EPISTOLARY MEMOIR / EPISTLE 10

Soon after my Navjote, the Piano entered my life. I was surrounded by pianos. Just across the street, the Borthwicks had a beautiful upright. In the same building,Soona Aunty (Aunty Gold) had a beautiful Bluthner on which I could hear her daughter practising. And in the building next dooe was Jeroo and I could hear her playing too. Also across the street was a German who typed late into the night. (Perhaps he was a writer !:)) Then he would play recorded piano music. I was enchanted by Chopin's Walzt in C sharp minor, which tugged at my soul and summoned me out of bed, but as I was only four or five years old, I was afraid to go to the balcony alone, and I would drag Daddy ( next to whom I slept) out of bed and we would quietly stand on the balcony while I listened, entranced, to the music. It was the first piece of classical music that I fell in love with. profeeor Frierich Niecks has written that "one cannot help but believe in the immortality of the soul." It seems to have been Heaven-sent into my life at that tender age, when neither of my parents listened to classical music. Mummy used to visit Mrs. Borthwick and take me along. Her son Jerry, was a passionate amateur photographer. He took a photo of me in which I look about three or four, seated on the revolving piano stool with a cushion on it, a chubby forefinger putting down a key. I looking solemnly at the camera, and my student Josh commented that "You look very sad." That was because I had cried and begged of mummy to take me to Mrs. Borthwick's piano. I could think of no greater happiness than sitting at that divine instrument, putting one ivory key down at a time, and listenening to the golden sound. Jerry used to lift me up and put me on the piano stool. As far back as I can remember, I used to beg of my mother to get me a piano, but she said,"Who do you think you are? A princess, that you want to play the piano?!" No doubt my parents were hurting for money, and so I had to wait till I was eleven before I could start taking piano lessons, and this happened quite by chance. Mummy send me to Mrs. Mowdawala in the next building to give her the parsi newspaper which listed Parsi deaths, funerals etc. I gazed lovingly at her piano and her 18 year old daughter Jeroo offered to teach me for free. And so I started piano lessons!!!:) I worked furiously to make up for lost time and made rapid progress. Within six months Jeroo prepared me for the Rirst Grade exam of the Trinity College of Music, London, which I passed with Honours. here I must pause to explain that we in India were very fortunate, that as we were a leading member of the British Commonwealth of Nations, the Trinity College used to send its examiners to India once a year to assess piano students at all levels, as the examiner would travel all over India ,including the boarding school in the Hill stations, to assess the candidates who were mostly Anglo-Indian or Parsi. A year later I did grade 5, skipping grades 2,3, and 4, and once again passed with Honours. By now, my parents, seeing that I was doing so well, rented a pianofrom Bayne and Company. I shall never forget the day when the piano arrived! I used to dream that there was a piano in the house, and was ecstatic, only to wake up and find to my dismay that there was none. The piano arrived on the heads of six coolies who were special piano carriers. I must deplre this practice! Even though it helped them to earn a living, I wish that pianos in India had been transported by truck as they are in more affluent coutries, the coolies then trnsferring them from the truck into the house. it must have been harrowing for them to carry it on their heads for a mile and a half over hot streets and nthen up our stairs!! I was a child and innocently unaware of this. Infact, I waited on my balcony and was thrilled when I saw them coming down the sttreet. Of course, I started playing on it as soon as the coolies left! The next day, Mr. Bayne, very dapper in a white, shark skin suit (I have no idea why they were called that) came an tuned it. Jeroo got married and I had to start taking lessons from our school music teacher, Miss Saldanha. She was a lovely woman who lived in a flat in Byculla, bear our school. This meant that I had to take the bus on Sundays, and after a forty-five minute ride, walk down a quet street to reach her flat which we tucked away some distance off the main road. I liked Miss Saldanha, and enjoyed the long ride on the upper deck of the BEST bus, and also felt grown up doing it all by myself. The lessons pretty much took up my whole Sunday afternoons and I 0played the piano both before and after the lesson. I cannot recall her actually instructing me, as, because of my zeal and my ambition, I pretty much learned the pieces on my own. She did teach me the fingering of scales which by now I had to play for four ocataves, and taught me theory up to the fourth grade exam , I passed the siwth grade )"Senior" piano ("Practical") exam with honours , in which I played my beloved C sharp minor Chopin waltz.:) I skipped the seventh grade and did my Higher Local for which I was pretty much self-taught. Unfortunately I missed Honours by two marks and passed only with Merit. My mother picked up the phone and berated Miss Saldanha! Miss Saldanha asked to speak to me,and said, simlpy, "Please find another teacher. I'm sorry, I can't teach you." And so I lost another beloved teacher, years after my mother did the same thing to Mrs. Archer. Meanwhile, my Father had bought me a four legged grand for three hundred rupees. In terms of the cost of living, it was the same for him as $300 would be for an American. It was very old and had only one pedal the rod that connected it to the piano kept breaking. The ivory keys had turned brown with age and some were cracked and others simply not there and my fingers played on wooden keys. This was all my Father could afford and I don't blame him. But I disliked the piano, even though I practised and played a lot on it. I would take this opportunity to say that it is very important for students to have access to a really good and beautiful piano to practice on! I will keep this nEpistle short, and stop here.