Tag: rachmaninoff

The Lending of a Piano

I play the piano. I have been plunking the keys since I was probably two or three, though my first memories are of me trying to “play along” with my mom when I was maybe four. My mom’s hands would seem to be flying over the keys, and I really wanted to be part of this magic. I would hit a couple keys at the very top of the keyboard, sure that if I played gently, it wouldn’t mess up the song. We had an old piano in our living room/dining room there in the North of Haiti. It was in the corner of the room and I remember being drawn to it. It did such amazing things. 

We left that house when I was six and moved to my grandparents farm in Eastern Kentucky. We were living in a small trailer. No room for a piano. In fact, over the next ten years I did not have a Real Piano in my home. My parents got me a keyboard when I was pretty young, then later, as I pursued music more seriously, they got me a nice keyboard, a Roland with a full length keyboard and weighted keys. It also had a cool function where I could record myself playing, play back the recording, and play along with myself. This function worked great for me because I knew lots of duets and I could rarely get someone else to play the other side with me. 

Over the years I learned how to keep an eye out for Real Pianos (because keyboards are great, but nothing can replace real strings and hammers and keys that respond to the lightest touch). I would enter a home and glance around, any pianos? Oh, you have a piano! Do you mind if I play? When we would travel to different churches, I would linger afterwards, waiting for everyone to leave the sanctuary so I could sneak up and maybe play a quick song on the vacated piano. I was drawn to the instrument, some kind of magnetic force I wasn’t even aware of. 

Of course, I have always said, it would be a lot easier to play guitar. Then you just carry your instrument around with you. Alas, a pianist does not have that luck. But, I have good memories of all the pianos I have discovered and stolen a couple moments from over the years. 

The church we attended when I was in eighth grade had a giant Steinway Concert Grand Piano. And for some reason I can’t remember, my father had to be at the church pretty regularly during the week, and sometimes he would take me after school, and the secretary gave me permission to go in and play. I remember sitting in the auditorium-like sanctuary, all the lights off except a little lamp on the piano. I remember the keys were a lot heavier than I was used to. I would belt out the grandest song I could come up with, and at that age, it wasn’t anything too grand, and I would marvel at the richness of it all. It was heavenly. 

Later, when we were back in Haiti and lived close to the Baptist Seminary, I would often walk down our mountain that we lived on, go to the seminary and get the key to the Chapel where they had a lovely brand new upright piano. It was draped in a thick, quilted, fitted cover. You had to pull it off just-so or it would get stuck on a corner. None of the keys were chipped. There weren’t any notes you had to avoid because they would stick. The sound was warm. The empty chapel with it’s wooden benches making a holy atmosphere for creating music. 

I remember when we moved to Bethel, Alaska right before my sixteenth birthday. We had only been there a couple days and one of the local pastors came and introduced himself, invited us out to lunch with him. We went to the local pizza place and got to know Pastor Ralph Liberty a little better. He was the friendliest, jolliest pastor I had ever met. My dad mentioned that I played piano and I was needing a place to practice. Pastor Ralph immediately offered the piano in their church, a little Assemblies of God congregation. I started walking to the church regularly to practice, and our family started attending the church. They had a new, black, baby grand. It was perched on their little platform stage, to the side, right by a window. I remember the carpet was a rich burgundy color and the light came in weakly through the small windows. I would turn on the little lamp on the piano and pull out my books. I had just started piano lessons at the local community college and my new teacher was determined to challenge me. The first day she sent me home from my first lesson with the Rachmaninoff Prelude in C# minor that was written on four staves in certain sections. I had never had a piece that difficult and I was determined to prove myself worthy. I remember sitting in the little sanctuary, pushing forward one measure at a time until I could finally play through the whole thing, very, very, very lento. 

A couple months after that my parents found me a little spinet piano that just barely squeezed into the tiny house we were renting. My days of searching out pianos to practice on were finally over. I loved that little piano, and I wore it out. But, looking back, I am glad for the adventure I had in seeking the lending of a piano. I inhabited many sacred spaces that became my own for the short time I was there. 

And so I say Thank you. Thank you dear churches. Thank you dear friends. Thank you dear strangers for lending me your piano. Those moments brought me great joy. 

Pursuing Rachmaninoff

This post is a lot longer than my others, and it’s not funny. But, it is: Life With Esther.

Thirteen was a pretty crazy year for me. My family was living in the north of Haiti, my parents  serving as missionaries. I was in 8th grade, attending a small mission school and I was enjoying the school year as we had new classmates, a new teacher, and our small junior high class was determined to have fun. My birthday was the end of September and my classmates surprised me with some birthday presents. I felt grownup, beautiful, and ready to conquer the world. One week after my birthday, there was a coup d’etat and the president of Haiti was overthrown. The whole country was turned upside down, and our lives right along with it. We were stuck in our house for about a week, as the roads were blockaded, and then my parents felt we would be safer if we moved to a nearby missionary compound. We stayed there a month or so, laying low.  Then the decision was made that all Americans had to leave the country. We were told that we could take a 40 pound bag each. All our other belongings would stay in Haiti. Whether they would be there when we returned, or when we would return, nobody could say.

