(Note:  The following appeared first in the December 2003/January 2004 MHSAA Bulletin and
is republished in Lasting Impressions, which appears in the MHSAA's online Library)

Many years ago, a short, balding high school choir director taped the first rehearsal of a very difficult musical composition. The first effort through the piece brought terrible sounds and bewildered looks from students who had lost their way. Three times the director halted the group, pointed to where he was but few of them were, and he restarted them. 

At the conclusion of this first run-through, the students groaned, shook their heads, wrinkled their noses. They did not like this selection.  “It’s too hard,” they complained.

Undaunted, the choir director began the arduous task of teaching the composition, breaking it into small pieces, teaching and practicing each of the voice parts separately and then together. 

Gradually, over several weeks, he put the voice parts and then the composition’s pieces together. 

Repeatedly, he asked the choir to do it again.  The students would groan, but each time the director would demand a new perfection of rhythm, pitch, volume, diction, emotion.

Finally, when he was nearly satisfied, the director had the choir sing the piece all the way through for an audience, and he taped it again.

The next day at school, the director’s entire lesson plan was this.  First, he played the tape of the very first rehearsal of several weeks earlier.  He tried not to grimace and the students giggled with embarrassment.  He made no comment.

Then, he played the tape of the previous night’s public performance.  He tried not to gloat; and the students, when the last note of their performance ended, broke into applause and cheers.

When they silenced, the director said just this.  “Hard work matters.  Practice pays off.  Attention to detail makes a difference.  Teamwork works.  Together, people can transform chaos into beauty and discord into harmony.”

And then he walked out of the room into his office and closed the door.  There was absolute silence in the choir room.

Then a voice from the back of the choir said, “Let’s do it again.”  And they did, all the way through, on their own.  And it was even better than the night before.