> Honestly, the whole "you need to get them when they are young" idea never convinced me very much. It's never too late to learn a thing and often you need a certain age to actually appreciate something. You don't have to be a childhood prodigy to be good at something.

While starting early is neither necessary nor sufficient for success, the question should be: do the benefits of starting early outweigh risks? Like the parent comment, I think they do, if done correctly and gently, but it should be decided case-by-case for each child. The only risk I can think of is: if you push too hard, it can have the opposite effect of making the child hate it. So, one has to do it with utmost sensitivity and by responding to cues and feedback from the pupil.