Music Is — and Always Was — Supposed to Be Fun

I’m jealous of my son Theo. Envious. Wishing I had my youth back and could walk in his shoes, at least in one respect.

Theo is blessed to have a one-of-a-kind orchestra teacher at school who radiates the idea that music is joy. Bust-out-smiling, completely-lose-yourself-in-the-moment kind of joy that involves hard work, yes, but never gets overtaken by it.

There were actual laughs at the kids’ orchestra concert the other night. Mr. Cole told jokes as he emceed the event, leading Theo and his fellow fifth-graders — first-year players all — through some simple exercises/songs and describing for the audience what the students are learning as the year goes on. The lessons go way beyond the music itself, expanding into concepts like personal responsibility and commitment and service to others.

But the joy of the music comes first.

At one point during the concert the kids plucked two notes — the right two notes — repeatedly, slowly at first and then becoming more rapid … until we realized that they were playing the beginning of the theme music from “Jaws.” An ominous shark video appeared on the big screen above the stage to add to the effect.

That’s Mr. Cole.

I wish I’d had him as a music teacher growing up. Alas, I did not. I had the complete opposite.

The music teachers I had in my K-12 years must have made a pact with each other to inject as much misery into singing and playing as humanly possible. I was always in choir, so I can only speak from that perspective; the band teachers looked sort of fun from afar. But choir could have easily been renamed chore; because it was a chore, seemingly by design.

We sang mostly Christian religious songs back then, which is a feat for a public school. And the atmosphere was always serious, ever so stuffy and formal, never once giving us a chance to let our hair down the way the hair bands did on MTV. (Note to younger readers: MTV once played music videos.) The only time I had fun was when we screwed around out of desperation because we couldn’t take another moment of forced tryouts and rehearsals for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

My friend Dan and I cooked up a scheme once to imitate Van Halen’s rendition of the old Roy Rogers sign-off song “Happy Trails” as a way to end one of our high school choir concerts. But we quickly abandoned the idea, knowing it would never fly with our forever uptight teacher. After all: It would have been fun (strike one), it was relatively contemporary (strike two), and it didn’t have the word “God” in it (strikes three, four, and five).

No, I’m not bitter.

That’s how music classes really were for me, though, especially in junior high and high school. Music was a blast in my everyday life — literally and figuratively — but somehow it was served up as Robitussin cough syrup in school: something to be endured, not savored. And it never even occurred to me that it could be different, that it was supposed to be different.

Until I started watching Mr. Cole in action. And in attitude.

A few months ago, Mr. Cole invited us parents to school one night so that we could spend an hour playing our kids’ instruments, under his instruction and direction. Most of us were rank beginners, just like our kids, but he still told us we played quite well — “for parents,” he was quick to add. It was a simple way we could taste both the highs and the challenges our kids experience as they learn to play the cello or the viola or whatever instrument they’ve chosen.

And it was fun. Everyday, normal, routine fun for Theo. Long, long overdue fun in a school music room for me. Something I didn’t think was possible.

God bless music teachers like Mr. Cole, for they are delivering to my kid and thousands of others a crucial message, early and often: Music is supposed to be fun. It is joy. Unbridled joy.

I’m finally getting the ride I always wanted in music class, at age 48, through my son and his exceptional teacher. I’m back in the saddle again.

Oops, that was Gene Autry.

Happy trails to you. Til we meet again.

Peter Vogt

I’m a writer. An essayist, to be more exact. I tell stories here—true stories, from my own life, in hopes they will make a positive difference in yours.

I share laughs and tears, insights and observations, frustrations and realizations, relying all the while on the storytelling wisdom of Julia Cameron, author of The Right to Write.

It is a great paradox that the more personal, focused, and specific your writing becomes, the more universally it communicates.