Music = life

(image by maxmann on pixabay)

When I was growing up, my parents always had CBC radio playing in the house, so in between all the cultural talk, we were exposed to every kind of musical interlude. My mother also played the piano every day. She played very well and could effectively bang out Scott Joplin’s rags or any other classical piece from the standard repertoire.

My father had a violin, a viola, and a very nice wooden recorder, which had survived his exodus as a Jewish teenager from Germany just before WWII. He would pull them out only occasionally and my mother told me he had perfect pitch. I think that music opened every emotional wound he had because his father and mother had been killed by the Nazis. He fondly remembered his father playing cello in several chamber music ensembles. He would tell the story of his three cellos, the most basic he called “Nebelung” or “foghorn”, which he took on the tram to rehearsals. My father often cried at the symphony, but he loved going. Interestingly, I have a vivid memory of myself crying over my eggs at the kitchen table when I was about five. There was classical music playing on the radio and my mother said, “What’s wrong?” and I said, “It’s the music. It’s just so sad!” I suppose intergenerational trauma is real.

I tried piano lessons as a kid but hated them. Then I discovered the guitar at age eleven and loved it and took classical lessons for six years. Then in high school I played flute in the band and sax in the jazz band. I got pretty serious about the flute and would ride the bus downtown every Friday for private lessons at the Vancouver Music School. I was devastated when my parents said they couldn’t afford for me to live in residence to study music at UBC. In hindsight, it was a good thing. I didn’t have a performer’s bone in my body. I am still very shy about playing in front of anyone.

As a retired person, I always have ambient music playing in my house. I don’t like silence. I prefer gentle world music, jazz, upbeat electronic dance music, and even rap. I’m pleased that both my kids learned piano and various other instruments and enjoyed the process. I kept the fallboard from my mum’s hundred-year-old piano, which had lived out its lifespan, ironically at the exact same time she passed. A good friend added some lovely coat hooks to it in my front foyer. It’s a daily reminder of her playing.

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