I was 14 years old when I took up the clarinet at my state high school. It would be a nice story if that led to me playing for the state symphony orchestra. It didn’t.

But it turns out there were life-long benefits from my failure to master this supremely daggy instrument. And I did perform at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl.

I didn’t only take up the clarinet to get out of maths class, I swear. I loved music and wanted to learn a new skill.

My primary school didn’t have much of a music program at the time, except the occasional singalong if your teacher was musical. So when my state high school offered free tuition, I signed up. My parents bought a secondhand clarinet. They hadn’t played an instrument, but encouraged my reckless foray into what was, for me, an uncharted wilderness.

Instrumental music was starting to be introduced at my high school and when I was in about year 8, a small concert band was formed, playing pop and classical pieces. People who were actual musos gave lessons – the ones we skipped class for – but it was optional, and a little uncool. Not that many of my classmates played an instrument, but one boy was a seasoned trombonist because he was from a Salvation Army family. His little brother played trumpet like a pro.

I wanted to be well-rounded and just loved music. I listened to the radio all the time. But I turned out to be a pretty poor clarinet player, even after two years of learning. Clarinet was fairly easy to assemble and play, except for the reeds in the mouthpiece that would get soggy and split.

I did learn how to read music. I knew what a bar and a sharp and a flat was. I could keep time, as long as it was slow 3/4 or 4/4 time. It’s just that the notes on the page didn’t reach my hands to play them quickly enough. I was never going to be the next, um, Acker Bilk.

But looking back, it was worthwhile. I made a good friend, named Lisa. We bonded over a love of the soundtrack to the musical Chess. We played in the school band and went to band camps – one was in the Yarra Valley, with kids from two other rowdy northern suburbs schools. Those poor teachers.

One day, Lisa and I saw an ad in a local newspaper that the State Youth Concert Band was starting. We joined. It sounded highfalutin but if I could get in, their standards can’t have been too high. We played third clarinet, meaning never playing melody, and with fewer notes or fast bits. It was perfect.

We rehearsed at a private school with lavish facilities. There were about 100 kids, some playing instruments we’d never seen, such as oboe and bassoon. It felt like a big deal.

We played pop and classical pieces and movie themes. The conductor had a booming voice and was strict, like an army boot camp instructor. The trumpeters and other horns got the lead parts in those great John Williams compositions such as the Star Wars theme. I remember listening with joy and awe.

For the performance at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl, we wore naff white windcheaters with a logo on them for Victoria’s 150th birthday (it was 1985) and had to sing – not play – the soppy Barbra Streisand song Evergreen. It was excruciating. But that’s showbiz.

I don’t have much memory of the occasion, other than how surprisingly non-glamorous, made of concrete and steel, the Bowl looked from the stage and how close the crowd was thanks to the famous sloping auditorium. Looking back, I realise how cool it was to have played on a stage that’s been graced by The Seekers, Paul McCartney and Wings, ABBA, Midnight Oil and AC/DC.

Also in 1985, Lisa played with the State Youth Concert Band for Prince Charles and Princess Diana at Port Melbourne. I wasn’t at that event – but I can’t remember why not. But both the Music Bowl and the royals gigs are great examples of where playing an instrument can take you.

Now, in 2026, Lisa goes to classical music concerts and still has three friends she met in the band. “It was a great experience,” she said. She still plays the clarinet occasionally. As for me, however, after a few years of lessons at school, I gave up the clarinet and sold it to some other beginner.

I’ve never picked up a clarinet in the decades since. I have no regrets. Those years learning at school introduced me to instrumental music, to reading notes, a band, and a friend. Then I was done.

But now, thanks to that knowledge, when I listen to a song on the radio, I hear music differently. I can harmonise, and pick out each instrument. If I meet or interview a musician, I can talk shop – or at least try valiantly to fake it. Sometimes I casually mention I was in the State Youth Concert Band.

If a parent ever asks me whether it’s worth their kid taking up clarinet, flute, trumpet or drums, I say, “go for it”. They may not end up a world-class musician, but it will open up their world, just a little.

This was the final instalment of the Opinion Summer Series, The year that changed me.

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