I Played

I Played

Cheryl Pope

147 Sugar Hill Road, Rexford, NY 12148

305-393-0303 capope1013@gmail.com

I PLAYED

By: Cheryl Pope

The coolness of the tiles was soothing as I leaned against the wall.    Clasping my dad’s wrinkled hankie which I carried in my case, I wiped my sweaty palms and upper lip. Closing my eyes, I went over the music in my head reminding myself of crescendos, diminuendos and tricky timing. It was the day of the big audition.

    At the other end of the hallway, I saw Sylvie and her father. Sylvie glanced over and waved, giving me a thumbs up.

  Sylvie’s father, Mr. Swartz, leaned toward his daughter and stage whispered, “She’ll probably get third or fourth chair, or like other years, not be accepted.” 

I heard him and wasn’t surprised. I was used to this. 

    Sylvie was always a step ahead of me; a ladder rung above my head that I could just barely reach but not quite.

    When my parents hired the same instructor Sylvie had, her father hired a better one. Sylvie’s dad bought her a top-of-the-line instrument while my parents found a used one for me. 

    The door to the audition room opened suddenly and I jumped. Gathering my things, I entered the room as Sylvie’s dad called, “You’ll probably do fine.”

    I worked incredibly hard, practicing six to ten hours a day. My parents and grandparents thought I spent too much time practicing and said that I should come out of my room and get some fresh air. I just loved to play.

    In school I spent every study hall and every lunch period in the practice room. I also spent many French class times and history class times in the practice room expecting to be busted for skipping class, but it never happened.

    My dream was to become a professional musician playing in a symphony orchestra in a pit or on a stage, wearing my austere black dress in front of hundreds of people. French and history would be of no use to me in that world.

   Many students who auditioned hired professional accompanists and worked with them prior to the audition. That’s what Sylvie did. My family always supported me at some sacrifice, but a professional accompanist was not in our budget, so I was accompanied by someone provided by the program. I had never met him.

I adjusted my stand and instrument, tuned to the piano and began. There was a section in the composition where the piano played a solo and during that section there was a page turn for the flutist. Just as I was reaching up to turn the page, I noticed a face in the window of the classroom door behind the judges. Mr. Swartz’s face was framed perfectly. He was grinning wide, stuck out his tongue, waggled his fingers in his ears and disappeared.

I was shaken for sure but went to that place in my head where only the music and I existed and finished the audition. 

As I passed Sylvie and her dad waiting in the hall I said, “Why did you do that? You almost made me mess up.”

Mr. Swartz squeezed my shoulder and smiling said, “Just trying to help you relax. Don’t be so serious.”

How could I not be serious? I’d tried out for this orchestra in my sophomore year and my junior year and wasn’t accepted either time. Sylvie was accepted both times although she sat fourth chair. This was my last chance. If I didn’t get selected this time it would be over for me as a senior, no more chances. 

   On the following Friday when I got home from school there was a large brown envelope on the dining room table. I tore it open and read that I had been selected and was assigned second chair. I’d didn’t have to wonder who’d be sitting first chair.

The doors opened and kids with violin cases, cellos and French horns filed into the auditorium. The stage was lit and set up with metal folding chairs, each one with someone’s name taped to the back. Sylvie had called me on Friday night to tell me that she’d been chosen for first chair which was no surprise to me then or now. It was what I expected.

What did surprise me was that the conductor told us that we could challenge other players for their seats. I didn’t know that was a thing. When we broke for lunch, we could fill out a challenge form and auditions would be set up. When we returned the next morning, we’d know the results of the challenge based on the name tags on the chair backs. I made an uncharacteristically bold decision, filled out the form and handed it to the secretary. 

Sylvie and I were given a note with our audition times. Sylvie folded hers and placed it on her stand. She smiled and said, “Well, you can look that up in the dictionary under fat chance.”

We returned in the morning and my eyes went immediately to the woodwind section, specifically the flute section. My name was taped to the first chair and Sylvie’s to second. I climbed up the stairs to the stage and went to my section with my nerves tingling. Standing in front of the chair felt very uncomfortable and I was reluctant to take my seat. It was as though the chair was too short or too wide. I thought of Goldilocks. The chair wasn’t just right but I sat down.

Sylvie came over, sat in second chair and said, “Good job.”

