Open Writing

A piper in the streets today
Set up and tuned and started to play
And away, away, away on the tide
Of his music we started; on every side
Doors and windows were opened wide,
And men left down their work and came
And women with petticoats coloured like flame
And little bare feet that were blue with cold
Went dancing back to the age of gold
And all the world went gay, went gay
For half an hour in the streets today.

In his verse O’Sullivan is describing the power of music to take us from the hard world of work and poverty and hardship into a Utopia of joy and light in which we forget the bad things to enjoy the good.

I have always envied those who can be carried away by music. For me it has only happened to a minor extent three times, and I certainly never reached anything like the highs of some of the other people around me.

At school every Sunday evening we had some sort of entertainment, a play, a concert or a recital, put on either by the boys, the staff or a visitor. When we heard that Dame Mattie Teyte was going to give the concert the following Sunday evening, we did not know what to expect. There was some sniggering among the boys because to us a dame meant someone like Mae West or Lana Turner, and so I was disappointed when a motherly figure came on to the stage.

She made herself comfortable on a chair in the middle of the stage and then started to talk. The first thing she told us was that she had been to the school many times before when her two brothers had been pupils, but that had been in the dim and distant past and she had been looking forward to coming back to see what changes had been made.

She caused a smile by telling us that in those days her name had been written as TATE, but she had had to posh it up when she became an opera singer. Now that she had gained the sympathy of the boys, she started to sing. The first songs were simple folk songs which we all knew, but before each she told us what we had to listen for. We clapped politely after the first but were waved to silence. She told us she could not waste the time she had on applause. “You can clap if you want at the end.”

After the folk songs she went on to lieder and then on to opera. She prepared us each time for what she was about to do and managed to people the stage with the characters from the operas so that we could almost see them. While she sang, the audience held their breaths, and there was a sigh at the end of each song as people started to breathe again.

Then to everyone’s surprise the headmaster stood up and said that he would have to stop her as it was over an hour after the younger boys’ bed time. She had been singing over three hours and had had her audience of over 200 boys in the palm of her hand. She could have gone on all night. It took us a while to get back to earth, and it was the cheering at the end which broke the spell. She must have been past her best when I heard her, but she was wonderful.

The other two occasions that come to mind I was involved only on the outside looking in, amazed at the power of music over others.

While I was studying in London I became friendly with a film actress named Renee Houston. Up the road from the college was the Waldergrave Arms which Renee and her husband Donald Stewart used as their watering hole. For some reason Renee took to me and mothered me. I was invited to several parties both in the upstairs room in the pub and at their home nearby.

One Sunday evening after the pub closed I was invited to a party in the upstairs room. A group of musicians were there, and they set up to have a jam session. There was a set of drums and a piano in the room, and they produced between them a trumpet, a trombone, a clarinet and a saxophone. They sat in a group and started to play, seeming to be feeling out the other players.

Gradually it seemed to evolve into a contest, each trying to outdo the others in the variations embroidered round the theme they were playing, acknowledging when a particular player scored. As time went on the competitive element faded to be replaced with a striving for harmony. The players seemed to have been taken over by the music they were playing while the rest of us could only sit and wonder. I naively asked one of them, “How do you manage to do it?” I was told, “It’s all in the head, man.”

Exhaustion finally set in around five in the morning, and we all adjourned to Renee and Donald Stewart’s house for breakfast.

A few years later Elizabeth and I were visiting for the weekend a friend’s farm a few miles out of Kalomo in Zambia. Every year after the harvest Peter used to give his workers a bullock to slaughter and maize to make the native beer. A great party was held to celebrate the harvest home. The men were invited, but to Elizabeth’s chagrin none of the women were allowed to attend.

At about seven o’clock on the Saturday night we drove down to the native village on the farm. After we had parked the car we were met by the headman, who led us along paths through the bush to a place where a huge fire was burning. This was about a mile from the village. All the men and big boys were gathered there, and they stood up to greet us, clapping their hands in welcome.

For what seemed to me a long time we sat and made polite conversation. I have never found sitting on the ground to be comfortable, and I was soon squirming and turning the other cheek. When the honours had been done we were given food. Some of the meat had been roasted and some boiled with herbs and it was good. There were huge pots of sadza, a maize porridge, almost missionary size. We, being the guests of honour, were given tin plates piled high with meat and sadza. No knives or forks. Fingers, which were made before forks, had to do.

The drums had been playing all the time, but now they started to become louder and more insistent. The beer had been flowing freely, and the three 40 gallon drums in which it had been made were at least half empty. The men round the fire seemed to settle expectantly.

As the noise of the drums reached a crescendo, a figure jumped from the outer darkness into the light of the fire. It was a small dark creature, potbellied with horns on its head. From the other side of the circle of darkness an identical figure appeared. The beat of the drums had slowed, and the two creatures went crouching round the circle in time to the new beat. They appeared to be searching for something. As soon as they met they turned and ran into the darkness.

The drums got louder and the beat got faster. Suddenly they reappeared form the place opposite to where they had disappeared. This time there were three dancing shapes in the firelight. The third, obviously in command, was female. She was a pinkish colour and had long blond hair. She was misshapen with a huge behind. With her assistants she danced round the fire, approaching and retreating from the seated men who cringed back when she approached.

Suddenly she and her assistants ran in and seized a man. As he was pulled nearer the fire, we saw that it was the headman who had welcomed us. He looked terrified. Suddenly a gigantic figure appeared from the other side of the circle. He danced a challenge to the woman which she accepted. The rhythm of the drums followed the dancers as they fought each other in the firelight. First one seemed to be gaining the upper hand and then the other.

Suddenly as the drums beat a frenzied rhythm, the woman was driven out of the circle of light, followed by her assistants, who released the headman. The victorious giant danced round the fire in triumph. Soon he was joined by many of the onlookers.

The whole assembly was carried away by the beat of the drums, and they all joined in celebrating the victory of good over evil. We slipped away unnoticed after a few minutes, but the dancing went on to the rhythm of the drums until the men collapsed exhausted.

(I don’t know why the devil was a white woman wearing a bustle. Maybe that was the way the first women in the territory appeared to the Africans.)

I enjoy music, but I regret that I do not get carried away on its tide. I rather envy those who do.

(Huddersfield Universiy of the Third Age)