The Closet: An Essay on Music Education by Sean McPherson of Heiruspecs

I was sitting in a closet that holds the basses and guitars at St. Paul Central High School, starting to cry. I was just learning to hate the tears, to fight back the tears and I was just trying to take a moment for me when no one would notice. I walked in pretending to look for my bass and just collapsed in there. There was a dispute within the school music community about who could play at the Multicultural Festival. Namely, could one person play in multiple bands at this festival, one that had a bigger audience than any other school event? I played in about four bands at the time and my big ass ego wanted them all to play. I didn’t think much about inclusion, or student rights, I felt that if I made time for all these rehearsals and all these bands I should be able to play in all of them. I didn’t have the vision or the maturity to see what a community I was in, how much everyone in these classes worked hard and deserved their time to play. What I knew was that people were pissed at me and a couple other people who played in multiple bands. I felt like the extra work I put in was slapping me in the face. My teacher, Red Freeberg, had just defended the idea of limiting each person to playing in one band. I felt shocked that he would do that, it felt like a personal attack on me. And he was such a proponent of treating the school like the real world, and running things from a business point of view. I started to feel broken and defensive as the plan molded into reality in the class. So I stepped into the closet after class.

Red walked into the closet and leaned against the counter like it was a coffee shop. He asked how I was doing and I mumbled basic nothings. My heart knew that nobody was out to get me, I was just starting to learn that the world wasn’t out to help or hurt me. It just was, and I just was, and the loneliness of this world was starting to sink in. Red teased my mumblings into sentences. He let me know that the hard work I was doing was going to give me a lot to look forward to, in life, in music, in the world. Red sprinkled his words to let me know that no part of me should feel like it’s wrong to try hard, to play in a lot of bands and the rest. But he let me know that I had to handle things. I had to make peace with what was bothering me so I could go out into this world proud. He helped me realize that a lot of my issues were with myself. There were things I was waiting for people to say to me so that they could let me look at what I already knew was wrong. I knew that I was being possessive of things I should be inclusive with. I knew that I was bringing the same bullshit that kept me off the sports field in high school into the arts world. I was being an arts bully, Red didn’t need to tell me that and my classmates didn’t need to tell me that. I needed to start telling myself that. Red’s words that day continued his teaching that helped me find myself as a young adult.

I came to Minnesota a brat. I probably won’t leave Minnesota until I stop breathing and by then people will have forgotten that I was a brat, but I showed up all bratted up. My dad was coming in to be the President of Macalester and I was the tenth grader fascinated with music trying to find a high school. When your dad is going to be the President of Macalester everybody treats you pretty good and everyone has an opinion about what you should do for school; everyone’s daughter goes to Cretin, or brother-in-law teaches at Edina, or noticed that Eagan has a good jazz band. I heard about a lot of different high schools and all of them sounded way better than the little high school I was coming from in Massachusetts.

At Mount Greylock High School in Massachusetts there was a cork board next to the front desk. You got on that board if your sports team did good or if you won a scholastic or music award. That cork board was the congratulations distribution center for the school at large. In high school you either get noticed for doing good or doing bad. So if you weren’t on the cork board or in the principal’s office for buying weed, you were keeping your head down looking forward to graduating and getting the fuck out of Berkshire County. There was no chance you’d get on the cork board if your band won a demo contest in the local paper, or if you’re band was picking up paying gigs in ninth grade. I know cause I did that shit, my friends did that shit and my brother did that shit before me. It’s a great thing to bitch about, being in the paper is good enough, playing music is good enough. No one set up a system to honor, criticize or cultivate popular music students. And you’re left confused about if your shit is good. If no one asks if you’re doing good with the band stuff, if it’s working out, if you’re getting the right gigs you forget to ask yourself.

And when I got to Minnesota I thought I might have a shot at that being different. It was a shock to hear about multiple choices for schools. I sat stunned as I realized that I was moving to a city; having been raised in a town of eight thousand this was all a bit to adjust to. I saw some great facilities and met some great teachers at Edina and Saint Paul Academy but when I got to Central it felt good primarily because it scared the shit out of me – and that’s a good feeling to a lot of ninth graders. It scared me because I came from an area where I knew everyone and where most people were white. Saint Paul Central was one of the largest places I had ever been and by far the most diverse up to that point. At 10 a.m. my tour guide opened the door on Red’s class and there was a full live hip-hop band going through some songs. I basically shit my pants. My tour guide walked me around the rest of the recording program’s area until we found Red. Red was deep in discussion with a student about a recent performance. Red was asking questions like “did you pass out fliers after the show?” “did you connect with the audience?” “did you get paid well?.” I didn’t know teachers were allowed to ask these questions, but honestly, why not? These are the same questions I ask my friends today after gigs we play.

My tour guide tried to interrupt Red during this discussion so I could meet Red. Red told my tour guide “I am in the middle of a serious discussion with a student about his performance and you will have to wait, please give us some privacy.” I knew then that this was the education I needed. Having a teacher that would take those first couple coffee shop, open mic gigs seriously and give you attention was such a breath of fresh air. It truly changed my life. I saw a path, I felt respect for what I was doing. I felt like the powers that be at the school respected music, honored it, and cared about supporting it. Red had us sitting down making plans for what we wanted to achieve during a given year and how we were going achieve those goals. He had us put our posters up on the wall so we had something to work towards. I started going to the shows, studying, practicing and my second year I started putting posters up on the wall. I started Heiruspecs with Felix and I worked constantly at getting our shit together.

And when I was sitting teary-eyed in that closet I was in serious need of a pep-talk, because I felt like all that work had driven a wedge between me and people I cared for. I don’t know why I needed to hear what Red started to say that day, I don’t even remember everything that Red did say. But I know that I walked out of that closet being OK with struggle, with conflict, with shortcomings, with growing up as a work-in-progress.

Red said, “you have to make it so you can deal. You don’t have to please anyone else, but you have to make it so you feel okay. If you feel OK telling everyone in these classes that you want to play in every band that gets to play at the Multicultural Festival bill then do that. If that’s really how you feel you probably wouldn’t be in here feeling the way you are. I know you’re strong, so if you’re feeling this way, it’s you, not them. You have to do what you need.” And at that point it felt like a good pep-talk. I felt like Red had put in place what I already knew but I was starting to stand up, I was feeling better. Then Red threw me for a loop. “If you need to learn how to read music, learn it. If MacPhail wants you to learn it and you don’t, fuck ‘em. If you need to lose some weight to deal, then do it. If you don’t, don’t worry about it. If your parents need you to lose weight, fuck ‘em. But if you need to, just handle it. You can handle it, you can make it work out.” Red put a responsibility in my hands that I hadn’t carried. He was taking big risks on big topics, I was struggling with my weight, I was struggling with a lot of things he was touching on.

He just put me in the path of myself, I started to know who I had to please, who I had to answer to. I remember that day sitting in that closet closer to Red in every way than I ever had been. I felt like I had a blank calendar and I could solve whatever problems I wanted to, whenever I could. I started to catalog my needs and my goals. I learned how to stand up for myself not for the purpose of winning but for the purpose of reaching the goals I wanted. I stopped wasting as much time wondering how other people felt about what I was doing when what I was really wondering was how I felt about what I was doing. I walked out of the closet with Red and I felt like there was things I could never tell anybody else he said, he talked about my weight, he said fuck a lot, it was unique in many ways for a high school student. I walked out of that closet feeling different, someone who was learning to love the struggles and the tears of life, knowing that I was on a path.

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