Mr. Wilson's second act: Virtuoso's progression from SF Opera to middle-school classroom
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Tim Wilson, music director at Lovonya DeJean Middle School, plays the trumpet during the Spring Concert.Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle
Tim Wilson steps onto the small stage platform, raises his baton and asks the 100 or so students seated before him to settle down. Music, he tells them, is painted on a canvas of silence — a lovely metaphor that has no effect. The October dress rehearsal for the middle school band’s first concert of the year is not going well.
Wilson waits. The hum of conversation continues, punctuated by an occasional clarinet’s revolt or trumpet’s yawp. The canvas at Lovonya DeJean Middle School in Richmond is rarely silent. So the music teacher waits some more.