No, this column is not about The Sound of Music.
However, it easily could be. I am not joking when I say that I could talk for an hour about the wondrous 1965 musical. Every element of the film is perfect: Julie Andrews, the beautiful Austrian countryside, Christopher Plummer as Baron von Trapp, and the exquisite cinematography and songs.
Instead, this story is about the literal sound of music.
As omnipresent as books and film have been in my life, so has music.
I began playing piano as a young girl along with my sister, but not by choice.
Let’s just say, we both hated it.
For what reason, I can’t say. For me, perhaps it was that I couldn’t forget that a piano has 88 keys. Or, that for the longest time, I could never remember the difference between a sharp and a flat key when playing. Therefore, my chords were always wrong when I attended my weekly piano lessons, stressing me out far more than necessary.
Even then, I was a perfectionist, so I would criticize my skills whenever I tapped the wrong key or if the piece didn’t sound fluid enough. I wanted to make the piano sing, to hear a different voice than a human’s. When I messed up, the singing would end, frustrating me.
Regardless of my mishaps, both my sister and I increased in skill after many years of lessons and practicing on our piano at home. We began playing countless concerts with our music school in the iconic St. Cecilia’s Music Center, the center for all young musicians to start their music careers in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
By fourth grade, I could perform “Beauty and the Beast” and J.S. Bach’s “The Well-Tempered Clavier: Book 1, Prelude in C Major, BWV 846” without any sheet music.
This was the peak of my piano career.
Following in the footsteps of my sister, I quit piano when I was 12, a decision I now regret. After that, I played the violin (at an extremely amateur level) for three years in school.
Since then, music has vanished from my life.
Yes, I have Spotify and listen to music of all kinds daily. But playing music is a completely different form of connecting with an instrument, and one I dearly miss.
Over the past summer, in moments of boredom, I found myself sitting at my grandparents’ grand piano, hoping to pull an extravagant piece from the depths of my mind.
Alas, I could only play the first few notes of “Für Elise” and the primary chords of the piano.
At that moment, I wanted to know music again. I wanted to feel the weight of the keys beneath the pads of my fingertips as I made the piano sing. I wanted to hear flats, sharps, naturals, hear the heavy silence of a whole rest as I tap my foot on the sustain pedal to resonate the sound. I wanted to feel the voice lift and elevate me with its effortless tone.
I hadn’t truly felt the impact of an instrument in so long that I’d begun to feel numb to its effects.
There’s something about classical music, void of lyrics, that can hit me to the core, wrap me in the crescendo, and make me feel like I’m floating. Now, that feeling is a stranger to me, ever since I lost the ability to sightread.
Playing music is a passion, a feeling not dissimilar to the excitement that I feel when I dissect the color theory and directorial choices of one of my favorite movies. It’s a medium of art that connects people and allows them to express their emotions.
On a day when the pressure of homework and work responsibilities is nonexistent, I hope to reconnect with the sound of music and relearn the forgotten art from my childhood.
