Music Boy

Last Sunday morning, Easter Sunday, the preacher who is an elderly gentleman with a long career in evangelism, stepped up to the pulpit to give the morning announcements. In an effort to compliment me for our opening hymn, he forgot my name and called me the "music boy!" Somewhat incensed, I was tempted to respond back to the "preacher boy," but I wisely held my tongue and went on with the service. Of course the service was not about my bruised ego nor was it about my embarrassment nor was the service about what people were thinking. The service was about Jesus Christ and the events of the Resurrection.

Later the preacher apologized to me for his statement, which meant no harm, and explained that in his casual country background, he tended to called everybody a "boy." And in thinking about it more, I realize I have heard people refer to each other as "old boy" many times. So I suppose music boy makes a little bit of sense in some ways. All is forgiven and I am over it.

I have always resisted being labeled a "music person" or a "music" expert or even a musician in that it makes me feel rather limited and narrow, which could be true in some ways but certainly not in others. In fact I resist labels (I sound exactly like my father!) and would prefer to go another direction than be labeled a certain type of person. Truthfully, a complete musician is also knowledgable in poetry, literature, theater, art, sports, math, science, education, computers, and often business. In today's world, one cannot be a musician without having some kind of knowledge in other disciplines. Not to mention the need to be sensitive, emotional, bold, communicative, profound, confident, compassionate, and healthy. Being a music boy is to synthesize knowledge and perception, melding skill with experience, embracing humanity, and communicating emotions to the world. To be a musician is to be more than a musician, applying depth of thought and intrinsic expression to extrinsic practice.

I like being a musician but I want to be known as more than a musician. Yet because of the abstract qualities associated with music, because music is inherently mysterious in many ways, because music is powerfully emotional, musicians tend to be placed myopically into small compartments. Bursting out of my compartment is easy since for me it never was a compartment. For others to see me as greater than my compartment is difficult, but worth the effort.

We tend to become or at least attempt to be whatever others project for us. Which is one reason I enjoy a moment to project success to my students by calling them "famous" or "skilled" or "wealthy" or "educated." In my case, I suppose I am the music boy, but I sure hope one day to grow up and simply be a man!