Music, Late and Soon by Robyn Sarah

Author:Robyn Sarah [Sarah, Robyn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781771963572
Publisher: Biblioasis
Published: 2021-07-23T00:00:00+00:00

That year, 1969–70, was supposed to be my last at Conservatoire. I was supposed to repeat my failed Supérieure II exam in February and play my Concours graduation recital in the spring; programs were already under discussion. I was supposed to do this while completing my final undergraduate year at McGill, in an honours program in philosophy that required me to write a thesis-in-miniature for which I had submitted as topic “A comparison of the doctrines of negative theology as propounded by Moses Maimonides and Thomas Aquinas within their respective faith traditions.” Perhaps I had bitten off a bit more than I could chew. One thing I was not supposed to do that year was to help build a harpsichord, but it is the thing that shone brightest afterwards in memory. To participate in the making of a musical instrument was at once humbling and exalting; to partake in such a hands-on way in the musical revival then in progress, the reclaiming of Renaissance period instruments and repertoire, felt like a privilege.

At Conservatoire it turned out to be a year of “supposed to’s” that never panned out. I was supposed to play a full recital in the fall which, for reasons I don’t recall, never happened. I was supposed to play the Brahms Clarinet Trio in the spring with an excellent cellist and pianist, coached in Otto Joachim’s chamber music class, but after a few exhilarating sessions the cellist had a serious dispute with her teacher and withdrew from the Conservatoire. They reconciled a week later and I was overjoyed to see her back, but just as we were to resume rehearsing, our pianist was diagnosed with mononucleosis. It was too late in the semester to find a replacement. In the end all I succeeded in accomplishing that year was to repeat my Supérieure II exam, for the same adjudicator who had failed me the previous year and who now deliberately kept me hanging, declining to let me know if I’d passed. I begged an assistant teacher to see if he could find out for me; he came back with a report that I had “passed, but with some difficulty,” and that he had been explicitly instructed not to tell me. By early spring, mired in medieval philosophy and existential angst—not to mention marriage plans for that summer, fast-tracked by a year on account of Fred’s legal status (or rather lack of it) in Canada—it became clear I would have to defer my Concours until the following year.

Sheldon had played his Sarah Fischer debut recital that December. Shaken by seeing Mr. Cohen again after three years, across a distance that seemed unbreachable, I was overwhelmed by feelings I could hardly name. How had I ever let the piano lessons go, how had I left my teacher? I noted the event briefly in my journal, promising myself to come back to it, but nearly two months passed before I could bring myself to write about that evening.

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