Following is an interview with the Lucas Slavin, a musical starlet and student at Eastman School of Music in Rochester New York.

TC: What was it like to have the opportunity to play in the All-State Symphonic Band?

LS: It was a surreal experience because we were staying at the hotel and Eastman Theater and there were certain periods of time where we weren’t allowed allowed to go outside. We were trapped in this hotel ballroom, no windows, for about eight to nine hours a day, for four days, just rehearsing for our one concert. The passage of time doesn’t really affect you, since you are stuck in a single place the entire time. Despite how it sounds, it was really, really, fun given the fact that we were rehearsing with people of equivalent skill level, which is something you don’t get all the time and you’re experiencing a different conducting style then you’re regularly gonna get from your school band. Since this conductor came all the way from Texas to conduct us, he was a bit eccentric.

TC: What was the best aspect of this opportunity?

LS: Best aspect…like I said the chance to collaborate with other players who have the same passion for music as I do, and at the same skill level as you, and people I could really relate too. The coolest thing about it was that you could go up to literally anybody there, any of the 900 kids from across the state that participated and you’d instantly have something in common with them. So it was really easy to make friends.

TC: Would you say you felt “at home”?

LS: Yeah, that’s a good way of putting it.

TC: How’d the concert turn out?

LS: The concert was ridiculous, everyone was exhausted, everyone was going into this concert with this sense of “okay we’re gonna do this, we’re gonna get it over with, and then we get to go home.” I tried to make the most of it, even though I was exhausted as well. It went really well. The Eastman theatre was just beautiful, one of the best places I’ve performed, so resonant. When you have a group of people that can really take advantage of it, it’s fantastic.

TC: Have you had an experience like this before?

LS: The only thing I can relate it to is all-county, where rehearsal is more spread out and it isn’t 4 straight days of rehearsing, and instead was an rehearsal after school. There was also the music programs I’ve done over the summer, where it is still intensive, but not as frantic as All-State due to the statute of limitations

TC: Is there anything else you would like to add?

LS: I just want to comment on how small the world of musicians is. I’ve been feeling it at every program that I’ve done. There’s always someone that you recognize without fail. And even though I was the only kid from Ossining high school, there was a bus full of kids from Westchester. When I got there I was surrounded by faces that I recognize from all the other programs I’ve done, orchestras that I’ve been in.