Conferences can be overwhelming. So first, to all whom I met in Cincinnati this past weekend, as well as those in Greenville, SC two weeks earlier, and in St. Charles, MO two weeks before that, please accept my best greetings and deep appreciation for the excitement you generated. That energy carries over and supports our work for the whole year (as, I suspect, it does yours).
It is hard to describe the sensation of being surrounded by a swirl of people whose overriding concern is creating beauty, goodness, and truth in their children’s education. Annoying stereotypes arise when some people speak about homeschooling. If only I could drop those skeptics into the midst of one such conference. Even the most dogmatic critic would have to rethink his prejudices.
Still, it takes a bit for things calm down after such conferences. I’m calming down in a hurry this time, though, because of entering a kind of earthly paradise. From Cincinnati, I came directly to Louisville, KY where I am parked on the second floor of a classic brick building, ensconced in a spacious office with lovely furnishing and real (openable) windows. One window looks out on the scenic green of Highlands Latin School and the other on its playing fields. The offices of Memoria Press are located on this same campus, so right up the knoll stands an even more beautiful, classic building where some of my favorite people in the world sit. They have brought me here to sit, think, and work as hard as possible on a music-and-art project.
What a contrast between my present situation and the pace of the last weeks. We were “recovering” from the Greenville conference, moving through Holy Week into Easter, then preparing for Cincinnati which meant gathering supplies for the booth, material for my talks, plus clothing and far too much snack food for the grandchildren who travel with us (now old enough to help in the exhibit hall). Once arrived at these conferences, one leaps off a high-dive into non-stop encounters with splendid colleagues, new families inquiring into homeschooling, and dear families of yore whose children not long ago were too young for Discovering Music, yet now are finishing college!
Monday morning, settling into the desk chair in my heavenly, temporary office, the silence was broken solely by the chirping joy of preschoolers from the Highlands Latin Cottage School. They were assembled a floor below me to watch the launch of Elon Musk’s big rocket. I wish you could have heard their excitement as teachers led them through practice count-downs. It didn’t seem to matter to them that the rocket launch was delayed. They simply took that energy out into the sunshine of the playground.
Later in that day, a varsity baseball game took place under cool, clear April skies. Everything that is grand about baseball, about youth, and about nature was woven into the same canvas. The next morning, Tuesday, these same high-schoolers were filling the chairs into which the preschoolers had clambered. Why? Because every student at Highlands Latin School is enrolled in choir. And not just playtime choir, but an ensemble providing a fairly rigorous training modeled after the traditional choir schools that bred many of our greatest thinkers and certainly our greatest musicians.
In a world where tradition is bashed, slashed, and trampled, often by those who barely understand it and rarely have experienced its fruits, how paradisical it is to be surrounded by educators who put their hearts on the line for it. Pedagogical traditions with centuries of roots exist for reasons. For example, to teach students to sing complex music, you have to pound out parts until the whole comes together. To build both the skills and the character endemic to a sport like baseball, students, coaches, and parents have to commit to hours, days, and weeks of practice plus a rigorous stretch of games (a second game took place Tuesday; another is scheduled this evening, Wednesday, as well as Thursday evening). Ongoing commitment is one of qualities lacking in today’s feeble ideas of education. It doesn’t matter whether it is easy or pleasant: each of us, preferably in youth, must learn what commitment means, and what it takes.
I could wax on more about this week at Highlands Latin, but my project is waiting, although nothing helps clear the thought like turning away for a bit. One thing for sure: the week is passing too quickly. Sunday I will fly to Dallas and spend a few days immersed in preparing a pre-concert talk on thrilling repertoire by young American composers Kevin Day and Adam Schoenberg, the latter the author of a spectacular percussion concerto written for the boundless artistry of Jacob Nissly, principal percussionist for the San Francisco Symphony. This will be a night of dazzling music, and I’m honored to be part of it.
And then, as my mother used to say when dragging me away from something I liked, “All good things come to an end” (really they don’t, but you get the idea). It will be time to fly home and see how high the laundry is piled. Because ultimately, we can’t stay forever on the mountaintop. It allows us the glorious view impossible to see from the trenches. Yet, without work in the trenches, nothing is planted, and nothing is reaped.
So let us be grateful for the intensity of events like conferences, the inspiration of a quiet work spaces (especially when enhanced by the crack of a bat), and the thrill of a dynamic concert. But let us also remember that our best achievements happen within the daily grind, as we grapple with stubborn problems while carting in groceries, tripping over muddy shoes, or searching for a sharpened pencil. Light shines in flares, but also in flickers. And each beam does its part to illuminate the darkness.