To the Editor:

I’m sorry to hear of Mr Grasso’s passing. I had weekly clarinet/saxophone lessons with him for roughly four years as a high school and college student. I have a number of good memories from those lessons. For example, I remember him really getting a kick out of me playing an assignment on his phone’s answering machine. Another was when I was warming up for a lesson and intentionally played a classical piece in a swing style. He came into the room with a smile and laugh, asking, “What did you do to that beautiful song?” I probably replied with a simple “I swung it!” and a smile.

One of the more profound memories I have is from earlier in our relationship; when I was taking after-school clarinet lessons as a high school student. Mr Grasso wasn’t my first lesson teacher, and I remember feeling frustrated from having to constantly play from exercise-filled lesson books. I broke down during one of our lessons when struggling through an assigned exercise that I hadn’t practiced. I felt like I was letting him and myself down, and I couldn’t hold back my tears. He asked me why I was crying; stating that there was no reason to cry. I exclaimed, “I’m mediocre!” to which he replied with a chuckle, “Aren’t we all?”

After making it clear that I wasn’t the only student he ever had who didn’t practice, he asked me why I didn’t practice. I told him it was because I didn’t want to play what was in the lesson books. He then asked me what I wanted to play. I told him I wanted to play something beautiful, flowing, and full of emotion… something like an opera.

It was then that he closed the lesson book, and replaced it on the music stand with a piece of music from his files. It was the second movement of Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in A major — Adagio. To this day I love this song. It was what I needed at that moment. In later years, Mr Grasso even catered to my longtime desire to play jazz on the clarinet (a dream of mine since I first heard a jazz band in middle school).

I often reflect on his response “Aren’t we all?” when I think of him; and what a great response it was. He made it clear I didn’t have to be perfect, that I could have fun with the music we played.

I will no doubt think of him whenever I hear Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in A major.

Steven R. Deignan-Schmidt, NHS Class of 2005

Groton