i would never tell my teachers but she's the reason why i'm an oboe player now

(derived from my own twitter thread, I talk about my experience with the anime Hibike! Euphonium and the missed opportunities in music due to the pandemic).

This character with the oboe, from Hibike Euphonium and spin-off movie Liz and the Bluebird, is Mizore Yoroizuka. She is shy and does not talk much, but her sound on the oboe is amazing. I couldn't stop crying after listening to her play.

The Hibike Euphonium series, an anime based on Japanese high school band culture, is a band geek's treasure trove, filled with intricate details and relatable situations. It had so much impact on me, especially considering I watched it during the pandemic. COVID-19 surged right before my middle school graduation into high school, so watching this anime in my first year after a long day of struggling to pay attention in online Zoom band rehearsals, isolated from physical people, made me overwhelmed.  

I kept thinking to myself, "Am I being robbed of my precious high school experiences?" As much as I understood the situation (this is just the way things have to be), with every passing day I couldn't stand playing music in the seclusion of my own room anymore. I was so, so nervous about the future. I missed playing with other people so much, and online music was just not the same.

Then the board finally let us play in person...!!

I was so happy when we went back to playing I literally almost cried. We might have been 6 feet apart from each other in a cafeteria with terrible acoustics for band, but there was SOUND. REAL, LIVE SOUNDS PRODUCED BY REAL PEOPLE THAT WERE AROUND ME.

After watching HibiEuph, I needed to have a fresh start. Let's jump on one of the hardest woodwind instruments to play.

Flashforward two years later, I've switched from flute to oboe (with maybe a little influence from Mizore...), am preparing for university auditions, and have played at festivals as part of an ensemble.

I've been teaching too, mentoring younger band students at feeder schools who have lost their opportunities just as I have.

The mixed bag of pain and longing that I felt during the pandemic watching HibiEuph pushed me to work even harder to make up for a whole year of lost time, and without that, I would have never considered my dream of being a band director seriously.

So yeah, thanks to this anime for being one of the reasons why I do my best each day to become a better musician and a big middle finger thanks to COVID-19 for making me realize not to take my time in high school for granted.