SEMINAL MOMENTS AND WHAT WE REALLY REMEMBER
It's that time of year. You can see the finish line, and lesson planning has given way to vacation planning. You chide your students in rehearsal to stay focused and on task, while your mind wanders to all things not music education-related.
There are still seminal moments ahead, however, so you need to stay in the moment. End-of-year performances, banquets, and graduation look large - followed by music collection, instrument check-in, and the dreaded end-of-year inventory.
These moments are important. The performances, graduation speeches, and last day good-byes. They matter. They provide closure for you and the students. You think that these are the moments your students will remember.
But there's something about this job that doesn't get talked about enough.
But they won't. And neither will you.
Or at least—not in the way you think you will.
Now, don't get me wrong. I love me a big moment. In fact, I have made a career and a lifetime reveling in them. But they are rarely as important as the moments leading up to them.
You see, the big moments are just evidence of the little moments that led up to it.
I have always said, "If I never go to a concert or contest again for the rest of my life, I will be just fine." Rehearsals? Now, that's another story.
Recently, I had the opportunity to conduct my son's band in a world premiere at Carnegie Hall. I don't know about you, but as far as "moments" go, that is about as big as it gets. It was magical. Fantastical. And something I will cherish for the rest of my life.
But it wasn't the part that brings a smile to my face. It was the rehearsals. Honestly, if you offered me another chance to conduct on that venerable stage or one more rehearsal, I would most assuredly choose the latter.
I could probably write several paragraphs as to why, but I will save you the trouble of reading all that - you're welcome.
Because somewhere along the way, I discovered that for me, the performance wasn't the purpose. It was a part of the process.
I was not always this way. And I love me a good contest.
Contests are measurable. Ratings are measurable. Trophies fit nicely into display cases. Administrators love programs with visible outcomes because they photograph well on district Facebook pages. Nobody posts, "Today, a sophomore trumpet player tried to recover gracefully after massively missing an entrance. And, if you look closely, you can see the percussion section starting a bonfire with their copy of Pomp and Circumstance.
These are not the moments your admin will remember, but they are the moments you students will remember.
They will remember the Tuesday in October when the clarinet section finally mailed page 47 of the drill. The day you lost your marbles because the trumpet section wouldn't shut up. Or the day you spilled your third cup of coffee on your shirt. Or is that just me?
That's the curriculum. Those are their memories. We're not producing performances. We are producing people.
And the strange beauty of music education is that students rarely realize what they're actually learning while they're learning it. And they're not learning it when they think they are.
They think they're learning dotted eighth-sixteenth note patterns. You're teaching delayed gratification.
They think they're learning breath support. You're teaching self-regulation.
They think they're learning how to tune a chord. You're teaching them how to exist inside a community without insisting on being the loudest person in the room—which, frankly, is a lesson half the adults on the internet still haven't mastered.
The final concert matters, of course. It should matter. Milestones deserve celebration. There is something sacred about the last cutoff of the year hanging in the air half a second longer than usual while everyone collectively realizes: Oh. We won't all be in this room together again.
But the emotional weight of that moment comes from accumulation.
Nobody is sad because the concert ended. They cry because a year's worth of rehearsals has ended.
Your success as an educator is not measured by whether the final chord was perfectly in tune. Honestly, most audiences can't tell the difference.
Your success is built upon 186 days of striving for excellence, creating art, and pushing kids to be something they aren't just yet. That's what they will remember. And as long as we're at it, that's the point of education.
As you close out the year, remember, the performance was never the destination. It was simply the proof that the journey happened.
Have a great week!
Scott