YaYa Goes to Music Camp

The biggest reason why we spent last week in North Dakota was because YaYa was attending band camp at International Music Camp, which is a fine arts summer school located in the peace garden on the border with Canada.  I spent a week at this camp five different summers of my adolescence, and worked there one summer after my first year of college.  Attending as a student was a wonderful experience.  Working there was not, but I’m not going to dwell on that.  Way back in February I mentioned while eating dinner out with my eldest daughter that someday she might enjoy studying her oboe at International Music Camp.  This year?  She asked.  Can I go this year?  In fact, she could.  In fact, I had gone the first time after I completed sixth grade also.  In fact, my reaction was nearly the same as hers.  There was a CAMP for BAND?  A camp all about playing my instrument?  A camp that was like school for music all day long?  I was on board from the second my music teacher mentioned the place, and my daughter was the same way.  We convinced Dr. Peds it was a good idea.

My very good friend Siri, who lives in Bismarck has a daughter who is one of my favorite people in the world, and she ended up going the same week for her bass clarinet, so the two girls registered to room together.  It ended up that Siri’s family was vacationing in Wisconsin before camp started, so they delivered an extra passenger to our house who rode with us all the way to camp.  She was delightful.

After registering two of my favorite musicians I helped settle them into their room.  Then we bought a few supplies from the gift shop:  lanyards so they wouldn’t loose their name badges, and also, I will admit, two spectacular sweatshirts for me.  I love sweatshirts.  I love music camp.  Music camp always sells great sweatshirts ( I know this because my job that not so wonderful summer was selling them, along with snacks).  I greeted the concessionists with kindness and grace and sincerely wished them a great summer.  Being a concessionist was a hard job.  

Then I asked them to let me take a picture of them.  YaYa was thrilled.  I hugged them goodbye, and they literally skipped away from me.  

We went about our week, mailing off letters to camp when we could and hoping that they were having great time.  Six days later it was time to pick up YaYa and head back to northern Minnesota.  The other kidlets and I were up early to load the van and head back up to the border.  We picked up YaYa’s stuff, and then had some time to kill before her concert, while she was at rehearsal.  We ate a picnic lunch, courtesy of Grandma Robbie, and walked around the camp a bit.  We relaxed under a tree in front of Howard Hall and watched all the people in line for lunch.  Music camp is famous for its very, very long lunch lines.  We were happy that we had brought our own lunch.

This building with all the flags is an old iconic centerpiece to the camp, Howard Hall.

It was a short walk down to the big auditorium where the concert is held.  I had forgotten how amazing the end of the week concert is!  It was seriously impressive.  It’s amazing what they can teach in one week.  I wish you could hear how fantastic they sounded.  It was so exciting to sit there and listen, even though my other kidlets were a bit squirmy from having been in the car and waiting and anticipating a very long drive back home.

Here’s my favorite bass clarinet player.

Here is a happy YaYa, in her element with other oboes and bassoons.  She was so happy to meet other oboe players, and when I asked her if she had a good week she said, “This will be my one summer activity every year until I go to college.”  I consider that a success.  Really and truly, International Music Camp is a magical place, and I am so happy that she actually did love it as much as I loved going there.  She had the opportunity to play in a chamber ensemble, a woodwind  quintet, which was challenging and a little stressful, but a very  rewarding experience for her.

Before the last song in the concert the guest band conductor (who actually went to camp when I went to camp) talked about what a magical place International Music Camp was, how passionate the teachers there are, how his experience there shaped so many parts of his life, and I had to agree.  It is a magical place.  I too, would never ever be the musician I am without it.  It inspired me in huge ways,  motivated me throughout the whole school year, and gave me the tools to go to college and study music.  I probably wouldn’t have fallen so deeply in love with music without music camp.

And although I didn’t meet my spouse at camp like the conductor, I did meet amazing friends who are still my friends to this day, and while working there I actually did have the dream that my now husband was dressed up in a pink Easter bunny suit.  That dream caused me to think carefully about Dr. Peds, who at that time wasn’t even on my radar.  After thinking carefully for a few months, I was back at college and watching that red headed boy closely.  After watching for a few months, I was pretty much infatuated from head to toe.  And while he spent the rest of that year not interested in me really, by the end of that year we were dating.  A year later we were engaged, and a year after that, married.  There’s a lot more craziness to that story, but still.

YaYa told wonderful stories about camp half the way home, and best of all, when she pulled out her oboe today, the change in her playing was remarkable.