“Letter I to the playing chair letter J to the ready chair.” This is it. I’ve played already, but why am I shaking? I get up to the marimba, send a worried smile to my friends, take a deep breath, and play. I had practiced for months so, I should do well.

It got towards the end of the song and I was excited to be done. A little too excited. My stomach plummeted as I realized I hit a wrong note. I was absolutely horrified when I hit a second and a third wrong note but, kept going and I think that was the best thing I could’ve done.

When I finished the song, I went back to my seat palms sweaty and quivering all over. My friend smiled at me to make me feel good about my performance. She wrote a note that said you did really well, but I was kind of disappointed about my performance. I was too excited to be done with my piece. I told her I messed up badly, but hopefully I could do a lot better on the snare drum etude and the tympani etude.

She did really well on the marimba etude, better than I did. I hope we made the same region band. There are 2 region bands. One is concert, which is the worst, but the people in it are really good and then there is symphonic, which is the best and has the top people who advanced from region in it. Everyone in the room advanced from district. We all played the same pieces in district but there were different cuts in the music. These cuts were longer and harder to play.

The next 2 pieces we were going to play were the tympani and the snare drum etudes. It felt so long because people played both of the etudes. The other people were very good but I was confident I could beat them. “Letter I to the playing chair letter J to the ready chair.” I didn’t feel as nervous as before, but I was still shaky. I did a lot better than the first etude, in fact I nailed it. Absolutely no mistakes! I was very happy and anxious to see what the results were. My friend did really well also. So we were both excited to see the results.

The results came out and everyone crowded the percussion paper. I saw people smile and people who looked disappointed. There were mixed faces so I had no idea what was coming. Some of the other people in my band made it to the percussion results before I did. They yelled, “Nick you got seventh chair and made symphonic band!” I didn’t believe them, so I went to see it myself. They were right! I made symphonic! I broke out in a smile. I ran to my band teacher and my mom and said I made region and got seventh chair! Everyone congratulated me and I felt really happy. My percussion friend also did well. She made concert and was tenth chair. She was happy also. I went home feeling relieved and happy.

I had accomplished something big, something that I will always remember. I learned that no matter what happens, you have to keep going and that’s how I made symphonic band.