I’ve been a band nerd all my life, and really, with parents like mine, there was no escaping it. My dad held a masters degree in music education, (in addition to a ministerial masters degree from the Iliff School of Theology in Denver). Essentially, he was either a high school band teacher or a Methodist minister, or usually some combination of the two when I was growing up. My mom, an accomplished pianist/part-time piano instructor/organist for the churches dad worked at/RN/mother. I know that when you think back on your childhood, it’s common for you to see your memories as a sort of mini-movie playing out on the back of your mind like it’s some sort of movie screen. But when I do this, I also hear a soundtrack along with the visual experience of my flashbacks. It’s a very choppy soundtrack, played randomly like the images in the back of my mind….One of my mom’s favorite records, The Carpenters, playing loudly on the record player while she vacuums around me on the floor…The sound of the church choir practicing on a Saturday afternoon in the sanctuary…piano notes painstakingly being pecked out awkwardly by one of mom’s students while Paul and I play with Legos quietly in the next room over…the staccato sound of my brother practicing the snare drum with my dad…my own “honking goose” sound from my clarinet as my dad patiently introduces me to the beauty of woodwinds…Somewhere between my memories of our spontaneous weekend visits to Seaside beach and my brother picking on me, the familiar notes of Rhapsody in Blue being played on a grand piano can be heard. The list can go on and on, but I will stop here for fear I may lose you dear reader.

The point is, I was born to be a band nerd. I couldn’t have avoided it even if I tried to. And actually, I doing remember trying. I guess being my mother’s only daughter, being placed in front of those 88 black and white keys was inevitable. Sitting high up on that piano bench, I remember a feeling of excitement flowing through me now that I was the one sitting next to my mother instead of one of those strange students. However, that feeling quickly dissipated once the lesson began. I was dumbfounded by the concept of having to read two lines of music simultaneously, and having to cross my hands over one another to reach the other octaves? What was that about? Not to mention those three mysterious pedals at my feet. I didn’t get much farther than learning middle C and maybe Hot Cross Buns and a song I can still play to this day, From a Wigwam. I had given up learning piano lessons and lessons before my mom eventually gave up as well. I think the conflict of interest is what really did us in. She was my mom, and I didn’t feel the pressure to practice as much because of that. Besides, there was no way I was going to read two lines of music at once. Sheesh.

Not long after the piano fiasco, I found myself with a violin. Our basements were always a fun place to explore for my brother and I. We moved a lot growing up, and therefore our family always had tons of cardboard boxes full of unpacked stuff in our basements lined up along the walls, laying in the middle of the concrete floor partially opened, etc. Whenever boredom would creep in on a weekend, my brother and I could be found rummaging through the old stuff in the basement. One day, I came across dad’s musical instrument collection. I remember a flute. A trombone or two. (My dad’s instrument of choice) A clarinet. And a violin. I opened all of the cases, looked, smelled and touched. The trombones smelled musty. The violin bow appealed to me because it looked like horse hair, and I liked horses. (I was probably 8 at the time.) And that’s how my violin years started. And then the music program at my elementary school introduced us to band instruments, and that was the end of string instruments for me. I traded my violin in for the clarinet in our downstairs music shop and it was official. I had become a band nerd.

I played through the rest of my elementary school years learning the basics from a very eccentric and strange teacher who only went by the name Dr. S. Thankfully, my lessons at school were supplemented by my dad’s instruction in his home office. Middle school brought better music and marching band, all-city. High school brought pep band, jazz band, all-state, solo & ensemble, more all-city, musicals and more marching band. College brought 1 semester of concert band on my freshman year transcript at the University of Northern Colorado, and then…I transferred to another college, chose a major and dropped playing. I missed it kind of like you would miss someone who passes away. At first, a little bit. And then, the longer it goes since you’ve seen them, more and more. Sometimes, I would pull out some old music I still had and play. An old solo, or a few measures I surprisingly still had memorized from my marching days. Just to see if I still could. Having played so well before, it was strange to think maybe I couldn’t play anymore. Someone once told me it’s like riding a bike. You never really forget how. And truthfully, I never did, but my embouchure sure got sloppy, and so did my sound. I needed something to get me playing again. I asked the local music shops if there were any community bands I could participate in, but there were none. I could take private lessons. I took a card, but I never called.

Then, I moved to Eugene. I started sticking around after work at the high school I worked at on game days to play with the high school pep band occasionally. (What can I say? Louie, Louie just never gets old for me). I asked the local music shop if there were any community band opportunities, and was given multiple options. I quickly joined the summer Springfield Community Band as well as the summer Eugene Symphonic Band. And now summer community band has led me to participating year-round in the local community bands, and finally I’ve gotten back to my band nerd roots and I couldn’t be happier about it. Each Monday night you can now find me excitedly hurrying out of work in order to make the drive to the beautiful University of Oregon campus, where I get to spend two glorious hours in one of the band practice rooms in the school of music with the ESB. Surrounded by other “band nerds” like myself, playing music. It makes for a very long Monday as practice doesn’t get out until 8:30, and then I need to make the 30 minute drive home but it’s well worth it. Walking along the path outside of the school of music to my car after practice the other night, the notes of a trumpet were wafting down out of an open window from a music room on the second floor, and I couldn’t have been happier as I silently thanked my parents for the inevitable love of music that they instilled in me.

In fact, lately all this band nonsense has really gotten me to thinking about my college major all those years ago. What if…?

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