| I played the national anthem at an Eagle Scout cerimony for one of my friends/fellow eagle scouts. I didn't really have much time to play ahead of time and practice in the hall, and that came back to bite me in the butt later.
The hall was pretty small, with lots of jagged/cornerd walls up twards the front. I decided to stand in the back and play to the front (this turned out to be a bad idea). I started playing and got off to a good start. After about 5 seconds, I suddenly hear all my sound bouncing back and I hear a really loud echo of myself. That made me loose my focus and I missed a note. Luckly I recoverd quickly and got myself back together, but a couple seconds later that awful Bb (instead of B natural) came bouncing back and I lost all concentration. It just went down hill from there.
But here's the worst part. At Eagle Scout cerimonies we have what we call the "eagles nest" where everyone there who has earned their eagle comes and sits in a litle group up in the front (there were about 6 of us). So after I compleatly insulted America with my awful performance I had to go sit up in front of the entire crowd.
During the reception afterwords everyone was telling me how well I did (even though I did awful), and how it's such a difficult piece to play (when it's really quite simple). But finaly this litle kid about 5 years old comes up to me and says "wow, you really did bad..." His mother was so embarrased, but I was laughing and happy that some one was finaly honest with me....
We all have a few performances in our lives when things just don't go our way, but we need to put those in our past and just go on creating more wonderful music.
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-David Jacques |