(to the best of recollection, decades after the last time Diana told the tale)
The Eastman School of Music accepted me as a keyboard student not too long after I graduated from Nazareth Academy in Rochester. This was not because I was the most talented musician who applied and certainly not because my father was on the faculty. No, my scholarship (a double major: piano and organ) was largely despite my lack of burning passion to be a musician and because a piano faculty professor, Cecile Genhart, seemed to sense a latent spark that only seemed to show when I played jazz. She probably thought it could be rekindled.
The truth was that I really had no idea what I wanted to do with my life, since a great number of things had interested me from when I was a toddler. By the time I graduated from Nazareth, my dream had been to become an actress but, since I knew no one in that profession, my mother suggested I study music at Eastman. That would get me on stage where, who knows, I might meet somebody who could steer me in the right direction.
Once in class, I soon saw that so many students had far more natural ability and could do things effortlessly so much better than I could with a lot of study. Still I was usually able to have a good time because I got along with so many of the others there and we all seemed to enjoy being together. Even in the duller classes, there were usually ways to keep awake.
Also helping brighten the staid halls of ESM was the growing interest I saw among some professors in adding jazz studies to the curriculum, although I never had opportunity to join any of those classes. A bunch of us did frequent the local jazz clubs, and occasionally we’d go to New York City, where we not only heard many rising stars but also might have a beer with some of them between sets. I still remember seeing Art Tatum and speaking for a while with Nat King Cole.
Because my main goal was to have a good time, studying took a back seat. When the quarterly piano juries came due, my plan was to cram the night before and so pass the review and keep my scholarship. Then again, the best laid plans …
Late in the afternoon before my hopeful cramming, I happened to be near the faculty area and was spotted by one of the administrative folks, who said, “Great, Diana, you’re up next!”
I asked, “Next for what?”
She answered, “Your piano jury.”
I countered, “No, I’m first up tomorrow morning,” to which she responded, “No, someone became ill this morning, so everyone was bumped up one position. They’re waiting for you inside right now.”
At that moment Dr. Hanson (Director of ESM, Prix de Rome recipient, conductor, etc.) opened the door and said, “Diana, how nice to see you. Please come in.”
Here I have to mention that, in an attempt to feel ever slightly more studious, I used to wear a black skirt, one of my brother’s white shirts with one of his black neckties, a pair of black horn-rimmed glasses with no lenses in them, and my hair in braids. The only incongruity in the image I was trying to project that afternoon was the bubble gum I was chewing and needed to ditch before I might create a bad impression.
Now, while trying to figure out how best to remove the gum from my mouth without drawing attention (right side? left side? swallow it?), wouldn’t you know it fell onto the ground, hitting the plush carpet just in front of my shoe. Dr. Hanson, gentleman that he was, saw something drop and bent down to try to retrieve it.
At that point, panic set in. I figured my only move was to try to step on it and hope I could get it to stick to the bottom of my shoe for later removal.
WRONG!
My foot, already in motion, pushed Dr. Hanson’s hand smack-dab into the wad of gum, so that as soon as I finally lifted my foot and he tried to recover his hand, long strands of bubble gum stretched from rug to palm.
I apologized, and he took out a handkerchief and began tidying up the mess I’d created. And again, gentleman that he was, Dr. Hanson said, “That’s all right, Diana. Please have a seat at the piano.” All the jurors were attempting to suppress their giggling, and I knew they had it in for me anyway, since I had always been pegged as the campus cut-up. Strike one!
Dr. Hanson began by asking me to please play a B-flat minor scale, but somehow my brain went into panic mode and then blank. I couldn’t remember any of the “-flat key minors,” so I kept recycling only the natural keys (F, C, G, D, A, E, B) and, continuing in fifths, the sharp keys (F#, C#, G#, D#, A#, E#, B#). For flat keys, I came up empty.
After what seemed an eternity trying to get past this mental block, I finally blurted out, “This is a trick question. There is no B-flat minor scale.”
Dr. Hanson then asked, “Diana, wouldn’t you like to think that through a little more?” I took a few more moments, but the more I thought, the less came up, so I said, “No, I’m sticking to my guns. I’m sure there’s no such thing as a B-flat minor scale.”
Finally, Dr. Hanson asked, “Would you like me to demonstrate it for you?” and defiantly I said “Sure, be my guest,” whereupon he proceeded to play. [At this point Diana, with perfect pitch, would sing in Italian solfeggio: Si, / Do, / Re, / Mi, / Fa, / Sol, / La, / Si, \ La, \ etc. – with raised seventh ascending and lowered seventh descending.] Strike two!
After having me play the augmented and diminished arpeggios, Dr. Hanson asked, “What piece have you prepared to play for us?” Rather than be honest and tell them “Nothing, I was going to try to think of something tonight,” I answered, “The Beethoven Sonata … [here, i forget which of the earlier ones she said; perhaps Opus 10?]” and proceeded to play the first movement adequately. Hardly prefect, but certainly not the worst they had ever heard.
Then came the second movement, a s-l-o-w adagio or largo or … zzzzzzzzzzz … next thing I knew, I awoke at the keyboard. Yes, I had fallen asleep at the piano. It was such a nice balmy summer afternoon, and they had so thoughtfully left me there as they exited quietly. Strike three!
Not long after that fiasco the mail brought the dreaded “Dear EX-student” letter. And even before that, my Papa had let me know, “You’ve disgraced me in front of all my colleagues on the faculty and in the symphony!”
Nevertheless, two things happened over the ensuing years that changed my perspective on this comic failure. First, of all the people in my class, I was the only one to become successful in music even though I never took a formal voice lesson in my life. Second, many years later in Washington, DC, after a performance of the Bach Christmas Oratorio in which I sang the soprano solo, I also covered for the alto, who had become too ill to perform. (Ah, the things I’ll do for some extra money.) And lo, a substitute newspaper reviewer extolled the virtues of my wonderful performance.
That reviewer, of course, was that same Dr. Howard Hanson, and he had failed to recognize me because the program had me listed as Diana Beveridge, not Diana Pezzi, and my blonde hair served as a disguise. Even if he had realized who I was, Dr. Hanson, a man of the highest integrity, would not have given a bad review simply because I had been far from the best or most talented student so long before.
June 2017