Crown Point Junior Music Academy students and parents gathered on May 4 to celebrate the life and memory of their beloved violin teacher, Stephen Luchs, in the most fitting way: with music.

Violins on their shoulders, his lessons in their heads, the students played a concert of songs Luchs had taught them over the years. Their teacher had died on April 10. His joy of music lives on.

A veteran of the San Diego Symphony, Luchs taught violin in public schools for 26 years. His students ranged from kindergartners to fifth graders to parents. The Suzuki Violin program follows the belief that music is a language, and as such, can be taught as a mother tongue.

It also required parents to participate for the first year. Parents got to know Luchs after learning violin from him twice a week. While students changed their regular teacher every year, they kept Luchs year after year, starting to know and anticipate his favorite antics.

“The thing I’ll remember most is the jokes,” said fifth-grader Maren Williams.

Luchs would say, “If you do this perfectly, I’ll give you a million dollars.” When they would try their best and ask for their payment, he would tell them he’d pay them in 100 years.

Williams added more of his favorite sayings: “Forte meant super-loud, and Fortissimo meant Super-Double-Dog-Duper loud… Allegro was an egg roll and Perpetual Motion was Pepperoni Lotion.”

In many ways, teaching someone how to create and perform music is also about teaching someone how to live life. Luchs taught his students to practice, work together, and to share jokes.

“He taught me to have good humor and that the butterflies in our stomachs before we performed in front of people are good for us,” said fourth-grader Nalani Valenzuela.

His students had many opportunities to experience butterflies, as they performed several times a year for the school and community.

“When performing, he would tell us to look at our neighbors and make sure we were all moving our bows in the same direction,” remembers fourth-grader Giovanni Gemelli.

Playing violin wasn’t just making music to be heard. Playing violin was also a performance to be seen. Some students even got to perform on stage with a professional symphony through Classics for Kids.

Luchs was dedicated to music and his students. Throughout health challenges and the pandemic, he remained steadfast in his commitment to the violin program at Crown Point. In 2020, he entered the Visual and Performing Arts Hall of Fame for his lifetime achievement in music education for San Diego Unified.

Another achievement? For the rest of their lives, his students will remember Luchs and smile when they hear “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.”

One lesson Luchs taught his students was how to take a bow: Bend forward, think “San Diego Freeway,” then stand back up and bask in the applause.

“Violin was always the best part of my day,” Williams wrote about Luchs. Applause for a teacher doesn’t get much better than that.

– WRITTEN BY JILL BHOWMIK