OOM: A Day In the Life of a Music Student

[herr_bookman]

Autor's day starts off early with classes on theory, the study of music's structure and form. The point of the class is to examine how music is perceived and why, and while Autor can't deny that while it's useful for his craft, analyzing the notes again and again can be horrifically boring. His teachers patiently cover acoustics, notation, harmony, and ear-training, as well as improvisation and composition theory.

He listens to Mozart and Schubert, trying not to fall asleep in the early hours of the morning, his vision blurring as he traces the notes with his thumb. The boy sweats through aural skills--performing and sight reading Chopin in front of the class. He is given homework in the form of reading and essays on Bach's forms.

The bell rings, and he's released to go to music history, his favorite class. The boy absorbs information about composers from Early Music to the Classical and Romantic periods and beyond, greedily lapping up the context behind the music he plays. His homework here is lengthy essays on the structural ambiguity of Satie's work, and a paper on how Auber's La Muette de Portici contributed to Belgian independence.

During one of his breaks, one of Autor's bullies, Finn, confronts him. "Get up, you twerp!" Finn jeers, as the boy lands in the dirt. Autor glances up, and he's startled by the very clear mental image of the other boy in the trenches, suffering shell shock after. He wonders if Finn's eyes, too, will have that glazed look he's seen in history book photographs from the future. He wonders if Finn will still be a bully when he comes back. If he comes back.

Autor decides not to bother arguing back, just extricates himself from the situation with a quick run, and moves on.

For the next block of time, Autor plays piano in a large ensemble in a wind and philharmonic orchestra. He prepares with them for their next concert, already planning to use Milliways to rehearse his part in Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto 1 in B Flat Minor. It's a fun piece, and he's rather excited about it.

Chamber music is much the same, only without the looming deadline of a concert to worry about. Ideally, a student would spend time playing music with his friends, but he doesn't have any here; it's the class where he misses the bar the most. But Autor plays his part dutifully, almost bored, since because he has practiced in Milliways songs he's not supposed to know due to the time he should have spent learning them, he can't really play at his own pace at home. But he behaves professionally, because he'd rather not hear the music fail, regardless of how he'd like to tell the members of his quintet to be quiet.

Next come classes on calculus, English, the hard sciences, Greek, Latin, Geography, Civic Education, and Religious Studies--depending on the day.

Every Thursday night, Autor attends studio class--a once-a-week get-together with students of the same teacher. Playing in front of twenty-two other pianists is terrifying--but thrilling. Autor is usually pleased to showcase his skills, and he has his friends in Milliways to thank for conquering his performance anxiety. He's looking forward to his mock auditions, where he'll play the full repertoire for an orchestra audition.

Some days, Autor squeezes all he can out of his education, like blood from a stone. On other days, he wonders if attending is even worth it. He knows he'll be drafted--the war looms, and it's only a matter of time--and that he'll have to flee to Milliways and figure out what to do with the rest of his life. The boy knows he'll never go to university, and wonders if he'll even be able to sit for his Abitur examination. The thought makes him sick to his stomach.

I'm too young, he thinks to himself, trying to convince the part of him that was too old to believe such protests. Then he stuffs those thoughts, returning to his essays and easier things, pretending that if he ignores the impending draft notice, it will never come.