Music has always been a central pillar of my life, and naturally, many aspects of my life have been melded around it.
External co-curricular music has always been the pinnacle of learning throughout my School experience, as I’ve had the chance to be in groups with the best young musicians in the ACT, through ensembles and organisations such as The Canberra Youth Orchestra, ACT Youth Orchestra, Canberra Symphony Youth Chamber Orchestra and even amongst the university level with my involvement with ANU orchestra.
Each ensemble has taught me to push myself to be the very best I can be, teaching me soft skills such as social etiquette, reading the room, dealing with nerves, expression and searching for passion and emotion. They have taught me to push when I’ve got nothing left, whether I like it or not, there’s little choice but to continue. I have also found that they have allowed me to find beauty and peace within stressful situations, offering a short reprise. Sure, I can still suffer through burnout and exhaustion, where my mind cannot be satisfied with unproductivity, yet I have learnt the hard way that taking the time to cultivate a moment or two of peace and allow myself to wallow and soak in it overall improves my relationship with myself and with the world around me.
I have auditioned for the Australian Youth Orchestra’s programme and have landed myself in various reserve positions. Although I have not had a successful audition for the programme, I can still get the most out of the experience. The competition amongst the best young Cellists in Australia is immense, and I know that when I do finally get a chance to experience the National Music Camp, I will improve as a player due to exposure to those around me. I remember playing with the Young Soloists, who came to Canberra Grammar School for a workshop; I had a taste of performing within a section at a higher standard than my own, and it was exhilarating. It really does lift your game. However, a successful audition by itself will not grow me personally. That happens by progressing through underwhelming results and using them as motivation for improvement, rather than as defining your character. The process in which I apply myself is what defines me. I have learnt to iteratively climb closer towards perfection and always keep my focus on the next goal. Learning how to do this through music has allowed me to apply this to many aspects of schooling, where each assignment and assessment can have a similar mindset, allowing me to constantly iterate and narrow my standards. The best form of music practice is one where nothing but the best results are accepted, as being your best requires critical analysis and observations. Applying this to school has allowed me to avoid complacency, as there is always more that can be done to improve.
From my descriptions, it might sound like music practice is a gruelling and arduous task, which it can be at times, however, it provides me with a space in which I can focus inwards on the music and away from the distractions of reality. The satisfaction from a mentally and physically intense practice session is similar to that of a workout or a tough hike; it’s always worth it in the end, both as a feeling and as the results achieved. Music acts as this intriguing mirror to almost any arbitrary aspect of life, which takes you on a rollercoaster of ups and downs, loops and side to sides, sometimes making you sick, other times making you exhilarated, all within one self-contained yet universally encompassing discipline. Really, music is what you want to define it as. There is always more to discover and to explore. I treat Physics similarly to Music, as I’m not entirely satisfied with an answer, model, theory or explanation until I can comprehensively connect and understand everything, even if it means stepping back and ripping out the previous assumptions that have built up over the years. Same for IT and Mathematics, and pretty much every school subject I have ever done. I can’t take ‘good enough’ as an acceptable attitude, and I will try my hardest in everything. If I can’t be authentic to myself in the way I interact with the world, why would I even bother? Why make things easier for myself if it doesn’t satisfy my thirst for knowledge and betterment? People ask me why I do so many subjects, and why I don’t drop from 13 units to the minimum of 10, and my answer is always: I love the subjects, and I don’t want to miss out on learning where I have the opportunity to do so. Sure, it increases my workload, and maybe the results themselves in isolation might be lowered, but interacting less would overall be much worse. I have a hunger for diving deep into things, even when I am stretched thin, which I can concur is both a strength and a weakness. But I just can’t let something go if I have done a half-hearted job of it, that’s not who I am.
Learning from the many conductors I have had the opportunity to work with has allowed me to pass their knowledge down to those below me, through House Music and leading the internal ensembles at school. Although I feel I have a long way to go in teaching others things I find difficult to explain, and I don’t particularly feel a strong pull towards teaching others, it allows me to continue to learn about myself, by interrogating the means and methods of those before me and gleaning what I can from them.
Through Year 11 and 12, I have participated in the ANU Engineering extension programme. This doesn’t count for my ATAR, but that does not change how I interact with the course. I treat it like any other school subject. Despite being fully committed to my schoolwork and music in Year 11 and 12, I have managed to do rather well in this course, almost averaging a distinction. It provides me hope for my future, as I aspire to be an Engineer. I tackle every project as I would tackle a school assignment, a music composition or a personal project. I do it for me and what I can get out of it, how I can improve. The course also allows me to explore my varied interests through a new mindset. Engineering is a mindset rather than a profession and it has taught me varied approaches to anything within my life. Taking a step back and analysing my own stances towards things has shown that this mindset has had a huge influence in the way I interact with the world and how I position myself for my future.
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