In 1948 General Dwight D. Eisenhower released a memoir detailing his experiences as the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe during World War II. In this brutally honest biography, he accounted for the sacrifices made, lives lost, and the bitter totality of what the world had just endured. He wrote about the immeasurable sorrow he caused, justified his decisions, and took responsibility for his actions in great personal detail.
Eisenhower titled the book Crusade in Europe. He chose the title after careful and deliberate consideration in hopes that the country would see the totality of the war and not just the atrocity. In other words, he believed that hidden in the horror of Hitler's wake was some good.
According to James Carville, Eisenhower selected the title because, "He wanted to declare to America that what they had just done—the stand they took together against evil, despite any internal divisions—was something much more elegant and profound than could be carried by the word "war." It was something noble."
Since Eisenhower's days and the parallel beginnings of public music education, we as educators have never experienced a moment so dire or requiring this much gravitas. The current Pandemic has brought sickness to our industry, infected our programs, and endangered our lives. It taxes us all mentally, emotionally, and, yes, physically.
But it is doing so much more than that.
The COVID-19 Pandemic provides our profession with an unwelcome but vital opportunity to put actions behind our words and show that our beliefs about the power of music are more than poetic rhetoric. This moment in time has given us the chance to rise up, stand together, fight a common enemy, and defeat it with unanimity. I believe that 2020 will be the time our profession remembers forever and remembers with pride. We set our differences aside, banded arm in arm, and charged towards the virtual abyss.
As we leave 2020 behind and look at 2021, there will be many who will mourn the train wreck that was the past three hundred and sixty-five days. Like Eisenhower, they will speak of the sorrow caused, lives lost, and the destruction left in the Pandemic's wake. They will be right to do so.
But will they also speak of the nobility of the moment?
If there was anything good to come from 2020, it's that among the unimaginable sacrifice, millions of students and parents stood up and said, "Music matters! And we are doing what it takes to keep it in our lives." Teachers created classrooms in their garage and learned new software while students banded together to make music in new and virtual ways.
To truly believe in something means you have to be willing to fight for it. For most of my life, I have not had to do so. Yes, I would wage the occasional battle for new instruments or a larger budget. I might even lobby for a better schedule or access to facilities. But, NEVER did I have to fight for my program's very existence. But this is where we are. And it's painfully hard.
I know it isn't easy to find hope in this remote and distant environment. As the new year dawns, we find the climate, political and otherwise, feeling dark and gloomy. You miss your students, your classroom, and your way of life. We awake to find our nation and our industry fighting the same war, with a virus, our history, and at times with ourselves. Literally and figuratively, these are dark days that re-appear time and time again like a Groundhog's Day dark comedy.
But these days are not funny and are not a movie.
I do not relish this moment. I wish it had never occurred. And as a parent, professional, and person, I have witnessed firsthand its tragic impact. But it is here, and fight for our lives we did. And there is something valiant about that. And it shouldn't be forgotten, overlooked, or undervalued.
Please know that the light is coming, and the end is near. We will soon look back at our darkest hours and see them for what they were... Our finest hour. Why?
Because we fought for something noble, we fought for music education and the children it serves.
You are hitting it out of the park and I am so very proud of YOU!
- Scott