If I could choose to be endowed with a great gift or talent
I would certainly choose to be a concert-standard pianist, but please don’t misunderstand. I have no desire to hear the thunderous applause, to be taken by the hand as the conductor and I acknowledge the standing ovation, to receive the bouquet, to come back on stage four times, to play a brilliant encore, to read the glowing press notices at the end of a late-night party.
All that is best left to the people who like that sort of thing. I merely want to match the professionals, to play as fluently, to memorize as completely, to express the composer’s intentions as deeply.
You may have gathered that I am a competent pianist. I know that I shall never get much better. I need the music in front of me. I do not own a Steinway grand, but a gallant old Brinsmead upright, now in its eightieth year. One plays — and one dreams !
So what about the ‘great gift or talent’ ? Is one born with it, or can it be developed ? The answers are yes and no. Occasionally, in a televised piano competition, one sees a young boy or girl, say aged thirteen or fourteen, sit down and play a Chopin ballade or a devilishly difficult piece of Liszt with consummate, almost contemptuous ease. That has to be talent. I could never do it in a thousand years. I used to tell myself that I could if I practiced more. Now I merely recognize that gift in others. I would never deny that to flower into perfection, the gift must be complemented by hours of practice, daily. Yet without the gift, no amount of practice will achieve the result. The word ‘practice’ implies a chore, the kind of mental resolution which says ‘I will do half an hour a day’. Well, yes, that will improve the muscles and therefore the performance. Yet, the talented youngster is content to live a keyboard, with a short break every few hours for a sausage roll and a coco-cola. And in turn this implies a musical background — since I believe that such people are favoured genetically-encouragement, a good piano, and above all opportunity. The development of a great gift has to be at the expense of a good general education. My late wife used to teach maths to Toots Lockwood, and grumble because Margaret’s young daughter made little progress. Toots, a budding actress herself, once made the precocious remark ‘Mummy didn’t need maths to become a star, did she?’
There are various reasons why I would like to have been a gifted pianist. Firstly, for my own satisfaction, since I enjoy playing a wide variety of composers and would dearly love to extend my repertoire. Secondly, I would like to be able to hold each piece, however long, in my memory, and to be able to think exclusively of the interpretation as my fingers automatically translated the score into sound.
Also, I would like to be confident about entertaining my friends, and this demands not only memory but the ability to improvise. Fluent improvisation is a gift not possessed by all great pianists. The story goes that the jazz pianist Art Tatum once challenged the great Solomon to improvise on the tune ‘Lady be good’ for as long as he could. Solomon gave up after ten minutes. Tatum manipulated the tune for half an hour without repeating himself.
So my guilty secret is that I enjoy playing jazz music as much as classical. Certainly not the modern variety of the Dave Brubeck school, with its unrhythmic runs and depressingly awful harmonies. But give me Duke Ellington, Earl Hines, Teddy Wilson, fats Waller — especially Waller — and I am happy. If I had Waller’s rhythm and Tatum’s ingenuity, life would be a rich thing !
So, personal satisfaction, giving pleasure to my family and few friends, and helping my grandchildren, all of whom play the piano at varying levels consonant with their ages. None is likely to show a great gift or talent, but they will all become competent, like me. There is no greater satisfaction than giving them a hand with their scales, their theory, their pieces at Grades at Grades 3, 4 or 5.
One of them is likely to become a better pianist than me. She may even become very good, but like the rest of us, she will never be a virtuoso. I am rather thankful for this, because life is tough at the top, and there are many drawbacks to a concert pianist’s life : jet-lag, bad hotels, the envy of one’s peers, an unbalanced life, perhaps a marital breakdown.
I prefer to have my cake and eat it. I would like the talent, but none of the pizzazz which always seems to go with it.
