A graduate student will be the clarinet soloist performer with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra this weekend after winning the TCU Concerto Competition last year.Myoung Song, a 40-year-old wife and mother, will be playing the clarinet for the second time with an orchestra.

Born and raised in Korea, Song said she began playing the clarinet in high school. Song went to college to learn music, but after having an unfair conductor, she quit playing when she graduated, she said.

Song soon married and moved to Texas in 1996 so her husband could go to school, she said. After he graduated, they had to return to Korea because of difficulties with their visas. Two years later, they came back to Texas and have been here ever since.

Since college, Song said she has played the clarinet every Sunday in church. Three years ago, she said she decided to really start playing again and wanted to go back to school.

Song said she wanted to go to TCU, but because of low grades from college she failed her entrance exam.

“I was very disappointed and discouraged,” she said. “I knew I cannot change the past, I could only change the future.”

Song’s professor, Gary Whitman, helped her take the right classes, she said. A year later after making all A’s in her music theory and history classes, she was accepted into the School of Music.

“It’s like a Cinderella story,” Whitman said. “She is very charming and hard-working. She is a delight and pleasure to teach.”

Song said she loves studying under Whitman.

“He gives the best advice, treats me the same as all the other students and, most importantly, he trusts me,” Song said.

Last year, when Song won TCU’s Concerto Competition, which was founded by German Gutierrez, associate professor of music and director of orchestral studies at TCU, it was her first competition to compete in.

After Song played with the TCU symphony in February, Gutierrez said he had many e-mails from people who went to the concert and were praising her performance.

Song played with the Fort Worth Symphony on Saturday as part of a series of community concerts and will play twice more this weekend.

Gutierrez will be the guest conductor for the performances.

“I was just a housewife, baby sat, cleaned and just sat at home. My life has totally changed,” Song said.