We flew on a small plane back to Florida where we stayed a couple days, then we drove a car up to Kentucky, where we had lived before. My mother was able to get a job as a Physician Assistant, I went back to the middle school I had attended when I was in 6th grade, my brother went to the high school, my dad found work. We settled into a fully furnished farmhouse that was in a completely different part of the county than I had lived in before. I came in to the school year in November. I had essentially missed 3 months of school and everyone was concerned about me being able to catch up. In order to help me, they did not put me in the honors classes that I had always attended, they also, for some reason did not put me back with my old classmates, but put me in an entirely different group of 8th graders. And so, though it was my old school, I was surrounded by strangers, doing school work that was not very challenging for me.

I had very bad anemia which made me weary and want to sleep all the time. I also went through a very deep depression. I kept a journal that was full of all my dark thoughts. We stayed in the States through June and then made plans to return to Haiti. Before we went back, my parents attended a missionary conference and my brother and I went to the adjoining Missionary Kids Camp. During that camp a speaker taught on the fact that we can’t rely on our parent’s relationship with God, we have to form our own relationship. I dedicated my life to God during that altar call, and later that evening, while walking through a field, staring at the stars, God spoke to me, told me he loved me, and that was the beginning of my life-long journey to know and follow God.

Back on my 13th birthday my brother had given me 2 cassette tapes that he had recorded for me. He had borrowed a friend’s classical music library and made me a compilation of some of the best piano music ever. My recording had Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No.2, Beethoven’s Waldstein Sonata, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue and his Piano Concerto in F. I listened to this music nonstop. It was the constant accompaniment to all the drama of my life. During this year I read Bodie Thoene’s Zion Covenant Book series which followed some Jewish musicians in Europe during World War II. I dreamed of being a musician, playing with an orchestra, playing this music that I was listening to. Somehow being a part of this amazing musical passion, even if only in a small way. It did not seem like an impossible dream. I had been playing piano for a while now and during our time in the states my parents arranged for me to take lessons. Those lessons and my practice time at home were the bright spots of my life. And, as I practiced my pieces, there was always the dream that one day, I would be practicing the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 2. One day.

Fast-forward to present day. I’m 39. I had just come out of a rather long depression and was also dealing with a bit of a mid-life crisis as I contemplated where I was and where I was going. After high school I had pursued the dream of Rachmaninoff until, after 2 years of studying piano performance at University, I had realized that I actually, really hated performing. I had then taken time off school and went overseas for a year, came back to the states, got married, got pregnant, and that was that. My next 18 years were spent pregnant, nursing, changing diapers, homeschooling little ones, keeping the house together, doing life with small children at full-speed. As I stopped to look at my life, I wondered about my past dreams that I had laid aside. I wondered about my future, what will I do when the kids don’t need me full-time? I wondered about my significance in a society that no longer honors the role of a stay-at-home mom. I asked myself the age-long question of “Who am I and what am I doing with my life?”

During all this angst, my husband took me to see the Knoxville Symphony. We didn’t know much about the program, we were just excited to go hear some good music. We were late and got to our seats just as the lights were coming down. I squinted in the dim light, trying to see my program and made out the words Rachmaninoff. Oh Good! I love Rachmaninoff. Then I looked at the stage and saw a big Grand Piano in front of the orchestra. Even better! A piano concerto! I was so excited. The conductor came on stage, applause, applause, and then the guest performer came on stage and something in my throat caught. She was a tall, dark haired woman, beautiful figure, beautiful red dress. She looked like my “fantasy” me. The Me that I always wished I looked like. And then she sat down at the piano and yes, she started playing Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 2. My concerto. I was in shock. I felt like crying and laughing at the same time. And I thought, “Really Lord? You’re going to rub it in my face? My old dream? You’re going to show me everything I missed out on?”  I felt very fat, and dowdy, and unaccomplished as I sat and watched this beautiful woman play my concerto. But, the music was breathtaking and I couldn’t help just luxuriating in the rich sounds of Rachmaninoff.

Then, something unexpected happened. They were at a very tricky rhythmical section and suddenly, the soloist wasn’t in sync with the orchestra, she had made a mistake. The conductor turned his body slightly to her and started exaggerating his movements as he tried to help her get back in place. I sat up straighter, scooted to the edge of my seat. What was she going to do? I watched as she valiantly played through the section and got back on track. My heart was pounding, I sat back in my seat, let out a big breath. Man. I suddenly remembered how much I disliked performing, how stressful it was for me, the fear of making mistakes, the inability to always play perfectly, the tension from having a lot of people watching me. And I thought, “I’m glad I’m not her!” And then I smiled in surprise. Yes. I WAS glad that I wasn’t her.

I looked across at my husband, grabbed his hand in mine. His hand was tough and hard from all the construction work that he did. He went to work early every morning, came home at suppertime every day, tired. He went to work for me and my children. He provided for me so that I could pour all my time and energy into our children. And even though we didn’t have a lot of money, he splurged and bought these tickets so that I could see the symphony. Just because he knew that I loved it and he wanted to make me happy.

I thought about my children at home. My older children were babysitting the younger ones so that Andy and I could have a date. My children were so amazing. They were so talented, funny, kind, entertaining. And each of those amazing children looked at me, and called me “Mom”. I was suddenly overwhelmed with how blessed I was to be their mother.

And I prayed now, a prayer of thanksgiving. “Thank you Lord. Thank you that isn’t me on the stage. Thank you that I am sitting here with my husband. Thank you that I have a whole house full of children, waiting for me to come home. Thank you for this life you have given me.”  And maybe some tears came down my cheeks. But they were tears of joy. I am Esther Picazo Heneise. I am a wife. I am a mother. I am me. And I am thankful.

And I sat in the darkness, surrounded by Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 2, and life was good.