Helei Gomariz

Karen Tucker

ENC 2135

28 Oct. 2015

Inside My Bubble

The best summer of my life happened a year ago. Someone told me about a summer

orchestra festival in North Carolina, and I decided to apply, just for the heck of it, with no real

hope of getting accepted. A few weeks later the results came in and much to my surprise they

had accepted me with a substantial scholarship. I think the places that I feel most comfortable are

around musicians, mostly classical, but not necessarily, and that’s why Eastern Music Festival

was such a great experience. Without EMF I would have never met Kayla or Ana Luna or Gaby

or Antonio or any of whom I consider now to be my closest friends. It was there that I

experienced the greatest happiness of my life but also the greatest sadness. We were only

together for five weeks, which might seem like a long time, but goes by quicker than one could

possibly imagine. There are huge, important, and defining memories of that summer that I feel I

should remember the best, yet I mostly remember the smaller details, the routine. I remember

waking up at six every morning and running to Gaby’s room:

“Gaby hurry up, we’re going to miss breakfast!!!”

“Give me five minutes, I’m almost ready I promise!”

“Hey Eloise have you seen Gaby?”

“No.” she said with a glare.

I’m pretty sure Eloise started to hate me near the end. Even the unpleasant aspects, communal

bathrooms, curfew, early mornings, became pleasant because I knew I would never be alone.

There was a friend around every corner. Sometimes it would have been nice to have a little bit of

privacy, but I would not trade that experience for the world.

It’s amazing how something as simple and taken for granted as music can be such a life

changing experience. We were all classically trained musicians. We knew the same repertoire,

had played the same pieces (for the most part), and spoke with certain vernacular that most other

people, or even non-classical musicians would be able to understand. We would talk about atonal

composers, neopolitan 6ths, bow weight distribution, different types of rosin, and so on (if you

are not a musician and are reading this props to you if you know what any of those things are).

Around this time I also phased out of any music other than classical music. I used to listen to

alternative and classic rock, but for some reason a few years ago I stopped listening to any of that

and became a classical music snob. It probably had a lot to do with my boyfriend at the time,

who had been judged by the Florida Flute Association to be the best flute player in Florida. I

think that listening to classical music so much gave me an advantage in the festival setting that a

few of my friends did not have.

The day that the festival ended came the great depression. I have never seen so many

people crying at the same time. I would never see most of these people again. Music is a much

more powerful force than people may realize. Music is what created this festival and what

created my experience. It is not just a song or a symphony, it is a common factor shared among

the ninety-five people who were chosen to participate in this festival. The only reason why I

even considered doing violin as a career was through motivation from the people at EMF. The

competition was real.

This was also the summer that I played Rite of Spring, one of the most difficult pieces in

the history of orchestral repertoire. It was without a doubt the best concert I had ever played in,

and the audience thought so as well. There was something about the adrenaline rush that I had

never experienced as vividly or intensely. Even in rehearsal I had never been able to get all the

notes, but somehow in the concert I did. Probably one of the reasons why it was so difficult to

leave EMF was because I knew I would never get the chance to play with the same group of

people again and would never be able to replicate what had happened in that concert.

North Carolina had been my reality for five weeks and within eight hours I was back in

Tallahassee. My room was just as I had left it. My bed was made and there was still a small pile

of clean laundry sitting on my desk. A fine layer of dust coated all surfaces. I had spent most of

the car ride home crying or sleeping so I don’t remember much, but somehow I had left my little

bubble of the world in Greensboro and travelled back to reality, which was Tallahassee. For

months afterwards I would text and skype my friends constantly, but now that everyone had

returned to their real lives nothing would be the same. The only things we had left were photos,

videos and recordings. I remember looking through the photos on my phone every single day just

to assure myself that it all had really happened and hadn’t been some sort of wonderful dream.

Every time I saw someone’s face, laughing or smiling or annoyed or angry, I would either start

laughing or crying, both out of some sort of happiness. Those few weeks after my wonderful

summer ended were the most depressed I think I have ever been. I imagine what it would have

been like without technology: no photos, phones, email, texting…we would be able to write

letters to each other?

I’m not sure if I can emphasize enough how isolated we had been. I left the campus a

total of two times during the five weeks that I was there. A week into the festival my boyfriend

broke up with me, and he was the only person from home who I had been talking to besides my

parents. I was around the same ten people for twenty-four hours every single day (even counting

sleeping time because I had a roommate). After five weeks we had no choice but to go home. I

will always feel like a part of me is still left there in Greensboro, but what I still have with me are

the memories in photos, videos and recordings of the best friends and the best music that I have

made in my life.

The thing is life there was definitely not as perfect as I made it seem…

“So how was chamber?”

“The first violin sucks.”

“I heard he was pretty good.”

“Maybe at solo rep, but definitely not at practicing his part.”

“Why did she get first chair? She’s not a very good leader…”

“I like her, do you think you could do better?”

“Well no, but they should have put someone else up there, like Sara.”