It wasn’t as weird as I thought it would be and had gone much better than it had in my head. Or so I thought.

Near the end of our lunch break I was handed a note saying that the conductor would like to have a word with me in his office. 

I went into his office and was offered a seat. Mr. Brady, leaned back in his chair, folding his hands over his stomach. 

Mr. Brady began, “I called you in so we could have a little chat.”

He shifted slightly in his squeaky chair and was silent for a moment. At last, he leaned forward now resting his clasped hands on his desk.

“I received a phone call from Mr. Swartz, Sylvie’s father.”

As if I didn’t know who Mr. Swartz was.

He continued, “You can imagine that he was very upset over Sylvie losing the challenge. He seems to think that she may not have been feeling well or that she didn’t do her best so that you could have a chance. He wanted us to redo the challenge, but there’s no time for that and I trust the judges' decision.

“The difficult problem I’m having is that Mr. Swartz is a great supporter of youth music programs. He gives a lot of money so that kids, like you and your friends, can have great opportunities. In fact, the company he owns has paid for this entire program. Without his support I doubt that we would be able to do this.”

There was an uncomfortable feeling stirring up in my stomach and I wished he’d just get to the point, although I thought I probably already knew what was coming.

Mr. Brady began to slide paper clips around on the desk surface, studying them with his eyes and not looking at me.

He continued, “Mr. Swartz wants Sylvie in first chair and if that doesn’t happen, he is probably going to take her out of the orchestra and take his money too.”

I interrupted, “So, I’m out.” It wasn’t a question.

He raised his eyes from his paper clips and looked at me. “No, not at all! I was just wondering, in order to make everyone happy and to solve the problem of both you and Sylvie being equally qualified, perhaps we could have both of you as first chair. Two first chairs. You’d play the same music, except for the solos which Sylvie would take. You’d just be sitting in a different chair.”

He chuckled, “It’s just a chair. A gray hunk of metal on legs."

I studied my sneakers and said, “No, it’s not just a chair to me. What you’re asking isn’t fair. Why does he get his way just because he’s bossy and has a lot of money?”

“Well, you'll learn that life's rarely fair. This is your choice, of course, but if you don’t move there probably won’t be a concert anyway. There’s a lot of kids out there who would be very disappointed.”

What would happen if I didn’t agree? Would I be kicked out or would the concert be canceled, and all my friends would suffer and probably be furious with me?

His expression was soft and kind like he was someone’s old grandpa asking for a hug.

My dad always told me that the most important things in life were honesty and standing up for yourself when you knew you were right. To keep from crying I wrapped my arms tight around my flute case, pulled it and my music folder close to my chest and stood up.

   Mr. Brady smiled a sorrowful smile and said, “So you’ll slide down?”

“No,” I said. “I think I’ll slide out.”

Mr. Brady stood abruptly, as I turned to leave.  “Now, Allison, don’t cut off your nose to spite your face.”

I answered, “At least I’ll still have face.” Stupid.

The concert was performed but I wasn’t there. I didn’t buy the album and in the school orchestra I continued to sit one chair down from Sylvie for the rest of the year.

   Near the end of my junior year my school orchestra director called me into his office to tell me that the new high school built in the next neighborhood had been completed and that many of the students who now went to my school would be transferring over. One of them was Sylvie. 

   I never heard from or saw Sylvie again. As is often the case, we move from one season of life to another and some things we take along with us and others just fade into a memory.

   My orchestra director found me a talented instructor who had relocated to the United States from France. Her name was Madame Corey. She had graduated from the Royal College of Music, one of the top music schools in Europe.

   Madame Corey was wonderful and eccentric, and she believed in me much more than I did. She assigned pieces to me which were way above my skill level and one of them I worked on for two years and she was still not satisfied. Madame Corey’s absolute belief in my ability encouraged me to work harder. She gave me a taste of life as a professional musician by taking me with her when she played in the orchestra for theater performances. I sat in the pit right next to her and played with everyone else. No one questioned why I was there or seemed to mind having a seventeen-year-old in their midst.

Madame invited me to play with quartets and ensembles at weddings, receptions, parties and public events and under the tutelage of Madame Corey, I reached for those things that were above my reach until eventually I grabbed on to them tenuously and then firmly grasping. I pushed myself to fit in with much more talented and skilled musicians and I improved.

