Prompt: Briefly elaborate on an extracurricular activity or a work experience?
This is the supplement for the Vanderbilt application.
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Walking into the room feels like walking out onto a glass ledge, swaying thousands of feet in the air. Behind a poorly draped black curtain sits my judge, typing swiftly into the file that will decide my fate. Butterflies, man's best friend, flutter in my abdomen, ramming against its walls. I stand there patiently waiting for him to finish, all the while praying he will type on--just one more second--so I can climb through my F Major scale in my head just one more time. The clicking discontinues and my judge requests my chromatic scale.
Hesitating just slightly, I reach down and slide my clammy hands over wool-wrapped mallets-my saviors. The moment my hands begin to glide over the mahogany bars of the marimba, I am secure, acquitted of any crime. The anxiety previously exploding across my body is no longer my enemy, but my friend, pressing me on through the scale and the prepared pieces that follow. The black curtain falls and behind it there is no longer a judge, but an audience eager to consume the next note of my performance.
When I close the final roll of a Samuel Hazo rhapsody, nerves and emotion are no longer my enemies they are my friends. Anxiety is nothing more than a miscommunicated adrenaline rush. Anxiety and nervousness are emotions and music is the art of emotion. Playing music is having the ability to take pain, sorrow, and even anxiety and convert those indescribable human emotions into aural beauty. Music has taught me to take my emotions and convert them into something constructive.
Music is my favorite escape and band is a major part my life. I can't thank the trusting walls of my band-hall enough for the years of growth they have provided me. In their confines, I have grown and developed into the person I am today. For eight years, they have protected me against assaults on my masculinity and given me a place to put my emotions not into words, but music. My peers and friends in band have supported me and have given me numerous opportunities to develop the leadership skills I now use on a daily basis. As I look back over the years I've spent playing in the band, I realize that it is one of the best decisions I have ever made.
