It was a sunny day, and we were excited. I was in the car with three of my friends and we were headed to Spring String Thing. Spring String Thing is exactly what it sounds like, a thing, in spring, for strings. More specifically, it is a three day camp near the end of May at James Madison University where kids audition and are placed into one of many orchestras, before they learn three pieces in two days and have a concert at the end. I wanted to go to Spring String Thing in seventh grade, but my parents said no. A year later, they said yes, and also said they don’t remember saying no. Nevertheless, I was excited. I along with eleven other friends, was going to get to miss school for orchestra.

The first day, Friday, consisted of a lot of driving. I lived in Northern Virginia and the camp took place at James Madison University. Once we arrived, we had to check in and get to our dorms to unpack. I was sharing a room with one of my friends from school. Two more of my friends were across the hall. As soon as we all got to our dorms and dropped off all our stuff, we bolted out again in order to audition. Months were poured in to the audition pieces, with help from my private tutor, school orchestra conductor, and friends. I was really nervous, and I made a few mistakes, but nothing crashed and burned, like the one time I accidentally played the wrong scale for an audition (I didn’t pass that audition).

After our auditions, we went back to our rooms and calmed down after our hectic morning. The next event was learning which orchestra we placed in, but that wouldn’t take place for a while. We managed to find out where the rest of our friends were and met up. Eventually, we had to go to the concert hall to find out where we placed. I got placed a middle orchestra, fourth best out of six, and so did Justin. We were to report immediately to where we would be practicing for the next day. When we arrived, we met our conductor and sight read the pieces were going to learn. They were easier than what I had played before, but that was because we didn’t have as much time to perfect the songs, so we needed songs we already had some grasp on. Once our practice was over, we had one last event: an ice cream social. The entire campus is centered around one huge grassy park, with dorms on one end and practice halls on the other. We ate our ice cream, talked, and played and ran around before we went back to our dorms.

James Madison University is known for its food. My orchestra teacher during that time went to James Madison and told us about the food. And if there's one thing I loved about Spring String Thing, it was meals. Once you arrive at the mess hall, even before you enter it, you can smell the delicious aroma of the food and your stomach rumbles as it prepares for the incoming feast. You can take as much as you like too, as it’s similar to a buffet. I also loved this time for another reason: this was the one time where I knew I was going to be able to see all my friends. It's like school lunch, but it tastes better.

Saturday was filled with work. We practiced for twelve hours that day. It was hard, and my shoulder became sore because my shoulder rest kept rubbing against it. But I kept trying and blocked out the pain. We had a few breaks here and there, and you don’t always play because sometimes only certain sections need to work on something, but it still was grueling. We worked until it was dark out and it was hard to see the way back, but we were still in high spirits because the whole experience was enjoyable. We got to make music in those 12 hours, and by the end, I believe we really nailed our songs. We got the intense parts intense, the beautiful parts beautiful, and the dramatic parts dramatic. It sounded like we had a lot more than just a single day to work on these songs.

The next day, I was refreshed and excited for our concert. The concert went smoothly, and we didn’t mess up. At that moment, I knew that all the hard work was worth it. I also realized that I didn’t think of the practice as hard work because I had a lot of friends that made the whole experience awesome. Our conductor was really funny, and told us stories of how he got his orchestra to play pranks on his principal. All the people made the experience very enjoyable and made the work nothing. By the end of the camp, I wanted to go back and play more, and spend more time with everyone there.