One that took.

Today, being the last day of finals week over at the high school, and the high school students thereby being on half days, a former member of my middle school orchestra stopped in to our class today to sit in and play with the kids. He's a sophomore now, and about as totally into music as a kid can get. He played obligatory violin in my class with all the rest of the third graders way back when, and then switched to study clarinet with me in 4th grade. He played all through elementary and middle school in the band and then the orchestra. Since entering high school he has made it his mission to learn all he can about every one of the woodwind instruments. He can play flute, oboe and clarinet with grace and ease, and sat between my 8th grade flute player and 8th grade clarinetist and jumped back and forth between the two parts. After class he asked if there was anything he could help with, like grading papers or something. I had this unsorted pile of music on my desk waiting to be put right, and I asked if he would want to tackle that. He happily took it on, mentioning that he is also the music librarian for his high school band. In no time at all, he had the music all sorted and put back into its correct folders.

As we hung out together, I asked him if he'd started to think about colleges yet, and did he think he might go to music school. Yes, he emphatically told me, he wants to go to music school. Julliard, no less. I can't tell you how happy it made me to hear him say that. In all the years that I have taught music- 15 in the public schools and many more before and still in private situations- not one of my students has ended up going to music school. I know there are many former students who still play for fun, and that is important and fulfilling in itself. But, finally, to have a student who has the passion to keep going all the way, and who has stayed connected with me is a new and wondrous lifetime achievement for me.

I can only take credit for getting him started. It's been his own drive and stick-to-itiveness that has gotten him this far. But I can't help thinking about my own high school music career, and how hanging-around-the-band- room-sorting-music-and-learning-every-instrument I was myself. I know what that's like. It's great that with all the distractions modern kids have, here is one who gets a kick out of the same things I did when I was his age a hundred million years ago. I don't know where he will end up, but I sure am going to enjoy watching him get there.