Yesterday on the T, I sat across from two gentleman having an animated conversation. One, I deduced, was a Berklee faculty member. The other was a native Frenchman.

“I’m tough, but I’m fair,” the professor said. “I could go easy on the students, but why should I? That’s not how it is in the outside world.”

“Work, work, work,” agreed the French gentleman. In his glorious accent, it sounded like “Weurk, weurk, weurk.”

“Discipline sets you free,” the professor went on. “It’s like jazz. You can’t be great at improvising if you don’t learn your chords and scales first.”

They paid me no attention, but I nodded in agreement across the aisle.