Chapter 29

Okay. So we made it to the end of highschool. All the ups and downs of music had led me to a very nice and peaceful resolution. I even got an award and a gold medal from Kiwanis at the end. 

I mentioned all of the shenanigans from music in high school as basically over at this point in the last chapter regarding the end of Kiwanis for all intents and purposes, that was true. However, that was if we were using the yardstick of the hypercompetitive extra-curricular music events. I mentioned this before and I’ll say it again, for those who did private lessons for a musical instrument outside of school, public school music education was a piece of cake. I learned rudimentary music theory in grade 5 privately only to find it on the curriculum in high school. I was always overprepared. 

Point is, after the competitive stuff and the Chinese Community Orchestra stuff came to an end, the only thing left was the public school senior concert. Technical skill and practice requirements considered, this was nothing. Being in an orchestra for the public school and playing pieces way below my level was easy. 

But that doesn’t mean the last concert at highschool was a breeze. It was difficult for a whole other reason. I had to say a tearful goodbye to all the music teachers who have helped all of me through thick and thin. Unlike the competitive side of music, the public school side of music has always been my safe haven. Whenever I felt bad about being inferior to X or felt horrible after a lesson with CC, I would come back to public school and remember that at the very least, I had some value here. In truth, a lot of the time this was all I needed. I needed to be acknowledged to be valuable to some orchestra and be known to possess some skill at the cello. When my surrogate father figure, CC, verbally abused the crap out of me, the public school orchestra gave me the confidence boost I needed to simply just get by. Believe me, this was very important to a kid with no dad and a horrible surrogate. 

When the concert began, I was not nervous. It was melancholic if anything. I was happy that I got to where I am but was saddened that I will never see Mrs. R and Mr. P again. They were the teachers you read about in books. They were superstars. They also gave me some of the only positive experiences I’ve had with adults in my entire life at that point. It was a hard thing to say goodbye to. But I knew that I needed to move on. It was time to go. High school was amazing but can only stay amazing if it was fleeting. Before I knew it, the concert came and gone without a hitch. I did my part, though it took very little effort. On my lonesome walk home from the concert that night, I remember looking up at the streetlights and thinking that despite all the trouble I went through, I should never forget how lucky I was to have experienced all the musical experience I had. Despite all the toxic things that came and gone, I wound up on the other side all right. 

But it really was time to move on. 

The next thing was University and I had easily been accepted to the University of Waterloo for Science and decided to room with some friends of mine. The only thing standing before me and Science student undergrad was a summer of no plans. As you may recall, when I have no plans, I get antsy. After only a little bit of thinking about what I wanted to do for my last summer before university, I decided to pick up my cello once again. Old habits die hard I guess.

This time was different. I was no longer within the shadow of the Chinese classical music community and no longer had the support of my public high school teachers. I knew the feeling of being on my own already from when I did Kiwanis but this time, I was really really on my own. I had no high school teachers and not even friends around me. They were all preparing for their last vacation before university or getting ready for university. Meanwhile I was thinking about how I had one last piece of unfinished business. I wanted to do the level 10 RCM exam. 

As you know, the pieces I did for Kiwanis also doubled as RCM level 10 repertoire. I knew of this back then and kind of already knew I would be doing this when the time came. Still basking in the positivity from my public school concert and the euphoric experience of my Kiwanis win, I knew I had to finish my high school years strong for one last performance. Also, I did want to have one last jab at CC by registering for my RCM exam and filling in the section “Teacher’s name” with a “none applicable”. I had already gone around the ringer enough times to know how to do RCM levels pretty easily by now.

Step 1: A few chapters ago I mentioned that I had been keeping tabs on various music theory schools around my area. So naturally, I shopped around a bit and quickly registered myself for the appropriate music theory and history classes for pretty cheap.

Step 2: Practice. I wasn’t doing RCM level 10 this time with the vigor of going for a medal. While it was on my mind, I knew that I still wanted to somewhat enjoy my summer before university. The amount of effort to compete for a medal at level 10 was exponentially higher than all the levels I did previously and seeing as how I was simply doing this to check it off on my bucket list, I didn’t intend to go super hardcore into it. 

Step 3: Find my own accompanist. CC usually did this for me. This time I had to do it myself. It wasn’t hard. I asked a friend who I knew was good at piano to be my accompaniment and quickly set up an easy going schedule to rehearse the repertoire. 

To be honest, everything played out normally. I had at times even forgotten that this was my first RCM test organized completely by myself. If anything, I thought less about the actual practicing and more about how music would no longer be a key aspect of my life after this last victory lap in music. 

In truth, RCM, while very difficult to get an award from, was actually pretty easy to pass. The requirements were lax and most of the time the adjudicator wouldn’t really even know your pieces because they played another instrument. They looked for simple things like intonation, rhythm and as long as you played through your pieces with some decent techniques, you were good to get your medal. In fact, thinking back, I think all of my adjudicators in the past had been violinists. If you want my true two cents on the thing it’s this. RCM is one of those things that is really easy to pass and very hard to fail at. But it is also extremely difficult to be outstanding. 

The actual examination day? It played out pretty much as you’d expect. I played my pieces, presented the original copyrighted material on the day of the exam, didn’t mess up the notes too much but didn’t milk them much either, completed the ear testing for relative intervals and then did okay on my melody playback. I considered how in the Kiwanis competition, I was competing with everyone else who had passed the threshold of perfect notes and rhythms. Those were the basics of classical music playing. I was on the level of advanced stuff like emotion, character and style at this point and yet, I was being tested again on the basics. Regardless, I still passed. This time only with honors and of course, without a medal as a prize. That was fine with me, another check mark on the bucket list checked. 

Does this all sound kind of boring to you? If it does, that’s okay. Classical music and me kind of already had our last hoorah. This was just an epilogue if anything. But would it surprise you that despite how boring this summer seemed right now that this summer would actually be one of the most eventful and important summers of my entire life? 

Well.

It was.

Because you see, while I had this whole RCM thing going on. The summer actually had 3 separate plots playing out. You know the first one of course, that was just me preparing for university. Spoiler alert, it’s exactly like how you’d expect. The second storyline was this blurb about RCM and as you may have gathered, also played out exactly like how you’d expect. The third storyline though? 

My mom had decided to visit our family in China to celebrate my graduating from high school and going to university. That’s right. During this summer, I went to China with mom for about a week and a half where I was to meet my dad.

For the first time.

Ever.