The voice of Wigged-Out Weiner, the music teacher in my primary school, still grates upon the inner ear. A large, chalked-in treble clef with stave lines running the length of the board stood behind her. By the end of the class she'd be hammering the desk with the pointing stick, banging out each syllable: "There are five lines and six spaces to every stave." It meant nothing to us except the entertainment value of seeing a skinny, red-faced German woman lose her detached Aryan composure.
Now I see minims, crotchets and quavers as pretty maids all in a row sitting on those five lines and six spaces. These notes direct the position and length of time a finger is to stay on a particular piano key.
Poetry of written music
Weiner would have had us laughing in the aisles had she tried to explain the hidden poetry of written music. Lost us completely with words like stanzas pentameters, rhythm and cadence. We didn't care if something as ephemeral as music could be read and replicated with almost mathematical precision. Weiner was teaching way before the era of appealing to students' more basic instincts. How we listen from our earliest beginnings, even before birth. God knows she tried but the poor old lady had a hard time of it.
Throughout the decades that followed, I thought from time to time about taking up a musical instrument. I can't blame Weiner for stunting my musical growth as I didn't listen much to any teacher. Inevitably, I found myself working too hard and too long with no time to study a subject that wouldn't earn me a living.
My kids took the lessons I wanted. I watched them come in, throw bags, balls and bats on the floor and sit confidently before all 52 white, 36 black (I counted), keys and the house fills up. If there's anger it's played fortissimo, happiness has their fingers dancing giocoso, sadness if played pianissimo but espressivo. Soothing or exciting, the sound is always beguiling. I've seen their playing alleviate bad humours and accentuate good ones.
As their lives became busier, the piano sat mute for longer periods. The empty chair before it beckoned, keyboard wide open, poised and waiting. Silence filled the space where once there was sound. I heard Weiner shouting to sit down in front. I stopped thinking and sat before the piano and started to play with the keys. I enrolled for classes.
The first step in learning anything new is to swallow the bitter pills of pride and embarrassment like Alice in Wonderland with the medicine before fitting through the door.
Waiting outside that door of my first lesson, I saw it open and emit a beautiful, blond-plaited seven-year-old. The instructor stuck her head out, called my name and looked around and behind me expecting someone half my height and seven times younger. She was more embarrassed than me but being only half my age was mature enough to quickly get over it.
Down to business
We got down to business. Middle C is to the left of the two black key group under the maker's name on your piano. Music scales only use letters A to G. Using Middle C as a guide, go left and locate the As and Bs. Again, using Middle C locate all the Ds, Es, Fs and Gs to the right of C. You have now learned and located all the white keys on the piano.
A quick word about sharps and flats before those tricky black keys. A sharp raises the key one semitone (half step), a flat lowers the key one semitone. Most semitones are from a white to a black key.
Each black key has two names, for example F sharp (semitone above F), and G flat (semitone below G), are the same key. Now you know all the black keys.
Sometimes a white key may actually be a sharp of flat. For example B sharp - in raising B a semitone, there is no black key to go to - so you borrow C and call it B sharp.
In written piano music, the lines are lettered keys (A-G). Those black dots on and between them are notes telling you where your fingers should be and for how long. The lines starting with a treble clef are to right of middle C and mostly played with the right hand.
The lines starting with a bass clef are to the left, mostly played with the left hand. Simplistico! The most wonderful part of the above is even before it is properly digested and known by heart, you'll be able to play short songs adapted from the likes of Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms and Mozart to name but a few.
Relieves stress
And that's just the beginning. It opens a whole world that will never exhaust itself. There are always new items to learn like fingering positions, major, minor and chromatic scales and things I haven't yet heard of. It will all come with the new songs I've yet to try and play. Collecting melodies is a pleasant pastime which also relieves stress, calms frazzled nerves and lifts the spirts. Unfortunately, it didn't help Weiner much.
Mostly, I can't wait to be able to play all the old favourites; songs of many styles and moods, of different times and countries, those which evoke memories or songs which are just lots of fun to hear and probably twice as much fun to play. Always on tap and without needing an electrical socket.
Weiner called us bad boys and girls. The old dear yelled and banged that stick at 40 pupils one hour each Wednesday year after year. She tried in the only way she know how to educate us in the mechanics of music. Popular music was the only thing important to us. We were too stupid to make the corelation. She knew we needed the wings.
She was trying to tell us Every Good Bird Does Fly.