“I’ll Be Bach”
by Michael Harold FIVE YEARS AGO, I attended one of my high school
Quinn Peeper as Rach and Michael Harold as Bach. 62
reunions and ran into a girl from my class who was blessed with an excellent voice. Predictably, every high school class produces a few star athletes, but not every class has a gifted vocalist who stars in all the school plays and sings at events. She was that girl. I ran up to her and began humming a few lines from the most successful single of the 1970s, You Light up my Life, a song she sang in our chapel service to much applause. The response wasn’t exactly what I expected. “You know, Michael,” she said reproachfully, “It took a lot of courage to sing in front of the school, and not many students had the guts to do it.” I thought about it for a second. Of course, she was right, especially with THAT nauseatingly cheesy song, but she snapped at the wrong person. I looked at her and said, “And, I suppose playing the theme from Ice Castles on the piano didn’t expose me to any ridicule, now did it?” No comment. As a hopelessly unathletic teenager, I was predestined to rack up points on the nerd scale, but
Inside New Orleans
playing the piano sent my scores off the charts. Although it was much cooler to learn the guitar or the drums, at least I hadn’t picked an instrument of torture like the tuba. I stayed under cover as much as possible and persevered with my piano lessons. I spent every Friday afternoon from the age of eight until eighteen studying with a venerable Ursuline nun named Sister Elizabeth Marie. Each week, I had to wade through a sea of giggling girls in plaid uniforms to get to the music room, but once there, I was in another world. A world of calm and escape and more than anything, a world of great composers like Chopin, Beethoven, and our mutual favorite, Johann Sebastian Bach. If a young piano student shows any promise, you better believe the teacher will pridefully enter him into one of the city’s numerous competitions. Before I could reach the pedal, I was competing in the local Bach contest. I was lucky to win some medals, but in 1982, I really hit the big time when I beat out the other music nerd in town for the grand prize. His name was Harry Connick Jr. Thankfully, my mom kept all those old programs. I’m now out of the Billy Eliot stage of my life and am happy that people actually want to hear piano
photo: NATALIE WAGNER PHOTOGRAPHY
INside Story
