At age ten, I began to perform in front of ordinary people. In appreciation of the nuns who allowed me use of the school piano, I agreed to play as prelude to the annual Christmas show. My music would usher the par-ents to their seats while their children shed coats and scarves for their elf and wise-man es. My teacher, Mr. Martin, and I put together a program of Bach, Strauss, ahoven, ending with part of "Six Little Piano Pieces" in honor of Arnold Sberg, who had passed away the year before. We felt this last "modern" piece, while not overly familiar to our audience, displayed my rahout being overly ostentatious. The day before the Christmas show, I went through the thirty-minute program for the nuns after school, and the choices brought nothing but frowns and scowls from beh their wimples.
"Thats wonderful, Henry, truly extraordinary," the principal said. She was the Mother Superior of the gang of crows that ran the joint. "But that last song."
"Sbergs?"
"Yes, very iing." She stood up in front of the sisters and paced to and fro, searg the air for tact. "Do you know anything else?"
"Else, Mother?"
"Something more seasonal perhaps?"
"Seasonal, Mother?"
"Something people might know?"
"Im not sure I uand."
She turned and addressed me directly. "Do you know any Christmas songs? A hymn? Silent Night perhaps? Or Hark! The Herald Angels—I think thats Mendelssohn. If you play Beethoven, you play Mendels-sohn."
"You want carols?"
"Not only hymns." She walked on, hitg down her habit. "You could do Jingle Bells or White Christmas. "
"Thats from Holiday Inn," one of the other nuns volunteered. "Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire and Marjorie Reynolds. Oh, but youre too young."
"Did you see Bells of St. Marys?" the third-grade teacher asked her fel-low sisters. "Wasnt he good in that?"
"I really liked that Boys Town—you know, the oh Mickey Rooney."
Rattling the beads on her rosary, Mother Superior cut them off. "Surely you know a few Christmas songs?"
Crestfallen, I went home that night and learhe fluff, practig on a paper-cutout keyboard fashioned by my father. At the show the eve-ning, I trimmed half my inal program and added a few carols at the end. I kept the Sberg, whieedless to say, bombed. I played the Christmas stuff brilliantly and to a thunderous ovation. "Cretins," I said under my breath as I accepted their adulation. During my repeated bows, loathing swelled over their loud clapping and whistling. But then, looking out at the sea of faces, I began tnize my parents and neighbors, all happy and cheerful, sendiheir sincere appreciation for the holiday warmth geed by the vaguely predictable strains of their old favorites. No gift as wele as the expected gift. And I grew light-headed and dizzy the lohe applause went on. My father rose to his feet, a real smile plastered on his mug. I nearly fainted. I wanted more.
The glory of the experience rested in the simple fact that my musical talent was a humahere were no pianos in the woods. And as my magic slowly diminished, my artistry increased. I felt more and more removed from those who had taken me for a hundred years, and my sole hope and prayer was that they would leave me alone. From the night of the first perfor-ma was as if I were split in two: half of me tinuing on with Mr. Martin and his emphasis on the of classics, pounding out the old -posers until I could hammer like Thor or make t