The bridge and solo were accented with sharp heel and fingertip explosions of sound, a half-breath of power before being cut off so cleanly that it left the listener wondering if it had ever been there at all. Then back to the soft rainfall of notes, falling all around the sweetness of Amy’s voice.
We ran through it four times. As the last take ended, I did not look up. The music was back, singing in my mind and heart so clearly that I half expected the others to ask about it.
Instead Amy said, “He couldn’t have practiced. His guitars have all been sitting there in the corner the entire afternoon.”
“I doubt if there’s a half beat of difference between any of them,” André said to no one in particular.
“That was incredible, Maestro,” Mario said quietly. “Really fantastic.”
I nodded my thanks, said to André, “I’d like to run that through the sequencer.”
He understood immediately. “And choose a sound from the synthesizer and match them up, right?”
“Something that would pull it into a strong electronic flow,” I agreed. “Not distorted, though.”
“Just enough of a change to make the listener unsure whether he was really hearing a guitar,” André said, nodding at me through the window. “I understand, Maestro.”
I waited until André had finished with his note-taking, then said, “I’m ready to give you the solo now.”
There was no laughter, no words. I lowered my head to focus on the guitar and the music in my mind, but I could still feel their eyes.
I had to wait a moment while the tape was rewound, a level set for my solo tracks, then, “Ready when you are, Maestro.”
I took a breath, flexed my fingers, and gave them a nod.
This time, each note was carefully measured. Much of my solo was played with two and three fingers plucked together, my left hand racing up and down the entire length of the guitar’s neck. It was a delicate melody played in counterpoint to Amy’s voice, its sparse notes and carefully accented timing a strong balance to the rainfall of the rhythm section.
I did not hesitate, or wonder, or even need to think. It was all laid out clearly in my mind and heart. All the years of practice, the study, the effort, were drawn together in the tight focus of this moment. And soon it was over. Too soon.
There was a long silence after the song ended. Finally Jake said, “I do believe we’ve got it.”
“Maybe,” André said. “I need to wait and hear it with the vocals redone.”
“Don’t need to hear another thing,” Jake replied. “That’s it. That’s the one.”
“Maestro,” André said. “Could we please run through that one more time, just to make sure we’ve got it?”
“No problem,” I replied.
“Got what?” Pipo asked.
“Our single,” Amy said.
“What we got here is a major event,” Jake said.
“I’ve got tingles up and down my spine,” Amy agreed.
André turned his head toward me. “Do you have parts worked out for all the other instruments, Maestro?”
“Yes.” Brief staccato runs for Karl on alto sax, more spaces than notes; a brief lilting melody for Hans on flute; a hint of wind-pipe overlay by the keyboards; it was all there.
“Including Amy?”
I looked at her through the glass, saw my reflection more clearly than their faces. The light in the control room was dimmed, and the window’s triple panes both reflected and blurred my features. I wondered that the change within did not show. “If it’s all right.”
“If it is as beautiful as what I’ve just heard, I’m sure it will be fine, Gianni,” she replied. “I won’t sleep a wink tonight.”
“Who said anything about sleeping?” André was busy with his papers and switches. “The fire’s lit and the Spirit’s among us. Why stop now?”
Amy laughed at that. “You mean an all-nighter? Like we were all back in school?”
“Absolutely,” André replied, giving me the thumbs up to prepare for the second take. “Let’s use the flame while it’s burning strong. Hit it, Maestro.”
Chapter 15
Two days after we had completed the studio work, while the others were still busy worrying over details with the record company and getting in the way as the cuts were mixed, I called my father. I had known I was going to do it since my return from the gravesite. He replied with a lengthy silence when I told him who it was. I asked politely if I might come by and see him the next day. When I hung up the phone, I found my hand was shaking and my muscles tensed from the effort.
That night I could not sleep. I knew what I had to do, but I did not see how it would be possible. I prayed about it with a sense of dread, knowing that I was called to do something for which I did not have the strength.
I got up, went to the bathroom, prowled the apartment. From my guitar case I pulled out the latest lyrics Jake had given me, entitled “A Cry in the Dark.” He had passed them on just before we entered the studio, saying with a grim smile that there was no reason not to hope for another album after this one.
As with all good songs, the message was simple and direct—a man trapped in the ways of the world, asking if there wasn’t something more to life. The refrain was a call from on high for the man to come to Jesus.
I wandered through the living room, headed for my place at the dining table, and paused in front of the bookshelves. There were a dozen or so large picture books of European cities, souvenirs of places where Jake and Amy had visited. I had seen Amy curl up in the corner with several of these books and spend hours lost in remembering and rediscovering.
I pulled out the one on Florence, the only book she had on an Italian city. I began leafing through it and came to the section on the Academia. I spent a long time staring at the picture of Michelangelo’s David, turned the page, and went no farther.
On opposing pages were photographs of two other sculptures by Michelangelo, both entitled “The Prisoner.” At first I thought they were unfinished and wondered idly why two uncompleted sculptures had been given so much coverage. Then my exhaustion began to fade.
