E sharp

Me: "Play your F# scale.. Stop, finger and say note-names."
Junior Boy: "I was doing it right until I got to the upper-upper-stupid-note."

Junior Boy: "You have a blog? What's on it?"
Me: "Quotes from my stupids... I mean students."

Me: "What note is D flat the same as?"
8th-grade boy: "Hold on... Let me do the the math.... E sharp."

This is a Facebook message I received:
      
7th-grade boy wrote: [John] keeps saying that you accepted his friend request. But Im sure you didnt, since it never said it did. Can you tell him that you didnt accept his request.? Cuz we had a bet;; $20 ;D money. & never accept it. :) Thank You 

Paranormal Activity

Me: "How was your Thanksgiving?"
6th-grade boy: "Good. I ate so much at the Thanksgiving feast, that when I was running, I fell down on my stomach, and threw up, and it came out like a water-gun."
Me: "Awesome."

Same 6th-grade boy: "Oh, man, I have one of those throw-up burps right now."


7th-grade boy: "Mr. V banned scales from the building, so we can't do any in lessons today."
Me: "OK, get out your arpeggios."
7th-grade boy: "OK, I'll do my scales."
Me: "That's what I thought."

7th-grade boy: "I HATE THIS REED!"
Me: "Are you OK or do I need to put on a helmet?"

8th-grade boy: "We were too scared to watch Paranormal Activity directly so we watched the reflection of it on my lizard's cage."

7th-grade boy: "OK, so I'm going to play my solo for you, and you're going to tell me what I'm doing wrong. OK?"
Me: "Yes."

Chips!

8th-grade boy: "Let me start over.  I was hustling it a bit."

Me: "Are you going to carve pumpkins this year for Halloween?"
9th-grade boy: "Nah...." 
Me: "That's not a tradition for you?"
9th-grade boy: "No, my tradition is to hide in the bushes and throw hard candy at people." 

7th-grade boy: "I put on a new reed today, and it tasted like a chip!"

Senior Boy: "I lost my mouthpiece over break and found it yesterday.  I practiced my balls off...."

Human Aren't Plants

Me: "Louder!"
8th-grade boy: "Louder... What a weird word... It's like if someone's name was Lou, it would be like, 'Lou, DER!!!'"

Me: "What did you have for lunch?"
7th-grade boy: "Ham and Cheese...What? Don't you like Ham and Cheese?"
Me: "I'm a vegan... I only eat plants."
7th-grade boy: "So nothing that even comes from animals, like milk or eggs?"
Me: "Yes, exactly."
7th-grade boy: "So no fish?"
Me: "Fish aren't plants."
7th-grade boy: "OK. So you might as well be a cannibal and only eat humans."
Me: "Humans aren't plants."

7th-grade boy: "Is it make fun of [John] day?"
Me: "No, it's make John better day."
7th-grade boy: "When will it be accept John the way he is day?"
Me: "This isn't personal.  It's my job. I'm paid to make you better at the saxophone."
7th-grade boy: "But don't you get paid either way?"

8th-grade girl: "I eat when I feel scared..."
8th-grade boy: "I crawl up into a ball when I'm scared..."
Me: "You, scared??? Never!"
8th-grade boy: "Oh, yeah I am... like when I'm at home and I think of zombies."

Ta-Ta-Ya

Me (talking to someone else): "We should play that Ibert chamber piece with sax... harp..."
Junior Boy: "What's a sax-harp?"


Me: "I'm going to say something harsh.... You're playing like a--"
Senior Boy: "Girl?"
Me: "No! I'm a girl and I play better than you! I was going to say 'wimp'... Don't be sexist.."
Senior Boy: "I'm not sexist... I LOVE women..."

8th-grade boy: "I wrote in the dynamics on the lyrical etude... but they're hard to read.... because I wrote them in with my left hand."


8th-grade boy: "Do you know Chris? [another student]"
Me: "I've seen him around."
8th-grade boy: "He's a background person."
Me: "And you're a foreground person?"
8th-grade boy: "Yes." 

Me (singing articulations to him): "It goes ta-ta-ya-ta-ya-ta-ya-ta-ya."
7th-grade boy: "So do you want me to tongue when you say ta or ya?"

Acting Skills

Me: "You have to play those high notes like you aren't afraid of them."
8th-grade girl: "That's going to take some serious acting skills."

8th-grade boy: "I'm tired."
Me: "Me, too.  I have a long teaching schedule every day except Friday."
8th-grade boy: "I have a long learning schedule..."
 
Me: "Do you need a scale sheet or do you have them all memorized?"
Sophomore Boy: "I know all of them. I just need to know what it is, and then I'll know it."
Me: ".......?"

Me: "That note isn't staccato and it needs vibrato."
8th-grade girl: "That was a crime of rhyme."

Heiroglyphics

Me: "What kind of note is it?"
7th-grade boy: "It's a thirty-tooth note."
Me: "Well, yes, sortof."

Me: "How was the pep rally?"
8th-grade girl: "I think they're pointless. I don't see why school needs that much pep."

11th-grade boy: "Don't worry, next week my music will look like hieroglyphics..."
Me: "Like you're going to practice and mark your part?"
11th-grade boy: "Yeah."
Me: "Good."

Me: "You don't strike me as a normal cheerleader."
8th-grade girl: "What's a normal cheerleader?"
Me: "Well, when I was in high school most of the cheerleaders were jerks."
8th-grade girl: "Oh, yeah, most of them are... no offense to them."

Me: "Quit whining. Don't be a whiner."
11th-grade boy: "I'm not a whiner... I only whine when things are hard."

Just Wing It

‎Me: "Did you bring any payment today?"  

Sophomore boy: "No, it's Harold's fault... you don't know about Harold... he's our car... there was clanking and parts fell off...." 

Me: "OK, bring it next week."

 

Me: "OK, Let's look at this etude.."

Senior boy: "So you just want me to wing it?"

Me: "If by wing it, you mean, sight-read it, then yes... wing it."

 

 8th-grade boy: "I'm tired..."

Me: "You're probably about to have a growth spurt, and you need a lot of energy to grow new cells.."

8th-grade boy: "Yeah, for like, bone cells... muscle cells.... bone marrow cells.... and dendrites.  Do you know what a dendrite is?"

Me: "Aren't those the branches that come off of nerve cells?"

8th-grade boy: "No, they're what you lose if you sniff Sharpies.... or dry-erase markers.... or if you hit your head too many times..."

Me: "Pack up your saxophone quickly so you get to your next class on time."

8th-grade boy: "It's just Spanish... we don't do anything in there anyway... except sit around and talk... ... ...in Spanish."

Sign in the practice room: "Please do not touch the harp stools or the harps."

7th-grade boy: "Makes you want to destroy them all so no one can use them, doesn't it?"

Me: "No."

Me: "Turn on your metronome."

7th-grade boy: "The actual metronome or the metaphorical one in my head?"