Hey everyone it's Rima our episode this week is one of my absolute favorites it aired back in 2019

and I still find it pretty shocking you'll want to listen all the way through because we've included an update at the very end.

All right, here it is.

I hope you all enjoy it, and we'll be back in your feeds next week

with a new episode.

When Eric Abramovitz was 18, he played in this concert that to anyone else would feel pretty insignificant.

We were playing this amazing symphony by Maher, his third symphony.

Eric was a clarinet player in a university symphony.

And in the last movement at the great climax of this piece, I just, I was like overtaken by these like shivers and like unbelievable

feelings of joy. It's just like an upward scale, but like within the conduct of all the instruments, it's just like,

D'An, don't, don't, don't, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da. But I mean it's just it's huge you know I'm not doing it justice here The music completely overwhelmed him to the point where he felt like crying.

Just from feeling that I knew that music was exactly what I had to do with my life.

I'm Marie McRise and welcome to This is Uncomfortable, a podcast from Marketplace about life and how money messes with it.

This week, a crazy story about one guy's dreams and an unexpected price tag.

For as long as Eric could remember, he'd been around music. His mom played in a

Klezmer band and as he grew up watching them perform, he felt mesmerized by

the clarinet. When he was seven, he convinced his parents to let him take lessons. By high school

he was winning awards and playing in local orchestras and once he entered

college at McGill University in Montreal, music became his entire life.

Even when it came to dating, like he had this crush on a flute player.

So I asked her if she wanted to join my chamber group.

So was that your way of like flirting with her?

...