A Letter To the Orchestra Family

Dear Orchestra family,

First, I would like to make an apology. After this year’s graduation, I abruptly unfriended a vast majority of you on Instagram. It was rude, immature, and wrong of me to do so.

This was entirely my fault – I had nothing against any of you. I’m really sorry for that.

Now, some of you may know about the following decision, but many of you do not.

I decided to drop out of orchestra for my senior year.

You probably didn’t expect this at all. To be truthful, I didn’t either.

I’ve played the violin for almost my entire life. I picked up the instrument as a genuine interest when I was five. I participated in both my school orchestra and chamber during middle school and had private lessons with my teacher Ms. G. Good old days.

Then everything changed. I unexpectedly moved back to Taiwan (long story for another day). COVID hit the world hard. My violin lessons came to a halt in the middle of 2020, and sadly, never resumed ever since.

I moved back to the States for my freshman year in 2021 and served as a section leader for String Ensemble. It was really meaningful to be a role model and leader, teaching posture, and making bowings for pieces. To all my String classmates: you are quirkiest, craziest, and most humorous people I’ve ever met. You have taught me how music can bring people together as well as the sheer enjoyment of playing not just as individuals, but as one collective voice. Thank you and love y’all <3

At the end of my freshman year, I was confident to go do orchestra all four years of high school. I got into Philharmonia in the springtime. Given that Phil is a cherished opportunity that not many students have, I wanted to make the best use of these three remaining years.

So what happened?

Around the start of this calendar year, I started to have serious moments of contemplation about my interests. What am I truly passionate about? What activities did I want to invest in?

There are also so many activities you can do during a day, week, month, and year. I learned to prioritize: sometimes, there are too many activities on your plate to truly focus on anything. As my mom wisely reminded me: there are only twenty-four hours in a day. Cutting out sleep and school, I only have a few hours in the afternoon and evening as free time. No more, since I value sleep.

My junior year schedule was a complete nightmare. I had too many things on my plate, and I had started setting personal goals for myself; it was time to cut something out.

It was an excruciating choice to say goodbye to orchestra and the violin for senior year. But practicing scales, arpeggios, chords, and repertoire is no longer a priority for me; STEM, swimming, Math Club, and our school’s newly formed Christian Club now demand more of my time. For the first time in my life, I couldn’t envision continuing something I had dedicated over ten years to.

Last month, I submitted the course request form to drop orchestra for AP Statistics. And that was that.

But something tells me my journey with music isn’t over yet. I may practice for fun during this school year, and there’s a chance that I rejoin orchestra in college. I’m down if you want me for HoCo lol. I still listen to classical music on car rides. The current chapter ends, but I’m sure the next one will begin soon.

Here are some lessons I’ve learned from this experience. Do what you’re passionate about. Have a couple things on your plate, and do them well. It’s okay to scrape off some activities to focus on what matters to you. People change, and it’s okay. But don’t ever forget what you have achieved and what lessons you’ve learned.

You are an extremely kind, passionate, and resilient group of people. Keep at it and work together, and I believe that you will accomplish tremendous results!

I’m truly grateful for the wonderful experiences and memories y’all have made for me, especially in Ocean Grove and Boston. I will never forget the amazing festival dinners, fanatical screaming over the Ocean Grove river, humorous orchestra server bans(I left – if you are in it please invite me), Bobby quotes, Mr. Moore walking out the door, questionable trumpet playing, and of course – playing Hanon and Ruslan at 130BPM.

I promise I will come back to visit the orchestra room when I’m free!

Thank you all for such an amazing journey. Gonna miss you all. Peace.

-Daniel Lu (’21-’22 HSS String Ensemble, ’22-’23 and ’23-’24 HSS Philharmonia)