Piano Practice in the Shadow of Revolution
Many years ago, when we were little girls, Nora and I were tutored in piano. Monsieur Baiano would come to teach us twice a week. The piano was in the salon which, to my tender aged girl’s eyes, seemed huge and cavernous. It was adjacent to the dining room which was used daily. The dining room was light and airy. The curtains were never drawn. It was actively used, whereas the salon was still and silent. It awaited formal guests before allowing the light of day to enter it. French doors separated the two rooms. On special occasions the French doors were opened, but usually they were not. The curtains were mostly drawn together, leaving the room in silent grey shadows. Each day the room was dusted and aired and the curtains were once more firmly drawn together. With everything shut tightly, outside sounds did not dare enter the room. It seemed to always be hushed and grey, unless special company was anticipated.
In our country of origin, Iraq, where at that point in time, most of my father’s side still lived, there was a revolution in 1958. On July 14 of that year, which happened to be my sister Gilda’s birthday, the poor twenty-three-year-old king and his uncle, the regent, were assassinated and viciously and brutally mutilated. Their bodies were dragged through the streets of Baghdad. All this was graphically described and photographed on the front pages of all the newspapers of that time. In our family this became the subject for incessant conversation. Everything was described over and over again. They worried about our relatives who were still in Baghdad. None of us who had left had done so legally. We had escaped with little or nothing to our names starting in 1944 and after. My father and the rest of the men in the family worked hard and we were once more all comfortably off.
At that moment in time, conversation amongst the adults was quite disturbing and, to tender ears, terrifyingly graphic. I always had a vivid imagination and talk of dismembering kings and princes, then dragging their poor bodies through the street for the rabble to view, hysterically yell, and spit upon left me with nightmares each night. I would get up in the middle of the night gasping in terror, my heart thumping and threatening to break out of my rib cage. Sometimes, after they discussed the situation ad nauseam, my mother would suddenly remember that I had not practiced my piano that day and Monsieur Baiano would be coming the next day. They expected me to be ready. No dilly-dallying! Toute de suite, my girl! They would be sitting, my mother, her friends and my aunts, in the dining room, over cups of tea, platters of fruits, cheese toasts and cake discussing, discussing, forever discussing what was happening in Baghdad. The electric fan would whirl around as it cooled the hot July air. The ladies’ elaborate silk fans would rustle and gently fan their faces. In the meantime, I had to go into the salon to practice. I reluctantly dragged myself into the dim and silent salon. I switched on the fan, raised the cover on the piano keys and started to play. The women’s voices drifted into the salon. They seemed to accentuate the images of the ghosts of the king and his uncle that seemed to surround me. The agitated moans and cries for mercy of these poor victims filled my head. I imagined images of their tormented, terrified souls surrounding me in every inch of that room. The notes I attempted to play seemed to be wrapped tightly with visions of the incidents that occurred in Iraq. They writhed and twisted themselves firmly around each note that I played. I was terrified of being in that room alone. I shook inwardly. I made stupid mistakes. My fingers shook uncontrollably. The harder I tried, the more mistakes I made. Monsieur Baiano was displeased with me! He rapped my fingers with a pencil. ‘No! No! Basta! What is the matter with you?’ he kept asking.
After weeks of incessantly speaking of the revolution in Iraq, additional word came that at the same time that Malek Faisel had been assassinated, that very same day, my grandfather had passed away inside the house. No one was allowed to leave their homes. The family home in Baghdad was huge. It housed several generations in its different wings.
The political situation was terrible enough. Added to that, the family had the problem of having to give my grandfather a decent burial. He was laid out in his room waiting until they were able to bury him. In the Jewish religion, the dead must be buried immediately. My grandfather was a rabbi. That would have meant a lot to him. At last they obtained permission and were finally able to bury him. Because of the political upheaval, it was quite a perfunctory funeral. Not too many people attended. Hardly anyone came to sit shiva with them, for fear of being arrested. The distress and agitation this caused had a deep, lasting effect upon some of the family members in Baghdad for years to come. My cousin, who was studying in a university in the United States, had just come back home to visit the family for the summer. Because of what he had witnessed, he had a nervous breakdown from which he never fully recovered.
This new piece of news added to my agitation. It wrapped itself even more firmly around my being and made me feel even more unsure of life. I felt timid and uncertain. What other horrible things were in store for us? I began to dread practicing the piano alone in that silent salon. I did not mind it when the curtains were drawn apart and the balcony doors were open. The sound of the breeze, the birds perched on the branches of the trees outside singing merrily away. The heady aroma of the flowers rising from below reassured me. I did not mind it when Monsieur Baiano was there with his wife and his daughter Glaudeanna. Gilda and Glaudeanna would giggle and play together. Mama and Mme. Baiano would have their teas and amiably chat as Nora and I had our lessons. It was only when the room lay in silent shadows and I was left alone that the spectres of those poor unfortunate beings and, added to them now, my grandfather, rose to torment me. They added their tormented moans to each note I played. How I suffered! How I tried to control my fear!
Eventually, the adults stopped speaking of those horrific events. I relaxed a bit. Because of that, I never enjoyed practicing the piano again and I never became a good pianist, but I never lost my love of classical music. How terrible that would have been if I had lost my love of music as well…