06/03/2026
A group Volusia County Music Directors started meeting regularly here at Mr. Bill’s, As summer break is beginning they bought matching Mr. Bill’s T-shirts and gathered for a photo to remember the place where they spent so many mornings together.
(  I wasn’t able to get a copy of the photo if anyone knows them and can get me a copy that would be awesome. )
Watching them is surreal…….
Because ….
halfway through ninth grade
We moved I had played trumpet, loved music, but honestly wasn't very good. My band director, Mr. Romines, asked what instrument I played. I proudly said, "Trumpet."
He looked at me and said, "We already have 16 trumpet players. How about baritone? The mouthpiece is a little bigger, but the notes are the same."
I took it as a challenge.
By the end of ninth grade, and again in tenth grade, I was the top baritone player in the school.
Then one day he called me into his office. He told me a phenomenal baritone player was coming up from middle school and that she would be taking the lead spot. Then he said something that changed my life.
"I need you to play tuba."
I figured it would be easy. Bigger mouthpiece, same notes, right?
Wrong.
Different fingerings. Different notes. An entirely different clef. I would have to learn bass clef from scratch.
It was one of those moments where someone sees something in you before you see it in yourself.
So I did it.
And I became the best tuba player they had.
The band directors meeting in my shop today don't know any of this story. They don't know how much a band director's confidence shaped who I became. They don't know that every time I see a music teacher, I think about Mr. Romines and the gift he gave me.
It wasn't music.
It was confidence.
Sometimes the most important thing a teacher gives you isn't an education. It's the belief that you're capable of more than you thought possible.
