An American Elegy

This is one of my all time favorite musical pieces. Playing it is one of the most powerful experiences I've had as a musician.

The song was written by Frank Ticheli. It was written in the wake of the Columbine Tragedy. Ticheli wanted to write a song that said: We're going to rise above this. After every tragedy, there's still beauty. There's beauty in how we come together. There's beauty in the rebuilding.

It's a song most everyone who's been in an honor band of any sort has played. It's a song almost exclusively played by high schoolers and college kids. It's a song played by the people who weren't too off from the ages of the victims of the tragedy. It's a song that's played by people who aren't too far off from the ages of those who brought the tragedy upon those victims. It's impossible not to think about that when you play the piece, not to wonder what it would have been like if it was your school, your schoolmates. It's a bizarre experience playing such a beautiful uplifting song when you're thinking about your friends being murdered (or worse, being murderers). I count the evening I performed it as one of the most powerful experiences art has ever given me. There were a lot of tears. But there also was a lot of community. There was a band, coming together, making music. There was a community of parents and teachers and friends, coming together, making an audience. And we definitely weren't perfect. I missed notes. Clarinets squeaked. Someone coughed during somber, emotive moments. It was not, I can say with confidence, the most beautifully executed piece of music in the history of high school bands. Nor is this recording that I've posted here. I know the score of this piece like a part of my soul. There are plenty of missed notes. I have squabbles with how it was conducted. It's not perfect. It's not everything this song can be. But it's still beautiful. And I am still moved. We're rebuilding right now. We're going to take actions. We're going to come together as a community. We're going to do it imperfectly. It's probably going to take a lot of rehearsal. It's not going to be the everything a movement can be. But it's still going to be beautiful. Because there is so much beauty in rebuilding. There's so much beauty in overcoming something together.