About 5 or 6 years ago I took a few high school students to the local
State Music Teachers Spring Festival. the categories were by age with
no division of the sexes. Any way, one young lady began her piece,
messed up, started over, messed up, started again and gave a rather
lackluster performance. Another young lady gave a splendid peformance
with plenty of nuancem, just fabulous. My young gentleman did okay,
nothing spectacular, his voice still had that slight Henry Aldrich
quality. Ther were 2 judges. My student was given an honorable mention,
I still think it was sympathy. There was no third place. Second place
went to the obviously nearly flawless performance and first place went
to Miss Lackluster, screwups and all. Ther was an audible gasp from
everyone in the room(all the parents and teachers.) The reason she won
first place,"We didn't want her to feel bad." Please tell me there is a
happy medium in all this. It reminds me a bit(actually, alaot) of the
school that passes students until at high school graduation it is
discovered that they can't read. Anne
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