“I heard that the violins of Mahler 6 had to have a sectional…”

“Oh my god, they’re all so bad and so out of tune, it’s like none of them can count.”

“I mean we’re winds…they just play as a section, but they do have the melody a lot and they

have to be able to give us cues.”

“At Eastman the violins are so much better.”

“Same at NYO.”

“I’m going somewhere better next year.”

“Michael hasn’t even played a concerto…”

“How did he get in?”

“I don’t know, I just really don’t want to be his stand partner, he’ll screw me up.”

“Dude my stand partner right now keeps speeding and it throws me off so much.”

“Oh that sucks, yeah I heard him practicing…so out of tune…”

Shots fired. When all the egos gather together all hell doesn’t break loose all at once…but

little snippets of it slowly and steadily push their way into our lives causing drama, hatred and

discrimination. When I say discrimination the first thing that usually pops into peoples head is

race or skin color or religion or sexuality. Here I’m talking about instruments. Originally

orchestral music began in small ensembles that grew into larger sections and as orchestras grew

bigger the sections became more divided and collaborated less with one another. A lunchroom in

high school has basically the same concept as a lunchroom at a summer music festival. You

don’t only enter the cafeteria, but you also entered the cast of Mean Girls.

“Over there in the corner you have the flutes. They’re pretentious because they all go to big

music schools. There at that big table you have some of the violins sitting with the conductors.

They’re major suck ups. Over on the patio you have the bass players…they’re pretty chill. Then

at that round table are the clarinets and they’re so weird and sort of obsessed with themselves.”

I can easily say that most of my friends this summer were string players, and while other

instruments bash the string section, none of them bash the violins harder than the violins

themselves. Talent is the most highly valued attribute. You often hear: “She’s a bitch, but she’s

so good, did you hear her tchaik?” I think having an ego is a part of any form of art, but that does

not mean that I condone actions that will boost an ego at the expense of another’s feelings. There

will always be someone better than you, but there will also always be someone worse than you

and that can be the kickstart to a massive ego.

Imagine standing in a huge room. This room is called the Carnegie room. Carnegie…like

Carnegie hall? Carnegie Mellon? Sounds important and prestigious. It is just a room, a very

lavishly decorated room, but a room all the same, and has nothing to do with Carnegie hall or

Carnegie Mellon University, but nevertheless there is power in a name. Sitting in that room are

fifty or so other violinists, both students and faculty members, who have been playing the

instrument for just as long as you have or fifty years longer. Half of these professors graduated

from Juilliard. Half of them teach at a university. Half of them perform with major symphonies

such as the Chicago Symphony. You’ve heard these kids talk. They talk shit about their friends,

they talk shit about people who aren’t their friends. They will analyze every single sound that

your instrument makes. You walk out onto the floor. You practiced hours in preparation for

this…it’s not even a big deal! Just a studio class. Your fingers start sweating. “Oh crap, now my

shifts will be messy.” This makes you more nervous because now you know for sure it won’t

sound like it did in the practice room. Your knees begin to shake. You play and you’re out of

control, it doesn’t even feel like you’re playing. Every single sound you make shocks you just

enough to break your focus, the focus that you never were able to grasp ahold of completely in

the first place. This is performance, for me at least. I know some people do not experience these

sensations but they are the lucky few. Very few. Even though this community sounds like the

least appealing terrifying community to be a part of, in reality the violin community is very

supporting. Sure they discriminate and talk bad, but they never do it directly to anyone’s face.

Since we’ve all experienced the same type of performance anxiety and gone through the same

milestones we can all relate very easily to one another and be forgiving of mistakes. The

problems arise when people get stuck on their current level and forget that they struggled to

make it to the next level just like everyone else .

“Oh my god, great job!”

(“Wow that was not her best…I heard her in the practice room.”)

(“That’s not how she actually plays though, she just got really nervous, I could tell.”)

The world of music is vastly complex, more than anyone can imagine. It causes

psychological trauma, but also fixes it. In it you find your soul mates, the people who you will be

able to connect to for the rest of your life, and you see how cruel humans can really be. It is

interesting because although I have experienced this, I am able to look at it through a lens.

“Wow, he sucked.”

“That concerto is really hard… and I don’t think you could have performed it any better.”

I oftentimes found myself defending those who were being discriminated for their performance

abilities because I knew that if I ever had the courage to perform in front of an audience of fifty

or so violinists it would never my real talent.

Even though the festival holds scarring memories for me it also holds great ones. I have

learned, from experience, that the only way I learn is from experience. I think that accepting

failure is a part of that experience that will one day shape me into the person I was meant to be.

Failure to me can mean a great many things: failure to choose friends wisely, failure to perform

your best, failure to take advantage of your opportunities. For me personally most of my failure

is musical in nature, and that is why I will never be a music major. Now don’t get me wrong,

music has changed my life, I might even say for the better, but it has also made me realize that

there is definitely more to life that I want to experience. Being a musician can trap you in a

bubble from which you may never escape.