William Short

William Short was appointed Principal Bassoon of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in 2012. He previously served in the same capacity with the Delaware Symphony Orchestra and has also performed with the Houston and Detroit Symphonies and the Philadelphia Orchestra. William has performed as soloist with the Vermont and Delaware Symphonies, the New York Classical Players, and the Strings Festival Orchestra. He is a founding member of the Gotham Wind Quintet and has performed many times with the Camerata Pacifica, Dolce Suono, and Met Orchestra Chamber Ensemble chamber music series.

A dedicated teacher, William serves on the faculties of The Juilliard School, Manhattan School of Music, and Temple University, and is a Valade Fellow at Interlochen Arts Camp. In addition, he is a Visiting Faculty member at The Tianjin Juilliard School and has held visiting guest positions at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music and the University of Colorado at Boulder. He has presented classes around the world, including at conferences of the International Double Reed Society, for which he served as a board member from 2017-2021.

William has performed and taught at the Lake Champlain, Lake Tahoe, Mostly Mozart, National Orchestral Institute, National Youth Orchestra, Stellenbosch (South Africa), Strings, Twickenham, and Verbier Festivals. An occasional arranger, editor, and composer, his work has been published by the Theodore Presser Company and TrevCo Music.

William received his Bachelor of Music from the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with Daniel Matsukawa and Bernard Garfield, and his Master of Music at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, where he studied with Benjamin Kamins. As a student, he attended festivals including the Music Academy of the West, Pacific Music Festival, Spoleto Festival USA, and the Verbier Festival. Additional major teachers have included Jeanine Attaway, Kristin Wolfe Jensen, and William Lewis.

A Fox Artist, William plays on a Model 750, which he is proud to have helped develop.

Everyone Fails

June 18, 2016  /  William Short

In a perverse way, failure is fascinating. Everyone has lost auditions and performed poorly and ruined good pieces of cane. On a theoretical level, it’s easy to understand. But when it happens to us, it’s hard to avoid feeling like it’s an indictment of not only our worth as musicians, but our worth as people.

But failure is an unavoidable part of our perpetual quest to get better. After all, if we never made mistakes, we would have nothing upon which to improve. The fact that everyone fails means that failure, by itself, is utterly meaningless in determining whether or not we’re “successful.” What is meaningful? The extent to which we immerse ourselves in the process. The work we do in between high-pressure events, whether they were successful or not. How we brush off last night’s triumph or nightmare and get back to clearheaded work.

We all hunger for some form of objective validation; we all want to know that we’re doing OK. In such a subjective field, we inevitably cling to studying at that school, winning that audition, impressing that critic. Conversely, when we fail in one of those pursuits, we can feel that we’re hopeless. If we lost this audition, how can we ever even hope to win that job?

But everyone fails. And even when we “win,” we often forget that external validation is fleeting. The glow wears off after a while and we’re left looking for more—a recipe for disappointment if we’re looking for lasting affirmation. If we stay fascinated by the work, though, we will remain perpetually engaged in the process. Ultimately, that’s the only side of the equation we can control.

It’s virtually impossible to accurately assess ourselves. We’re either the greatest musician ever to walk the face of the planet…or we’re complete and utter disappointments. Obviously the truth lies somewhere in between. How do we reconcile these equally untrue perspectives, particularly when they are the lens through which we view ourselves, our progress, our success? We don’t, because they’re both equally irrelevant to what we have to do to improve. The morning after a great performance, we get up and get back to work. The morning after a lousy performance, we get up and get back to work.

"It's not easy, but if you accept your misfortune and handle it right, your perceived failure can become a catalyst for profound reinvention."

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