Idyllic Studies

I started playing music in second grade. Enrollment for band and orchestra began in third, but, in my effort to defy every rule in sight, I petitioned to be allowed to start a year early. I wanted to play cello, my favorite stringed instrument, but was told my hands were too small and that I should play violin instead. Deciding not to fight that battle, I picked up my designated instrument and set out to train my muscles and ears to make music.

From a young age, I felt music in my bones. My mother, a deeply creative woman, was a concert pianist—she left her home in Texas to train at Julliard when she was only 16-years-old, one of two people selected out of thousands to do so. My mother instilled in me a deep love and respect for musicality. The rare times she sat at the piano to play, the notes would echo through the house, and everyone would stop what they were doing and quiet. Her well-trained fingers danced over the keys, and we could hear her through the music. Though she didn’t sing, it was like I could hear her voice in every note.

My four siblings are all musically endowed. My oldest brother, the musical star of the family, can pick up any instrument, learn it in minutes, and use it to sing beautiful covers of all the best songs. My older brother is a brilliant singer and songwriter (though he’s so secretive about it that I’ve only heard tales of his talent). My younger sister expressed her musicality through dance and was a stunning classically trained ballerina. As for my youngest brother—you can hear him strike a single key on the piano and know that it is him at the bench.

I, the middle child, was first chair in my school’s orchestra and took pride in playing that single A note in front of everyone at the start of concerts. I took lessons, learned to read sheet music, did solo performances, and so forth. But, unlike my siblings, I was never any good.

When I say I was never any good, I mean something very specific—I failed a requirement that I imposed on myself. Despite feeling music in my bones, I never felt it in my playing. My muscular dexterity was high at the time, and I became technically quite good, but I was rarely subsumed by the music I played, and, even at a young age, I knew that meant that what other people heard wasn’t good. Frustrated with myself, I eventually quit the violin forever and began telling myself the narrative that I, Nic, suck at music.

No more. I have music in my bones, and it wants to come out. At 30-years-old, I finally feel ready to let it. I may suck at music now, but I know I can get better. I started a YouTube channel called Nic Sucks At Music to document my journey—check it out!