She froze, literally, worse then I've ever seen any kid freeze ever at a concert. Her mind went blank and she couldn't remember her song (it was a solo). She tried restarting a couple of times and couldn't get very far, and it sounded terrible. I was there in the front row recording. She then ran back to her seat and cried and gave up.

She had performance anxiety for years because of this and avoided playing solos in public, content to be in the orchestra.

But she knew she had to overcome this, so she auditioned to do a solo concerto with her school orchestra and got it. Her successful performance of that concerto shattered years of ghosts haunting her and liberated her. She felt a great satisfaction for overcoming her anxiety.

It was a great essay, and an even better growing experience for her! It's ok for kids to have challenges. Teach them how to overcome them!

As an aside, a previous thread asked whether music lessons were important in an age where we can just play the music on our phones in church and don't 'need' a pianist to the same degree. Absolutely kids need music lessons—it's one of the best ways (maybe not the only way, but one of the best) to help them learn to overcome challenges.