A note here: this was my Common App Essay, and I chose to write it about jazz. It’s been over four years, and I thought I’d revisit it. In those four years, a lot has changed, both personally and academically. I think of jazz as a part of my hobbies that I love to do, instead of my major or a part of my life that relates to academic pressure. My first gig at a jazz event at Haverford was so much fun, as well as playing at a local coffee shop in front of my mom and grandmother. Looking back, I think I wrote it about jazz because I wanted to show my unwavering devotion to something, despite my obsessive and borderline toxic devotion to adhering to a standard that I could never reach. That’s what it’s been like as an undergraduate student at a prestigious university, despite the amazing friends and memories I’ve made. My school has historically and currently discriminated against disabled people (just ask a disabled person who either transferred, dropped out, took time off, or graduated from Bryn Mawr about accessibility, and they will tell you how ableist it is) and BIPOC students. I wanted to revisit this experience here, as a part of a series on reckoning with academic achievements as a way of trying to compensate for my disability, or what I call being an academic weapon. The next part will be a word to my school about some actions disabled students are taking, so stay tuned for that.
Because I post about my Substack newsletter on social media, and some of my high school classmates follow me on there, this comes with a disclaimer and a warning: if you think you know someone in here, you do and you don’t. And if you thought you knew me, as a person to mock, you also don’t know about me. What you knew were my struggles against an ableist system, and what you didn’t know was that I was damn good at writing Even without that, we, the mocked and misrepresented, deserve respect. I don’t want your dms of apology, or “I didn’t know” type of script1. That struggle is between you and your conscience, and you can do that without me.
Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.
At my audition for jazz band, I played Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit2.”
I came to the drums by accident. I started my musical education on a steady diet of piano lessons, but I never really enjoyed it. At 13 I started listening to grunge, and I fell in love with the driving drumbeats of Nirvana3 and Soundgarden4. It spoke to me, especially my individuality. Banging a drum set was a way to express myself, my inner wild, and I was a female5 drummer to boot!
Then came the jazz band audition, and a big problem. For all my rock-ability, I couldn’t read sheet music, and that was the minimum bar to play. I tried to decipher it, and the teacher6 tried to help me through it. Finally, he gave up and said, “Just play something you like.” So I did. Buddy Rich7 it wasn’t, but it was good enough to get my foot in the door. I guess through the grunge, he saw my potential to play jazz, or at least my passion to try.
Actually, becoming a drummer at all was a most unlikely turn of events. As a child, I had poor gross and fine motor skills. I couldn’t really hold a pencil until I was eight8. My handwriting is still an adventure at best. So drumming was very hard at first. But I wanted to play so much. It felt so good when I realized that with a lot of hard work, I could make the same sounds as a rock star drummer. Wow!
During the summer of my sophomore year, I immersed myself in jazz. Listening to Count Basie, Gene Krupa, and Art Blakey9, I learned jazz fundamentals, how I should sound in this new musical world. I played jazz in weekly lessons, learning little by little to play softer, to hold my sticks differently, to slow things down, and to create a mood10.
My first year in jazz band was tough. The lead drummer played the best songs in class and in concerts11. These were pieces I wanted to perform. I was chafing at my role, always the understudy. But I kept working, learning how to read sheet music, listening to new genres, making my drum teacher teach me newer and harder techniques. Twice a week I practiced for a couple of hours with the metronome, playing “time” until I could hear the pattern in my head as I fell asleep12.
In some ways, my second year was even harder. I had to overcome my fear of soloing. I did fine in the practice room, or my garage. But in the moment in a concert, I’d lose my cool, getting over-excited and rushing through a section. At one point I cried over a four-measure solo in class 13 I had to learn how to gain perspective. The solo was just one part of the larger piece. My main responsibility was to the group.
This year, I could have moved up to advanced band. There is a very gifted drummer13 ahead of me, but there are also a couple of freshman14 who will be starting next year, like me a couple of years ago, with a lot to learn. I remembered how hard it was getting started15. No one took me under their wing in the band, showing me the ropes16. So I told my band teacher I’ll stay in intermediate. Soloing on the big stage is less important to me now than helping others feel my love for this amazing music, and the joy of playing it well17.
Drumming is a very important part of who I am. It is an identity completely apart from who I am in class18. From the audience you might see me playing, hair pulled back, stage lights reflecting off my glasses, with a concentrated expression as I work through a piece19. But what I feel up there is being at the center of it, the beating heart of the piece, and that is a wonderful feeling, knowing that I keep the performance on track while the soloists do their thing20. I have a more mature understanding of my role, and I take joy in those split seconds when I can slip in an extra lick (or two)21.
I’ve also learned that being a woman in jazz is tough. Women musicians have fewer chances to succeed in jazz than men22. Yet women’s music is every bit as good, every bit as profound, as men’s. This has made me more of an activist. I listen more to women jazz performers and try, in my small way, to promote them. As in so many other fields, women in jazz have had to work twice as hard as men, but the barriers overcome and the music we make is that much sweeter for it.
To the younger me, to senior year of high school me, to the me who in a year was going to change completely, I see you. I see you using academics as a way out. Trust me, there are better ways to cope. You’ll find them with a fountain pen and a journal.
Sometimes, the music isn’t enough. Sometimes, being in a combo isn’t enough. Sometimes, performing in a coffee shop where you improvised without a high hat isn’t enough. Your high school jazz band was a boys’ club. Only certain kinds of boys were accepted (remember how they’d make fun of one guy who’d play Party Rock23?). There were rituals, games, things you were always in the back of. What happens in Vegas sometimes gets sniffed out by chaperones because you can’t hide dumping pepper plus your leftover food onto a “loser” of a game. You’ll be glad your combo mates and your bassist bestie matured past their high school ways. Some people don’t.