When I was in elementary school, I picked up a saxophone for the first time.

I didn’t know how to play or what it even really sounded like, but I decided I was going to learn to play it because it “looked cool”. Now, 6 years later, I am the Bari Sax player in the Symphony and Jazz Band, and I highly enjoy playing music and the deep rumbling sound the Bari Sax makes when it’s mated with a half-decent player. I’ve always loved making music, and Band class is probably my favorite class. It wasn’t always this way however.

In middle school, I dreaded band. The novelty of playing an instrument had worn off, and I didn’t have much confidence in my abilities. Furthermore, I found band boring, especially in 6th grade. It all seemed so monotonous, and I didn’t get a lot of joy out of the music we played. As I moved into high school, things seemed unlikely to change. I didn’t feel I was very good, and I didn’t really talk to anyone my freshman year.

At the end of the second semester however, the band director came up and asked me if I would like to play Bari in the jazz band for the next school year. I said yes because jazz band was a lot of fun in 8th grade. Showing up for the first day of class in september, I was nervous, but we didn’t even take our instruments out, we just went over music and talked. This became a standard for the first few weeks of school as we worked out what pieces we wanted to play. I gradually became accustomed to this routine, until one day we were told to take our instruments out. I was scared to death, especially when I was told we would be improvising that day. I looked over at the tenor player next to me, some guy I’d never really talked to. He seemed in control of the situation so I tried to imitate him. When it came for my turn to play, I did awfully. I’m no good at improvising, and it didn’t magically get better when it was my turn to play. I was mortified, and I thought for sure that everyone thought that I sucked. Then it was the calm tenor players turn to make up a few riffs, and I prepared myself for an amazing follow up to my dismal performance. To my surprise, he wasn’t much better than me! I was shocked at how nonchalant he seemed after he was finished. Did he not care about what the other people thought of him?

That’s when it hit me. It wasn’t that he didn’t care - it was that they didn’t care if he messed up. That was the first time that I realized what my band director always talked about at band camp; how band was a family that we were all part of, wasn’t just a bunch of cliche nonsense like I’d originally assumed it was, but that it was true. In band class, I feel like we’re all almost united in our endeavour to make great music, and some of my best friendships were made in band. Walking into that room, it almost feels like (cliche as it may sound) I’m walking into a second home. I feel comfortable, and I know that  I have these shared experiences with all these people. In band, people just understand you, even if you haven’t really talked to that person much before.

This is why I believe in finding a community that you fit in. Go be with people that you can relate to, be it over music, a sport, or even just a shared experience.