Brian Wilson's Failing High School Music Grade Reversed

This time around, his school was true to him

BY Calum SlingerlandPublished Jan 15, 2018

For all his work with the Beach Boys, Brian Wilson is often heralded as a musical genius. It wasn't always that way, though, as his high school music teacher famously gave him an 'F' grade on the composition that became the band's first single "Surfin'."

While Wilson's teachers couldn't have predicted his career path at that point, the school has now made amends with one of their best known alumni.

As the Beach Boy revealed on Twitter today, a trip back to his high school in Hawthorne, CA, resulted in current principal Dr. Vanessa Landesfeind changing the assignment grade from an 'F' to an 'A.' Wilson quoted his former music teacher, Fred Morgan, who said that "Brian wrote a composition for me and it turned out to be 'Surfin.' That composition got an F, but it made a million dollars."

As he wrote in his 2016 memoir, Wilson admitted that Morgan prompted him to look at music differently. The musician added that upon catching up with him at a high school reunion later in life, Morgan told him that "you failed my class, but you scored big in music."

Let the record show that hindsight is indeed 20/20. You can find Wilson's tweets below.
 

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