The sculptures were finished. The two men, cramped into the agony of impossible positions, were imprisoned in the stone. Their muscles bunched and strained against the immovable force that held them fast. Their eyes were unseeing; all their attention, all their concentration, all their energy was focused on that which held them. Their lives remained unfinished, parched of power by their entrapment.
I scrambled for pen and paper, spread the lyrics out on the dining table, propped up the book in front of me so that every time I raised my eyes I could drink in the power of those creations.
Here were two men, isolated and blinded by their agony, just as I had been. They were trapped in stone so solid and overwhelming that both were held for eternity. Lost in their own separate worlds of pain. Struggling madly for release. Searching, fighting, straining to loosen the burden every way they could. I bent over my paper and began to write. That imprisonment was to be the basis for the melody.
I stopped and stared at the paper in front of me, struggling with the torrent of emotions that pressed for release. There was more than just the song demanding my attention. I fought to clear my mind, and continued structuring the song.
The bridge would be a trumpet shout calling to be heard. Here is hope, it would say. Here is joy for the asking. Turn to Christ and know freedom. You are trapped because you are looking in the wrong direction. Turn around.
I became caught up in the frenzy of creation, of release. A need was building within me to show others what I had found, to reach back into the darkness and give others a hand, a light, a sign that they too could find freedom.
I knew why I was called to this song. I understood, but I pushed the thoughts as far away as I could until the work was completed. I knew if I stopped and recognized what was building in my heart and mind I would not return to the act of creating.
In the melody for the v
erses there was the slightest hint of conflict between the instruments, a tugging in different directions. Not enough to intrude, but to taunt with this inner struggle of blind desperation. Searching everywhere but the one place where an answer could be found.
The refrain was a single unified blast of sound. It was an acclaim of unrestrained power, a call that demanded to be heard. All chords were major, all voices were in harmony. Heed my call, it said. Here is a beacon to light your way.
I looked at the pictures once more. So different, those statues, and yet so alike—trapped in the same awful pattern of hopeless struggle, while the call to freedom yearned to be heard.
I stumbled to my bedroom, stripped off my clothes, lay down and pulled the covers up over my head. Now that the work was over, I allowed the realization that had accompanied the song to return.
My father was imprisoned in a stony coldness of his own making, yet I found it hardest to offer him what had been granted me. Why? I knew the answer, had known it from those first early days of faltering prayer. I could offer it to him only when I had forgiven him. And I could not forgive until I had left the pain behind.
If the desire to help was only extended to those who did not hurt me, then I was not living Christ’s message. I did not need my Bible to find the words. They rang clear and true through the darkened silence of my room: Even the greatest of sinners loves those who love him.
Finally, finally I knew the solution to this impossible problem. The answer lay in surrender. It seemed so simple in that moment of utter fatigue, so clear now that I was not seeking to do the act myself. It was necessary for me to forgive my father, just as completely and utterly as the Lord forgave me. How was it possible? Only by allowing God to heal me of my pain. Only by offering up my doubts and struggles and memories and burdens, and asking Him to free me of what I could not carry on my own. Only by surrendering my will to Christ, by allowing myself to be an instrument of His will. I needed to show my father the same grace and salvation that had been shown to me. I did not have the power to light up his darkness, any more than I had been able to light up my own. But the Lord could. I lay in my bed, drained by the rush of creative effort, and understood what I was to do. I gave thanks for the beautiful simplicity of the answer until sleep crept up and claimed me.
* * *
The next day as I stood before the heavy entrance door to his apartment building, my hand clutched a crumpled piece of paper. On it I had written a Bible passage I had found that morning. It came from Mark, chapter eleven, verse twenty-five: “And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.”
I stopped with my hand outstretched toward the buzzer, prayed yet again for strength. I pressed the bell, waited for the release to sound, and entered the downstairs hall. Immediately I was struck by the smell of cleanser and dust and memories.
My heart was hammering and my breath rasping in my ears when I arrived at the landing and met Anna. She appeared unchanged. The same blond hair hung limply to either side of her face, the same silent irritation greeted my arrival.
I entered the living room and was shocked to stillness by the change in my father. His hair was almost entirely gray. I stood in the doorway and looked down on a dried and wrinkled shell of a man. He sat slumped against one end of the hard sofa and stared with red-rimmed eyes at the flickering television.
I walked to the television and switched it off. My father followed me with his eyes, but made no comment as I returned and sat down beside him.
“There are some burdens too heavy for us to carry alone,” I said, and the power of that simple truth made me stop and swallow hard. “Recently I have thought a lot about those early years. I think I understand what drove you away from me. It was probably there for me to see all along, but I was too much lost in my own pain to understand. Or want to understand.”
I stopped and waited, wondering if the man behind those dull, empty eyes even heard me.
He stirred in his seat and asked in a hoarse voice, “You are still a musician?”
