There should be a happier ending to this.
Oh, there was a better one, about a month ago, when Justin Doute stood in triumph amid great applause, a young man who only five months earlier had barely escaped death. But that was a month ago.
He is 22 years old with a life story of the type Hollywood used to dream up.
A percussionist, he played for four years in the Denver Citywide Marching Band, won armloads of musicianship and citizenship awards and got into the Manhattan School of Music in New York.
On breaks, he would return to Denver and give low-cost and free lessons to underprivileged kids, work as a teacher’s assistant at his alma mater, the Denver School of the Arts, and perform on Sundays with the church choir.
Fast forward to Dec. 19, 2009. He arrived home that day on Christmas break, telling his mom, Jessie, he felt weak.
Two days later, Jessie took him to the doctor. The news came back rapidly and horrific: Justin had acute myelogenous leukemia. It was rampant in his system, he was told. His organs were failing.
The most doctors could do was put him on chemotherapy. Next, they told him he had a rogue gene that wasn’t responding to the treatment.
His only chance was finding a suitable bone marrow donor, and there was at best a 5 percent chance of that. Without one, Justin had six months to live.
“There were many times,” Jessie Doute said, “that I thought we were going to lose him.”
Two months later, a donor was found. He and the family flew to Seattle for the transplant. Nearly five months later, they returned to Denver.
As he regained strength, he returned to the marimba, practicing every day. The Colorado Symphony Orchestra was having a competition. He practiced harder, won it and on Jan. 15 was a featured performer with the orchestra.
That day, the Arapahoe Philharmonic was holding its T. Gordon Parks Memorial Collegiate Concerto Competition for woodwind, brass and percussion. Justin Doute had filled out the application. No, he was not enrolled at college, he noted, giving the details of what he had gone through. Come on down, he was told.
He hired a pianist to back him, packed up his five-octave marimba and played. He won first place, along with the $2,000 prize that went with it.
Jessie and Larry Doute won’t say what Justin’s medical ordeal cost — only that it was plenty. The money would be extremely helpful when Justin re-enrolls at the Manhattan School come fall.
Five days after his victory, an Arapahoe Philharmonic official called to inform Justin he was being stripped of his win. He was not officially enrolled in college when he won, he was told.
“Should we let this story, one of miracle healing and his elation at returning to the world he thought was taken from him, go that way?” Larry Doute said.
He and Jessie and Justin have written letters to the philharmonic board asking it to reconsider. They have heard nothing back. My calls were not returned.
“They knew what had happened to me, and why I wasn’t enrolled when I applied,” Justin Doute said.
“Sure, the win was great, and the money would have been really nice, but I have learned there are always politics in music and complications in life. I did all I could, and I was happy to have the opportunity.”
He continues to play, even hosting a recital at the University of Denver’s Lamont School of Music, during which he raised $400 for the Leukemia Society of Colorado.
“All of it I see as just another sign that Justin has more good to do,” his mother said. “It is why he is still here.”
Bill Johnson writes Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Reach him at 303-954-2763 or wjohnson@denverpost.com.