   Fifteen years later, I had my master’s degree in music, was married to a symphony cellist, had a baseball playing son and a percussionist daughter. I never auditioned for a symphony position and was now the director of a non-profit music, art and dance school. On the side I played for the opera, musicals, Broadway shows and a couple of times, the circus and Ice Capades. The circus and Ice Capades didn’t pay very well but my family scored free tickets and that made it worth it.

   The Arts School was created to encourage students from underserved or low-income neighborhoods to participate in an arts program. Statistics showed that students who were part of such a program had a better chance of becoming successful academically and socially. 

So, now as the director of the Arts School, I became the judge and not the judged. Acting as an adjudicator was stressful when difficult decisions had to be made. I still remembered how it felt to stand alone in front of people who could had the ability to crush your dreams with one pen stroke. 

Our team had to ignore everything other than some amount of skill, potential and dedication. Nothing about the student involving appearance, race, socioeconomic status or family background could be considered. Therefore, the judges sat behind a screen out of view of the student and students were referred to by order number and not name. After only two competitors remained for each opening, the screen was removed, and we met the students face to face.

  It was our job to choose the ones who would benefit most from an arts education whether they became professional musicians or learned skills that would improve their chances of success in other areas and only played their instruments for pleasure. 

   On an unusually warm day in June, we began auditioning for the coming school year. There were over sixty students applying for twenty-five openings. The auditions took place over a two-week period until we were down to two finalists for each seat available in art, music and dance.

   This day two young flutists who had made it through the preliminary audition process were there for their final audition.

   A girl of about twelve entered the room carrying her flute and music. Her name was Sadie Bloom. Something about her eyes and the way she held herself reminded me of someone, but I had seen so many young musicians over the years, I couldn't be sure.

   She began her audition, impressing us with her tone, expression and grasp of the intricacies of the composition as well as her level of self confidence. 

As I was making notes, I sensed a movement to my left and I turned. Initially I thought of a ghost because there was a scary face looking through the glass window of the classroom door. Suddenly the face disappeared but not before I had a flash of recognition and felt certain it was Mr. Swartz from long ago. But how could it be? This was a school for underprivileged children. Why was he here, or was I completely off base, my memory distorted by twenty years gone by? I told myself that I must have had a flashback and that the person in the window was probably just looking for something.   

   I quickly thumbed to the back of the Sadie’s bio. Mother deceased. Father absent. Child living with grandfather. The address was in Randallstown, which could mean a beautiful stately old home or run down two-bedroom cape cod with overgrown lawn. Or it could mean a beautiful stately old home which had been converted into several apartments and had a metal fire escape ladder spiraling down its side.

   “Mother deceased,” I thought.

   Back in my office I went to the computer.

I learned that Sylvie had died of cancer when her only child was ten years old. Sylvie had been a flute instructor at a small music store at the time of her death. Sylvie’s mother was deceased without mention of cause. Mr. Swartz’s business had gone bankrupt after allegations of embezzlement. He had been fined and ordered to pay restitution but there was no incarceration, merely probation.

 Sadie was the daughter of my nemesis, Sylvie Swartz. 

I hadn’t thought of Sylvie for years and if I had, I would have thought that she had become a famous flutist perhaps overseas or across the country.  I would have imagined her being a professor of music somewhere or the first chair flutist in a symphony orchestra. I would have envisioned her father throwing money at any obstacle in Sylvie's way.

The powerful and audacious Mr. Swartz was now a shrunken old man with a few whisps of hair on his head and a long weary looking face. I glanced out of my office door window and saw him there, slumped on the lobby sofa with Sadie by his side cleaning her flute. I felt sad. I thought of a rose that bloomed one day and then – PLOP – fell to the ground. Here and then gone, never realizing its potential. I didn’t just feel sad that Sylvie had left too soon, or that Sadie would grow up without her mother. It only made sense that no matter what had happened to Sylvie’s musical dreams she had most likely passed her knowledge and skill onto her daughter. She would never see the results of her efforts.

I returned to the audition room just long enough to say, “I have to abstain from this one.” It happens sometimes.

I felt the overwhelming desire to escape the hard choices of the world and the reality that, like my old conductor said, life isn’t always fair. I wanted to get lost in the music and to forget everything other than the forte and pianissimo symbols, the presto and legato tempos.

I went to a practice room, did not turn on the lights and with tears on my cheeks, I played.