Sae Kyoung Jang is an 18 year old cellist from Okemos, Michigan. She was one of the young musicians, ages 15-20, chosen from across the United States and abroad to participate in the 2009 Kennedy Center/NSO National Trustees' Summer Music Institute (SMI).  This past summer 56 students from 32 states, D.C., and 3 countries (Russia, Paraguay, and New Zealand) participated in SMI. All students are on full scholarship as supported by the National Trustees of the NSO. For more information on the Summer Music Institute, please go to www.kennedy-center.org/nso/nsoed/smi.

Sae Kyoung Jang, photo by Margot Schulman:

How many musicians think about why they do music when they pick up their instruments for daily practice?  For me, practicing the cello has become a mere daily routine – scales, repertoire, sixths and octaves.  It's been that way for eleven years and I never question why I do it.

Before coming to the NSO Summer Music Institute (SMI), I asked myself the question – why music, especially if I'm studying to be an engineer in college?  When I tell people I'm studying science in college, some assume I chose science for the job security and music for the soul.  In reality though, science is my passion, and if I really think about it, I've turned music into a logical activity – something that will help the dexterity of my hands and the flexibility of my mind.

When I arrived at SMI, I was blown away by the amount of talent, passion, and dedication around me. To my surprise, I was the one falling behind in the Stravinsky, forgetting to count and missing notes, the one with the obnoxious vibrato in the Dvorak.  Why was my concentration falling behind?  Why couldn't my fingers follow scales I'd practiced for years?  Our conductor, Elizabeth Schulze, said that as rehearsals progress, we should feel more at ease, but my left arm only seemed to get clunkier and my bow arm heavier and heavier.

My peers, on the other hand, played effortlessly, so much that their instruments seemed almost like extensions of their limbs and bodies. Towards the beginning of the program, eleven finalists were chosen for the concerto competition. As the finalists performed, they showed no sign of effort or thought; their muscles followed the line of the music, as if the movements were ingrained in them by nature.  I could feel a gradient of their energy and their presence, their concentration in the musical lines and the emotions provoked by them.  Were they aware of the audience as they performed?  I couldn't tell.  It seemed that the music had painted them into reality, in front of the audience's eyes, that it was the music controlling them, instead of them controlling the music.

Over the years, I had forgotten why I do music.  I had forgotten that moment in a performance when the music takes over your body, the moment when you have to trust your muscles completely to hit that high note or that perfect chord, when emotions are spilling out of your heart into your chest and crawling out of your throat.  And I realized that music wasn't just an extracurricular activity or a hobby - it was a lifestyle.  It was a lifestyle of work - of hours of practice going into muscle memory - of emotional fulfillment, and physical training.  It was a lifestyle of being able to give it your all in the one moment that matters, out in the concert hall.  People became musicians not because of some obligation thrust upon them by parents, society, or religion, but because they loved being in the moment and letting the music carry them.

It has been around a week now since SMI ended.  I can look back to two orchestra concerts, four nights of chamber music concerts, many seminars and master classes, and memories shared with incredible people.  I've learned many things – to "dance" in my chair, to listen to the other sections, to concentrate, to let go of the tension in my body, to cook frozen pizza, to juggle, among many other things.  I'm still searching for my next moment of musical abandon in front of an audience.  I know I've done it before – because that's when I fell in love with music.  

Sae Kyoung Jang, MIT Class of 2013