are young. Ngaru has been playing the violin since she was four.
She is now able to perform Mozart's 23-minute Violin Concerto No.4 from memory.
Ngaru's teacher Victoria Harkness said her pupil was achieving standards well ahead of her age.
"At 12, she's playing pieces that I would have been playing at university level," she said.
The Suzuki technique created by Dr Shinichi Suzuki won world recognition in the 1950s. "Central to the (Suzuki) system is the belief that every child can be educated," said Mrs Harkness.
For now Ngaru has hour-long violin lessons once a week and practises twice a day - an hour in the morning and afternoon. She has won scholarships from the Knight's Templar Foundation in Auckland and has won the under-12 violin section of the Northland Performing Arts Festival competitions for the past three years.
Ngaru plays no other instruments, "but I'd like to play the piano". An older brother plays piano and younger sisters play the cello and violin.
Audiences can hear 20 Suzuki violin students, including Ngaru, at a Winter Escape Family Concert at St John's Church, Kamo Rd, Whangarei, on Saturday at 4pm.
