I guess there are not many who fit this profile, but I do, and I would like to hear from you if you do !
Tell me about yourself.
What made you decide you'd make it your career?
What made you switch careers?
What would you change if you could go back ?
I'll start with myself. I started showing some interest in music at age 5, playing on a small Casio keyboard.
Kept playing by ear, no lessons yet. Two years later my parents bought a Technics keyboard and enrolled me for private lessons. I hated the lessons so I stopped but kept playing by ear. I eventually realized that I preferred piano to keyboard, so my parents bought a nice Baldwin upright and I started the formal piano lessons at 9. I'd say my interest was moderate at best, but enough to continue taking lessons. I was ok with most of what I learned but hated Bach. I kept thinking "this sounds weird, it's not piano music!".
However at 12 I randomly heard Bach on the harpsichord for the first time. Love at first sight listening! From that point I wanted to become a harpsichordist. Asked my parents for one, they said absolutely not, we don't know what that is, you can play that music on the piano! So I stayed with the piano, eventually learning to appreciate playing Bach on the piano. The following years were consumed by my passion for the harpsichord, practicing feverishly every day, mostly baroque music! But then in 1989 I saw a documentary on Alexei Sultanov winning the Van Cliburn competition and was totally enthralled. Overnight, the dreams of becoming a harpsichordist shifted to dreams of becoming a virtuoso concert pianist, and my musical interests switched to the late romantic virtuoso repertoire. My career choice was set (or so I thought) and I enrolled in the local conservatory.
Unfortunately my years at the conservatory were not happy ones because I did not get along with my teacher there. Two years into the program I attended a recital by a pianist/professor at a local university and fell in love with her playing. I asked for one private lesson with her. We had an instant connection. In a heartbeat I dropped out of the conservatory and enrolled in the university piano performance program to study under her. The following years were among the best of my life. I thrived under her teaching and became her favorite student, practicing nearly 8 hours a day. But then another unexpected thing happened: I fell in love with her (she was quite young for a professor), but didn't have the courage to let her know. And then one summer she started this project of going on tour with a male violinist. I threw a fit of jealous rage and told her she should spend the summer teaching me instead of going on tour with that dweeb! In reality I was jealous because I believed she was in love with him; turned out I was wrong, and years later I learned that he was actually gay (oh well, my bad). But anyway the damage was done, my jealous rage caused a major falling out from which my teacher and I never recovered. The following years were the saddest. As I finally got over my passion for my her, my interest in music dwindled as well. I dropped out of the music program at age 28. Switched to another career (unrelated to music) that I am enjoying to this day. Also fell in love (requitedly this time!) with a young lady, and married her after a short courtship.
I barely touched a piano for 17 years (!) after dropping out of the music program. I did buy a baby grand piano, but as a piece of furniture. But then... PW happened, and reignited my love for the piano. I restarted playing and was glad to see I hadn't lost a step! If my life were a movie I'd say I finally became a concert pianist, but no, I'm happy with my current career and making much more $$$ than I would have as a professional pianist. The piano is strictly a hobby now, but clearly my favorite one.
So there you have it. Literally the story of my life thanks for reading. I really hope to hear from other conservatory/university dropouts! But I don't expect much. And to answer my own question, if I could go back and change something, it would have been to refrain from throwing that fit of jealous rage with my teacher. Who knows how different my life would have been!