Memories and introspection
I just returned from my 4th year at the Frederick L. Hemke Saxophone Institute (FLHSI). years 2021, 2022, 2024, and now 2025. That time sped through the continuum much faster than my mental capacity could ever process.
As I left, I felt a twinge of bittersweetness. 2 weeks full of intensity from reconnecting with a host of old friends, enduring hours and hours of practicing, performing several times (on repertoire I functionally had 4 days to learn), etc.
FLHSI’s core faculty is also comprised of several of my previous mentors. It felt like reconnecting with my various homes I’ve been blessed to experience throughout my musical career. At some point, that line blurred between mentor and friend. That’s a beautiful thing for me, seeing my growth from a bright-eyed pupil to an equal with my own thoughts, values, musical ideas, etc. — my own artistic voice that others can look up to alongside those mentors I revered in my own journey. Granted, my mentors are legends/legends in the making. But I can say the same thing about my friends now. Life is wild like that — progress is wild like that. Anyway, it is always a joy to reconnect and realize I am simultaneously leveling up exponentially and learning how the culmination of my experiences can still be built upon.
Then there are true friends. The other participants at the Institute, festival, workshop, whatever other function you attend. Watching the next generation grow alongside you, it makes you wonder. We’re going to be those mentors. It’s an existential minefield thinking it all through… and it’s why I choose kindness. I have no idea what the future will be like… that fellow participant might call me up one day and ask if I’m available to teach a masterclass at the University they teach at. You build this network of friends, experts in the field, fellow lovers of saxophone, etc.
But for now, we’re all just 20-something-year-olds just trying to figure out life. One of us might be finishing out their master’s, unsure about a doctorate. Another might have a job lined up. Another might wonder where they want to live next now that they have to move away. At FLHSI, there are 24 participants. 24 unique stories, converging for the drop in a bucket that is 2 weeks. How lucky are we to blend our lives together for that morsel of an experience over the expanse of our individual journeys.
It’s funny. We live life in a dichotomy:
Tomorrow is a given, yet is uncertain; Savor this moment, but ensure the next one reflect continual improvement; It’s not “goodbye,” but “until next time.”
It is a conundrum, the pursuit of building memories. We constantly gain them, and it shapes the way we navigate through our lives. Yet, we lose memories just as fast as we gain them. Photos, voicemails, signatures, note taking… all valuable substitutes to tangible moments. Yet, the candle burns out regardless of our authority over its wick.
Perhaps a dismal outlook, but consider this: the absurdity of our perceived authority of a flame’s existence gives way to motivation. It encourages us to enjoy the warm by the fire before it is snuffed out. We can then appreciate the flicker of its comfort for the relatively short moment in our individual journeys when we get to experiences its glow.
May the smoke of memories, as the candle burns out, linger as long as you need to come to peace with the departure of its warmth in your life.
KL