Renewed Again

One of my class goals that I communicated with my students over the years was simply this: That you walk out the door feeling happier than when you walked in. Did that always happen? Of course not! Life is unpredictable, consistent good behavior is unreliable, moon cycles and biorhythms and the toxic leakage of the daily news makes an impact. 

 

But more often than not, that’s exactly what happened. 

 

And it’s exactly what happened today. I got picked up by my host, who I had never met, and we drove to a site where I had never been (Anton Bruckner Private University) meeting mostly college students who didn’t know me. I had a plan drawing from material I had just done in London/ Vienna/ Salzburg, but the moment I walked into the room, I threw it all out. Here were two giant marimbas, a drum set, a stand-up bass, chromatic Orff instruments,  many bass bars, conga drums and Latin percussion and within one minute I knew what to do: Jazz. Quickly put together an outline in my head from my considerable storehouse of fabulous pieces and magical sequences. 

 

Two minutes before I started, I felt that damned dizziness again, fairly strongly and was briefly terrified that I might fall to the floor in front of the students and not get to do the workshop. But the moment I started in the circle, it all disappeared and I never thought about it again for the next 7 hours. Just dove into the refreshing waters of jazz taught Orff style and felt the infectious energy of these young people with great skills, great spirit and great enthusiasm. By lunchtime, we all walked out the door buzzing with excitement and glowing with happiness. 

The afternoon never sagged and had the good sense to end with one of my favorite games, Johnny Brown. On the last note, I had them look at the clock and it was exactly 5:00 o’clock (our closing time) to the second! How satisfying was that?!

 

My host offered to drive me back to the hotel and asked if I was exhausted and once again, I could honestly testify, “Not in the least! I feel more energetic and happier than when I started!”

 

Because of wanting to hear the reports of the marches on Saturday, I’ve been dipping back into the cesspool of the news and starting to feel dirty all over. So I will take a break again, focus on the living beautiful beings around me and continue this extraordinary blessing of releasing music at its height and depth everywhere I teach and to everyone I teach. I don’t know what I did to deserve it, but I accept it all with a grateful heart.