Repaying a Mentor with a Christmas Miracle

by Drew Holmes

The weeks between Thanksgiving and the new year is a special time to work at a music store. Holiday shoppers shuffle in and out looking for that perfect gift and there is anticipation in the air of things to come. The best part — every now and then you witness a miracle.

One Wednesday night in December 2007 I was working the closing shift at Cornet Music in Smithtown, NY, when a gentleman walked in who made such a miracle. He was browsing and asking general questions, seemingly looking for just the right gift for the musician in his family.

He paused and then asked me if I knew a certain local music teacher, one he had had back in his school days. I replied that knew the name, though the person behind it by reputation only, and that this educator was still going strong and teaching all these years later. The gentleman had a distant but thoughtful look as if he was playing some long-forgotten memory in his head.

“Growing up my family did not have a lot of money,” he explained. “We could not afford an instrument for me to play, and that teacher leant me a Bach Stradivarius trumpet when I was in his band. Do you sell those?”

“We do!” I replied and showed him the half dozen or so we had on the shelf, happy to help him reminisce about his trumpeting days.

He then got quiet. I could see he was considering something carefully, when suddenly he pulled out a credit card and laid it on the counter.

“I’ll take three of them. Please send them to my teacher so he can help kids who need instruments.”

I was flabbergasted. These were professional quality instruments, costing well over two thousand dollars. Each. Long Island has many well-heeled residents, and I could tell that while this was an affordable purchase, it was not inconsequential. Honoring the memory of the kindness he was shown all those years before and what it meant to his life’s journey was worth the financial sacrifice.

Throughout our lives we are helped and mentored by people who freely give of themselves. We want to repay them for their kindness, but that is futile. Our mentors cannot be repaid with kindness shown to them, but rather through our generosity to others.

Clint Nieweg, retired Principal Librarian of The Philadelphia Orchestra, was such a mentor to me. He was giving of his time and expertise, teaching me how to be an orchestra librarian even though I had no experience and did not at the time intend to pursue it as a career. I used that knowledge later when I worked professional in orchestra libraries, and now every day with my own music store. For years I tried to repay Clint for giving me such a gift, but eventually I realized — he was not doing it for me. He was repaying the kindness of his mentor, Jesse Taynton, who had done the same for him decades earlier.

Back at Cornet Music, my customer wrote a heartfelt note to his teacher to include with his gift. In the end his teacher elected not to take the three trumpets but instead exchanged them for over a dozen instruments for his band. The Christmas Miracle helped more kids to make music than was intended and repaid the generosity from years earlier in the only way possible — forward.

When we see farther it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. Sharing what we see with those who will someday stand on ours is how we honor those mentors.