Dr. Holst

I'm not much for writing stuff like this...but I want to share with those I know.

This evening about 5 minutes prior to the beginning of opening night for Peter Pan, 2 of my friends received texts that were shared with me. These texts were not good news. For in that simple communication, we found out that a dear friend, and musician had passed away tonight.

His name is Tanner Holst. I have only known him about a year and a half (I think). He was an early college student. He is 17 years old. Just a young one. :)
He was an AMAZING musician. He played bassoon like it was a part of himself. I have had many opportunities to play with him. First in orchestra, and then this past year in the wsu woodwind quintet. We also played a clarinet-bassoon duet last semester. Even though he was younger, he challenged me as a musician. He could get annoying at times (mostly because he was just better and knew more than me...but anyways), but overall, he is a very good person.

The story goes that last week he came down with a very high fever. I don't know that I saw him at all last week, so I don't know how ill he really was, but a friend of mine said he looked like he was dead (even then). Anyways. What I have heard is that he was diagnosed with pneumonia, but was doing ok until yesterday. Apparently he couldn't breathe, so they took him to the emergency room. He was then life-flighted to Primary Children's (again...so young!). In band we were told that some muscle damage had been done...but I'm not sure what really happened. All I know is that once I heard this news in band today, I had this gut feeling that he might die.

It really was such a freak thing. I think the only thing that is keeping me from breaking down is the knowledge that there HAS to be a bigger plan for him. He really had so much potential to be anything he wanted to be. His life was going far and he was doing well. He actually just passed the first round of auditions for the concerto night on bassoon(via recording, since he was sick during the auditions this past week). The Lord must need him on the other side. That's the only reason I can think of to explain why he got so sick and died. He was only 17! 17-year olds don't die from pneumonia.

Anyways. I'm so thankful to have known him in this life. I have nothing bad to say about him (excpet for maybe he was a little too into playing the bassoon...but it's great that he was passionate about something). He will be missed and it will be a happy day when I get to see him again.