Dear Diary – I

Life has turned into such a day by day, blow by blow event that it is difficult to focus on a topic or theme.  Remember the kaleidoscope – that amazing, crazy combination of colours and shapes? You fell in love with the pattern and then with a slight turn or shake of the cylinder an even more stunning pattern fell into place, never to be repeated. What fun!

Well, my seconds, days and hours have turned just as colourful, chaotic, comical, curious and compelling. 

Three days a week, I endeavour to develop the musical skills of little girls ranging in age from 8 to 13, in batches of 65 or thereabouts.  None of them come from English speaking backgrounds; none of them have ever been exposed to western music not even to the ‘Disney’ tunes that have enthralled generations.  I was told to expect the unexpected.  Little did I realise.

At every lesson, taken in the library, with keyboard primed, eager little feet came trooping in and 65 little bodies in all shapes and sizes settled cross-legged on the floor (no sweeping and swabbing required here – uniformed derrieres did the job beautifully!) and 65 voices wished me good day. I hope the smile on my lips belied the trepidation in my heart.  Did any of them know how to sing? A unified chorus of 65 yeses greeted me.  Did any of them play a musical instrument?  Again a full throated roar of ‘yes’.  Turns out they didn’t understand the question.  They had just stopped at ‘play’ and all children know how to play, right?  Well once that was sorted out, I got them learning how to fill their lungs with air and how to stretch their little lips into the required shape for sounding words.  So far so good.  The giggles and good natured pushing and shoving augured well.

Then came calamity.  Asked to ‘la la la’ to the tonic sol-fa, they just could not hit the notes.  Flat would be an understatement.  Without this basic skill, how would they ever sing?  And how would they ever learn the difference between shouting in unison and singing in unison? 

As I teeter between amusement and frustration, I remember one of my favourite musicals ‘Anna and the King of Siam’ – now if I could only reprise Deborah Kerr’s role (without Yul Bryner, of course – pity), life would be a song – literally!