FACING THE MUSIC: MUSIC FESTIVAL RATES STUDENT PERFORMANCES

Ten-year-old piano student Jessica Satterfield and her mother, Cindy, sat silently in a hallway Saturday waiting to be summoned into a small room where a college music professor would listen to Jessica's rendition of "Pandas on Parade."

Emerging from her performance minutes later, Jessica said she was nervous but only made one mistake. "I breathed deep," she said.

Saturday was judgment day for Jessica and the 500 other music students who swarmed over Brandt Music Building for the eighth annual Missouri Federation of Music Clubs Junior Music Festival. The festival is sponsored by the local branch of the organization, Encore Federated Music Club.

Students and their families from Cape Girardeau, Jackson, Scott City and Dexter participated in the day-long event. Finding a parking space might have been the most nerve-wracking part of the day, one harried mother said.

Eight piano judges, two voice judges, a flute judge and a violin judge sat in different practice rooms listening to each of the students perform two memorized songs. Since one of the songs had to come from a book most of the piano students use, the judges became very familiar with some of the tunes.

Ranging in age from 7 years old to high school seniors, the students were shooting for a Superior rating, the highest possible. By gathering enough Superior ratings through the years, students accumulate points toward a trophy. Enough trophies can be lead to receiving the Grand Cup, an achievement belonging to only one student in the history of the club, Eric Matthis of Dexter.

A student of Mary Ruth Boone of Dexter, Matthis is now a piano performance major at the Wheaton Conservatory in Anderson, Ind. Boone had 40 students at the festival, an event her students point toward all year long.

"This is the high point," she said. "They all are a little fidgety."

Some of the parents were, too. One mom who forgot her son's music had to drive the 40 miles back home to retrieve it because the judges need music even if the children don't. Co-chairwomen Marge Main and Becky Fulgham promised to squeeze him into the performance schedule later.

The piano is a very popular instrument none of the 30 teachers in the club has an opening for a student but getting children to practice is still a challenge. As incentives, some teachers use rewards such as stickers or goals such as performing at the festival.

"Sometimes parents ask me, Do I make them practice?," Main said. "I say, Don't make it a battle. Show an interest in what they are practicing."

Yet she admits that some students can learn to play the piano with very little practice. "That was me," she said. "I could learn it about half an hour before my lesson."

Barbara Hill handed out the rating certificates available 10 minutes after each student's performance. "We haven't had any tears yet today, but sometimes there are tears," Hill said. "Sometimes there's joy."

A piano teacher who also is the publisher of the Daily Statesman newspaper in Dexter, Hill said the festival is as trying for the teachers as for the students. "The teachers here are on pins and needles all day the same as the parents."

Thirty minutes per day seems to be the standard amount of practice for most students. Scott Schwiesow of Gordonville practices before breakfast. Scott, 13, already had his Superior rating. The pressure was on his 15-year-old sister, Becky, who was still to perform.

The children are home-schooled. Learning to play the piano was their own choice, said their mother, Donna, one she endorses. "It gives them a goal to work for, something to accomplish and dedication.

"And it's not bad to be nervous once in awhile," she said.