Be warned; this is going to be rather stream-of-conscious-esque.
I didn't grow up in a wealthy family. We were the epitome of "lower middle class." My dad jumped from job to job with his worker's union, and my mom worked at a local grocery store. We lived comfortably, but I didn't have a lot of the fancy gadgets that others had. On top of it all, we kind of lived in the middle of nowhere, in a small town with small schools, and hence not a totally prestigious music program (although, I have to say, Mr. Fosket has done wonders with what we did have). The nearest decently-sized city was a good hour away from where we lived. Two-hour round trip. We had a small house; a drum-set would have been out of the question in that place, as there would be nowhere to put it, let alone play it without driving my parents insane. My family wasn't a musical family. My sister, seven grades above me, went through the public music program that started at grade 6. She was the first in our family to play any instrument. We never had private lessons; we couldn't afford it, and there weren't many teachers in our area in the first place. I've seen pictures of now-amazing musicians when they were kids. Some of them, even as toddlers, had a mini drumset they played, or a toy keyboard. They had lessons starting at age 5. I didn't have any of that stuff. I didn't play music, aside from my tinkering on elementary school instruments, until 6th grade.
I remember one time in elementary school, there was some sort of culture assembly where some classical musicians came and played for us and talked to us about music. It totally enthralled me. I wanted to do what they did so badly (although at this point I was also totally enthralled by the motivational yoyoist that talked to us, too). In our music classes, I totally hated singing and dancing... but boy, when we took out this little tinker-toy mallet instruments and toy drums... I was in heaven. In fifth grade, I took a little evaluation to figure out what instrument I should play. I was a master of rhythm with those drumsticks. In sixth grade, I would be a percussionist.
And that happened. But my middle school band teacher wasn't the finest. He wasn't meant for the job he had. And something tells me he didn't give a rat's ass about what was going on way back in the percussion section in the back of the room. I took drums seriously. Very few others in that classroom did. I didn't have any professional lessons. Once or twice the local drum instructor came in and taught us "a thing or two." He wasn't meant for his job either. But he was what the area had. I essentially had to teach myself everything. One big thing did happen in middle school though (or, rather, didn't happen); I never actually really learned to read music. Sure I got the same basic instruction as everyone at the beginning. But as soon as he could, he threw me on timpani. There went my reading skills; right down the tube. To this day, I still have a very hard time reading music. I feel like if I had gotten some more decent training early on in my music career, I wouldn't be so disadvantaged now.
Fast-forward to high school. Bottom of the barrel. I barely knew how to play my instrument. A lot of others didn't, either. But by now those were the ones that were in this class because they knew it was an easy A, not because they wanted their lives enriched by music, or because they wanted to become better musicians, or even better drummers... they just wanted to hit shit and get an A for it. I could read music better than a lot of people there... but that wasn't saying much. To those who wanted to learn and needed to learn, Mr. Fosket taught. And I took in everything I could. But Mr. Fosket wasn't a percussionist, so he couldn't teach private lessons in them. At this point I didn't know what I wanted to do with music, and by this point I had started to play guitar, so that was more of a focus for me; percussion was just what I did with school. I had a solid sense of rhythm, but I never really got the chance to truly show what I was made of. I got a pretty good part in most ensemble pieces, including one of four "lead" parts in a piece that got us 2nd in the state solo/ensemble competition... but any mallet parts I ever had were essentially memorized. Rhythms were fantastic. Anything melodic or harmonic... I could not sight-read. Sophomore year I tried playing a mallet duet... and failed. Badly. Any musical dreams I had at that point were crushed. I figured I might as well do math. I was pretty good at that. While this wasn't really a turning point at all, my self-esteem hadn't really improved much.
Fast-forward to my senior year of high school. I'm more more self-motivated and independent than ever before. I've been on the sidelines in the band for three years, and I'm ready to prove what I'm capable of. I dug through Mr. Fosket's catalogs of percussion solos and found a short and pretty cool and easy one for the regional solo/ensemble competition. I practiced hard during band (and once or twice after school, as well as reading it to myself at home) for a couple of weeks. I won the spot to State, but much to my dismay, I'd need a new (and harder) piece of I really wanted to compete. Mr. Fosket, not always being one for personal motivational speaches, gave me subtle but effective encouragement. As did my mother. I went through some online samples of multi-percussion solos, and one in particular really caught my ear... but it sounded impossibly difficult. How could anyone possibly play that?! Absolutely insane. I'll find something easier. ...But I slowly got to thinking "...No, I can do this. If I put my mind to it, and work really, really hard, I can do it." So I got the score, and slowly picked away at it. I dug through the back of the band room, through piles of old equipment, looking for the right instruments that I would need for the solo, assembling it almost every day and practicing it after school when I didn't work. I played it on my lap for hours at home. I worked very, very hard, and with that piece, I got a $2000 scholarship and 2nd in the state. I finally had something for which to be truly proud of myself.
Fast-forward to college. Bottom of the barrel yet again. I realize that my musical skills are pretty lackluster. I'm worlds behind other entering freshmen. Sure, when it comes down to theory and weird rhythms and subtle things like that, sometimes I've got the edge. But essentially, when playing anything... bottom of the barrel. But I'm working hard on improving. I'm finally getting private lessons, and for one quarter I even got them from a fellow student, since I was so desperate for help, and this was truly what I wanted to do. It took me a year to muster up the courage and skills to actually audition for the band program... and from what it sounds like, I definitely needed that extra year. I almost gave up on music. But now, here I am. I'm finally a bit secure, now that I'm here in the band program.
But now I'm reading a book for my first music education class. It describes five kinds of musicians that become music teachers, and the professor, Stambaugh, added an extra one in class. We're supposed to pick one of these stories with which we most fit into. After listening to all of them, I realized that I didn't fit into any of them, because every single one of them received private lessons at a young age, came from a musical family, lived in a big city with a completely astounding music program, came into college as one of the best in their freshman class... all things that I never had. It's times like these that I realize that, yes, I was musically disadvantaged. But that didn't stop me in middle school. Or early high school. Or my senior year of high school. Or last year. And it won't stop me now.
--Jon
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