Music has changed everything about me. When I first started band, I was very shy and had a lot of trouble meeting and talking to new people. However, after just a few days of band camp, my personality had already started to change. Now, here I am, four years later. I've held multiple positions in my band program, including making it all the way up to being the Woodwind Captain. Through band, I have realized that people really aren't all that different. We can all come together through music. For example, most recently my band played at State Solo and Ensemble at the University of Florida auditorium. We played played selections from the opera "Turandot" by Puccini. Never in my life would I have considered myself someone who enjoyed opera music, I'd only ever go as far as saying I like "The Phantom of the Opera" (I know that doesn't count, though). Anyways, at our performance, I was part of only three people who played the melody of the song "Nessun Dorma." The song was so beautiful that it brought many people in the audience to tears, including many of my friends' parents. Even my mother, who knows absolutely nothing about music, was astonished. Music brings people together in a way that nothing else can. It has shaped my personality and my view of the world. I've never been so passionate about something, not did I ever dream I would be able to be this passionate about something. Music has given me a purpose, it gives me something to look forward to. I joined band in middle school on a whim because Spanish classes were full, and now I've dedicated many hours of my life to it. I now see the world as a place full of different cultures, and with that, different styles of music. But no matter what language barrier may exist, music is always there. You don't have to understand the words being said to know how the singer feels. Music portrays feelings and emotions in a way that nothing else known in this world ever could. Music has shown me how easy it is to bring people together through it. It's so much easier to lead a band of 250 high schoolers when everyone has the same passion for music as you do. Music has completely changed my life and has made it into something I never would have dreamed of. Not only has music changed my life, but music has changed the way I see the world around me.