The Violin: My Third Language

It wasn't quite a "sparks fly" kind of moment. Like real love, my heart merged with it over time.

In fourth grade, all the kids were given the opportunity to join the school orchestra for the first time. If you wanted to be cool, you would sign up. Like, come on, an instrument? Held in your hands? Get out of here.

There were four options: a huge bass that towered over you and shook the ground when played, a cello the size of your body that was perfect for hiding cell phones behind, a viola with a deep melodious sound, or a violin with a wide range of pitch. It was my dad who nudged me towards the violin. (Thank you, dad.)

My teacher measured my arm and announced my match would be a 3/4 size violin. When I first held my cheap, rental violin, I was uncomfortable. The shoulder rest pained my collarbone and my arm holding it up cramped two minutes into the class. It went on like this for a month: unpack, get it tuned, rosin the bow, then go over the names of the strings and how to hold it up. Forty five minutes later, the teacher would clap her hands and instruct us to put our instruments away. Our second month, we learned to bow the open strings and the notes on the D and A strings. I was this close

to exploding. To me, it appeared I had gotten a new pet that did nothing but sit there as I took care of it. It was boring. I have to applaud the teacher. Being stuck in a room with beginner violinists is difficult. It is the equivalence of being locked in a dusty closet with cats scratching a chalkboard. Both include adorable living things making ANNOYING sounds.

She gave us sheet music to practice for the end-of-year concert and I dutifully practiced it. The concert was over before we knew it. We returned our rental instruments and I was glad to no longer be in the vicinity of it.

That summer, I told myself I wouldn't do violin anymore.

Yeah right.

Fifth grade came and I signed up for orchestra again. There was some little, itty bitty voice inside of me nagging at me as I clutched my new full size violin on the first day. I was determined to play, to prove that I could do it. The sheet music was only slightly harder than the previous year, this time with more G and E string notes. We also had practice logs, where we had to record how much time we spent practicing each week. Over the course of the year, I watched as my time slowly increased from 15 minutes to 1 hour each day. There even came a day when my teacher got mad at me for practicing too much. I toned it down. I also participated in my first festival, getting a score of 2 (1 being the best). My excitement at my first medal made my friends think I had lost it.

But when fifth grade passed, I felt a sense of pride. I had been able to do what I thought I would never do. The violin became my fuel for determination as I practiced endlessly for days on end. When the day came to return our rental instruments, there was a feeling of sadness within me. There was a bond between that violin and me. And now it would be returned, for some other kid to use to play. As selfish as I was, I wanted that violin to be mine.

Which is why I decided to buy my own violin for sixth grade. It was a huge milestone for me, being able to claim that instrument as mine. Looking back at that violin (which I named Olivia, in all seriousness), it wasn't the best quality, perhaps $100 or so. But I loved it. It was the instrument I took with me to middle school as I made it into the school's Symphonic orchestra.

Through those two years of middle school, private lessons guided me alongside school classes. I continued competing in festivals (getting 1s!) and auditioned for the Junior District Orchestra. I did horribly (my scores were so bad, my teacher visibly cringed as she handed them to me) and was so upset I lost my appetite for violin for a few weeks. But when eighth grade rolled around, I tried out again. I made it in by the last spot, beating my competitor by .1. .1. That's crazy. During study hall, I would race to grab a practice room and practice intensely for those meager thirty minutes. My friends would peek into the room and supply moral support as I sweated through notes I didn't know I could play. And I wasn't the best. (That's not modesty, that's honesty.) There were kids in the Chamber orchestra above me that were prodigies! I would listen to them, admiring the elegance in their performance and their amazing intonation. That year, I got a much better quality violin, which I named Lindsey after my violin idol, Lindsey Stirling.

I auditioned for high school, getting into their Symphonic Orchestra. That year was perhaps one of the hardest as we were pushed harder than ever to get through pieces that required sixth position shifting in a quarter note equals 200 beat. We dressed up for the Halloween concert (I was Katniss Everdeen) and went through fundraisers.

Looking back at it all, it seems like an incredible ride. It certainly wasn't easy. But I persevered. It was in the violin that I discovered a piece of myself I didn't know was missing. It was through my violin that I regained self-confidence, I made friends, and I discovered a passion that I could apply to all areas of my life. There never was quite a "sparks fly" kind of moment. Like real love, my heart merged with the violin over time. We went through ups and downs, through terrible scores and deafening pitch issues to difficult pieces and a concert where I ran out of rosin midway (no rosin = no sound).

But it was all worth it in the end.