I nodded. “We have finished work on our first album this week.”
The sigh drained the support from his body, and his shoulders slumped still farther. He turned back to the blank television screen, watching as though it were still on.
I pressed forward, knowing it would never be easier than now, knowing it had to be said, forcing my voice to remain level, willing my body to cease its trembling. “I have found a source of strength and healing, and I want to share it with you. I have seen that by accepting Jesus Christ into my life I can be freed of the pain, and the blindness the pain caused.”
His gaze did not turn from the television. Almost without moving his lips, he murmured, “Another musician.”
“You blame yourself for my mother’s death,” I said, knowing it was true. “You’ve spent your life running away from it, and where has it gotten you? If I can find the strength to forgive you, couldn’t you come to do the same for yourself?”
He did not look my way as he said, “It won’t bring her back. Nothing will.”
“It might bring you back, though,” I replied.
My father looked at me in silence, his dark eyes revealing nothing. With the feeble motions of a man twice his age he rose to his feet and shuffled from the room. I waited, caught in the silence of a place void of life.
He was gone for a very long time. I heard muffled voices coming from their bedroom, and the thump of something heavy being dropped to the floor. I waited because there was nothing else to do.
When he returned he carried several sheets of yellowed paper in his hand. He sat down, gave me another long look, and handed the pages over without a word.
My hand was shaking slightly as I took them. I knew without knowing what they contained. I willed myself to maintain control, and began to read the unfamiliar script.
My Dear Caroline,
It was wonderful seeing you in New York last month and talking over old times. It’s hard to believe that ten years have passed since we giggled together through Dr. Anderson’s voice class. Your life and your work with the theater there sound terribly exciting to a little provincial girl like me.
Please excuse me for taking so long to reply to your wonderful invitation, but I wanted to wait until a performance took me away from home, so that I would have time to sit and write and think about these things in peace. I hear what you say about coming to New York, studying with the masters, working as an understudy, and being ready, always ready to make that big step.
I cannot tell you how it pulls at my heart to come and live there. And your offer is more than generous. It would be wonderful to raise Giovanni in an exciting, cosmopolitan environment. But it is something that I just cannot even consider.
My singing engagements are already taking me away from home four or five times a month, for two or three days at a time. My husband cannot or will not tolerate my absences. Every time I tell him about a new booking, every time I get ready to leave, every time I return, he is furious. Absolutely livid. You cannot imagine the rage.
No woman in Italy would think of pursuing her own career, he shouts at me. Let alone a career that takes her away from her husband and her child. He says that a lot. It means nothing to him when I say that this is America, I am American, and things are different here. He’s never adjusted to life in America. He feels out of place and lonely here. My going away like this only makes it worse. I really think it’s the biggest reason behind why he doesn’t want me to go. And that’s why he hates my music.
In America, my husband is a man without a country. I love him too much to be able to lie to myself about what my return home has cost him. You should see his face when he starts talking about Como—it is the face of another person. He lights up with that old soft smile, the one that I first fell in love with and see so seldom nowadays.
You would have to hear the things he says when he compares America and Italy to un
derstand why a move to another American city would simply be impossible for him. The summers are so much nicer in Italy. The bread tastes better in Italy. I haven’t had any good sausage since I left Italy. They call this wine? Look at these people fighting in the streets, there’s just no sense of quality to these people. The drugs these people take, they don’t even care about their own minds in this country. How could they allow such brutality in a game like American football and put it on television for all the children to see? Do they have no shame in America? Look at these skirts, only a putana would dress like this in Italy. These people have no morals and no shame. If any daughter of mine acted like this I would throw her out of my house.
I hear his voice like a chant in my mind even when he is a thousand miles away. Every word is an accusation. You did this to me. You. You and your selfish American desires, your demand to put your own career ahead of our life together as a couple. The worst things are the ones that are never said, the yearning I see in his eyes before I turn out the light at night, the ache in his soul to return to Italy. I know these things, and I am afraid to speak of them. What can I say? How can I make it better without agreeing to return? How can I return and still have my music?
I feel torn in two. I love my husband and my son. I love my music. I would rather die than do any of them harm, and yet as I live now I harm them all. My singing suffers because I should be giving more time to it, not less. I should have a place to work at home, practice five hours a day, arrive at sessions and concerts and rehearsals relaxed and at peace. None of this happens now. I have to sneak from the house and rush through my lessons and exercises. I am the last to arrive for rehearsals and the first to leave. Always whatever time I take is too much, too much. Always I am away too much.
If he could only be honest with himself, he would recognize that he is just as lonely when I am there as when I am gone. His fury is still there when I return, and it forms a permanent barrier between us. He says he hates my music, but I don’t believe it. What he really hates is my being away. He attacks my music because he sees it as the cause. It has gotten so bad that lately he will not even allow me to play a record or the radio in the house. He can never let go of the anger over my leaving him. I wish. . . .
The Maestro Page 39