Real Life Matters

“When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.” – Buddha Siddhartha Guatama Shakyamuni

In high school, I studied trumpet with Alvin Belknap. He played trumpet in the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. I loved having him as my teacher. But he didn’t love having me as a student – at least at first. One day, I arrived for my lesson and went down to his basement studio to warm up, as usual. He came down a few minutes later, crossed his arms and said: “Tim, I can tell that you have not been practicing. I don’t need your money and I really don’t need you to waste my time. So, I’d like you to put your trumpet in its case, get in your car and go home. You can call me in two weeks, and I will think about giving you additional lessons.”

Mr. Belknap knocked me right off my pedestal. For those who knew me then, it was overdue. I had been skating by in life without really trying. The tough lesson I received from Mr. Belknap changed me forever. I went home and practiced like crazy. I called Alvin Belknap in two weeks and he kindly agreed to continue teaching me how to play the trumpet. It was as if our difficult conversation had never happened. This time, however, I focused and did my very best to be the best trumpet player I could possibly be. My interaction with Mr. Belknap was a watershed moment.

While studying at North Park College in Chicago, I played in the orchestra and our conductor, Thom Wilkins, inspired me to do my very best. To this day, he remains an inspiration to many.^[1]This recent speech by Thomas Wilkins is excellent. While at North Park, I was also able to take private trumpet lessons with Luther Didrickson, a professor of trumpet at Northwestern University. I simultaneously feared and admired Mr. Didrickson. He was a legend.^[2]http://www.hsutrumpets.com/luther-didrickson/.

Many of us need at least one teacher who cares enough to demand the very best that we are able to offer. Great teachers intervene at just the right moment, changing the trajectory of our lives forever. Less enlightened teachers can cause terrible emotional damage. It should be no surprise that the most demanding teachers are the ones we remember. Their impact persists long after they are gone from our lives. Indeed, they never truly leave us.

At this stage of my life, I do not have a music teacher looking over my shoulder, inspiring me to practice every day. My trumpets now rest in their cases in our basement. My guitars live in our storage unit in the dark. Nevertheless, the lessons I learned with these instruments carry on within me as a legacy to where I have been, what I have learned, and who I am today.

“Storytelling is the fundamental currency of medicine.” — Suzanne Koven