The Saturday before Mother’s Day, Ty played his first piano recital. His hair was tied back like Daddy’s. He wore a dark blue polo, black jeans, and his WTSHTF boots. As his teacher, I introduced him. He did not seem nervous at all, perhaps because it was his first public performance or because he is just a cool kid. He was the first student to play, which gave him the advantage. Ty walked up to the bench, squirmed a little to get centered, and began playing “The Swing,” a 16 measure piece written by the author of his lesson book. The audience clapped when he finished. He squirmed a little more to get centered to play an adaptation of Carl von Weber’s “Hunting Chorus,” which is in a different key. He did play a little too fast during one of the eighth note slurs, but only his parents and teacher noticed (having heard his practicing for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks). When he got to the ending, he played softer as the music directed with the dynamic notation. And softer. And softer. And he lifted his hands up above his head (to let the audience know that he was finished). He smiled at them, jumped of the bench, and bowed twice — to the left and to the right. He just kind of stood there, watching their watching him. A man motioned him to go over and collect his little music note trophy. Ty looked at it, smiled, and lifted it a little while looking at the audience… in a surprised, humble way. And he sat down.
“I got a flag trophy,” he told the girl who sat another seat over. The boy who sat directly next to him was at the piano, playing his two pieces.
After the recital, Ty saw that his three grandparents were there along with one of his uncles. We had lemonade and chocolate chip cookies with the other participants and their families.
