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Frustrated Musician
At home, throughout 1947, I continued teaching myself to play the violin because my parents, although by that time convinced of my determination, couldn't afford to pay for any lessons. One day at the start of my second term at QEGS I discovered the school orchestra. I had no intention of offering my services, one didn't push oneself forward at QEGS – it was simply not done! Instead I sat down in a corner at the back of the Assembly Hall and listened quietly, and I thought unobtrusively, just for the pleasure of watching the string players rehearsing.
As I listened, I began to appreciate how rudimentary was the technique of many of the boys. I watched as one or two of the older and more proficient boys were detailed off to help the beginners tune their violins so that all the Gs, Ds, As and Es more or less matched the notes hammered out in octaves on the piano by the music master. Non-musicians would be surprised at how long that can take! It was made all the more difficult because even I could tell that the piano itself was by no means in perfect tune.
Eventually the Master, Mr Renhard, noticed me lurking in the corner and asked me if I could play any instrument. Rather foolishly, I volunteered that I could play the violin “a little”. Jumping to the erroneous conclusion that I was simply being modest about my ability, the Master thrust a spare violin into my hands and told me to take a seat amongst the second violins. “Join in when you can, Cunnane,” he said. “There's no need to be shy.” Obediently, and no doubt blushing horribly, I sat down.
The piece in rehearsal was a much simplified version of the well-known March from Handel's opera Scipio, played at a truly funereal pace. It was written in the easy key of D Major so I felt emboldened. I enthusiastically joined in but got very embarrassed when I played one or two wrong notes. Soon, I completely lost my place in the score because I was spending too much time looking around the room instead of concentrating on the printed page. The boy next to me, seeing my predicament, stopped playing momentarily so that he could point with the end of his bow to the correct place on the music page but he then promptly got left behind and lost his own place. For the rest of the piece I pretended to play but kept my bow just above the strings – and that's easier said than done!
When most, but not by any means all, of the rest of the players reached the end of the piece with a flourish in roughly D Major, the Music Master, who must by then have been wishing that he'd never accepted the commission to run the school orchestra, came amongst us and asked loudly the name of my violin teacher. When I muttered that I didn't have one, he clasped his hands behind his back under his flowing black gown, rocked backwards and forwards, and said sternly, “That explains it! Go home and don't come to another rehearsal until you have engaged a teacher and you have his permission to play in the school orchestra.”
I withdrew, humiliated. Not for the first time I realised the drawbacks of coming from a poor family.
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The boy next to me, seeing my predicament, stopped playing momentarily so that he could point with the end of his bow to the correct place on the music page but he then promptly got left behind and lost his own place