Recital

“I really don’t want to do this.”

The voice from the back seat dripped with despair and anxiety. I drove on, listening to muffled sobs, trying to think of something reassuring to say. Nothing I tried seemed to help. We were driving to my son’s first piano recital and he was nervous and scared. I tried to project an air of calm confidence but I knew how he felt and I knew there were few ways to make it better.

“I’m going to embarrass myself. Dad, I really really don’t want to do this. I’m scared.”

His pleading tore at my heart but I drove on. We pulled into a parking spot, I turned off the engine and we sat. I watched as other cars pulled up and people hustled to the building. Most of them had that grand-parent look to them. I didn’t see any other students - probably already inside, I surmised. We didn’t have an entourage. Not because we don’t have people who would have been interested but because we neglected to note the date of the recital on our calendar. We would have missed it completely except we had a lesson the night before and his teacher mentioned that we should be here by 7. My wife and older son were already committed to a boy scout camp-out. It was just the two of us and the thirteen other students and their extended families. N felt unprepared and I felt like it was partly my fault. That fact made his sobs all the more painful to me.

He was in a good mood earlier. I’d picked out some nice clothes and he’d eagerly gotten dressed. We had thirty minutes before we needed to leave so I suggested he run through his piece once. The piece is entitled “March of the Gnomes”, chosen by his teacher because she learned of his love of gnomes. N decided to perform it while wearing a gnome-style hat with an attached beard. He took my advice and sat down at our piano, adjusted his hat, and began. He played through the piece almost perfectly, probably the best he’s ever done it. He smiled, obviously proud.

I began preparing to leave. I told N that, after such a good run through, it might be best to step away from the piano and leave on a high note. He did not heed my advice. He wanted to try one more time, just to see if he could get it perfect. He tried. This time there were a couple of rougher spots. Upset with himself, he launched into a third attempt. More mistakes. I looked at the clock, we needed to leave. Crying now, he tried a frantic fourth time. Midway through the piece, he lost his place completely. This had never happened to him before. Panic set in as I shuffled him out the door and into the car.

As we sat in the parking lot, I explained that even if he didn’t want to perform, we still had to go inside and talk to his teacher. She was expecting him and he couldn’t just not show up. N has a great deal of respect for his teacher and I explained that she may be able to help him feel better. We went inside.

The recital room was packed. Fourteen families turns out to be quite a crowd. Most of the other kids were sitting up front, in a row of chairs off to the side of the piano. We found his teacher and I explained the situation. She tried to calm N down with some breathing exercises. I sat down in the audience. N sat next to me, clutching his music and his gnome hat.

A couple of minutes later, the last student arrived. The teacher brought all the other students together in a huddle near the piano. I urged N to join them to hear what last-minute instructions she was giving. He reluctantly complied and positioned himself on the outskirts of the group, occasionally glancing back at me.

As the huddle broke, I watched as his teacher gently put a hand on N’s shoulder and guided him over to an open chair along student’s row. Without really thinking, he sat down at the end of the row of chairs, beside another little boy clutching a sheet of music. He sat and stared back at me, still unsure how he had gone from sitting next to me to suddenly sitting at the front of the room. He looked scared, probably because he was scared.

As the teacher began her introductory remarks,I checked the program, hoping that N would be playing near the beginning. Sitting in that chair, waiting to face the crowd seemed like torture. I just wanted it over with. Alas, I looked to see that eleven other students would play before him. So much for getting it over with quickly.

Soon, the recital was underway. I alternated my attention from the piano to my son, trying to assess his mood. As the night progressed, I detected a slight improvement in his demeanor. Gradually, he was focusing less on me and the crowd and more on the other students and their performances. He almost, almost looked like he was enjoying himself.

Finally, his turn came. The crowd chuckled as he strode up to the piano in his gnome hat and beard, but he looked serious. After a brief moment to compose himself, he started playing. It wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t too bad either, certainly on par with his peers. He finished, stood, pulled off the gnome hat and bowed a big bow. He was all smiles as he returned to his seat.

After the last performance, the room turned into a sea of motion as parents and grand-parents reunited with their pianists. N was a bundle of excited happiness as he received congratulatory remarks from some of the other adults in the group. He posed at the piano and I took a picture to capture this triumphant moment.

On the drive home, the voice from the back seat was a happy, chatty one as he worked through expelling the pent up energy of the night. A couple of my favorite quotes I heard as I drove:

“I don’t know for sure if how I feel now is worth how I felt before, but I think it is.”

and

“I’m so happy that, I think if someone slapped me, I’d still be happy!”

Me too.