by David Hajdu
She didn’t know how to play the piano. We never gave her lessons. We didn’t even have a piano in the house. We had a record player, and Greg had a radio, but we didn’t use them anymore, because of Adry. You know what she was like when music was playing. But this was very different. I don’t want to exaggerate to you, even if that’s my prerogative as a mother. Adry was not exactly Ferrante and Teicher. She didn’t really know what she was doing. But it was something, and she was loving it. Greg and I took seats in a couple of the folding chairs and just watched her.
Gregory Geffel:
Through my associations with the many businesses in the county, I was successful in acquiring a high-quality piano for Adrianne’s use in our home. Among the clients I serviced was an excavation concern, Saultz Brothers Scrap and Salvage. I alerted Gary Saultz of our interest in a piano for Adrianne, and in less than two months, he told me about an instrument in an old home in town that his company had been hired to clear out for sale. The homeowner, now deceased, was an elderly gentleman—retired English teacher, no family, no heirs, no will. He never married, and—guess what?—he played the piano. Logical. I arranged to purchase the instrument, through Gary, and a crew from Saultz Brothers delivered to us. They had a hell of a time getting it through the front door and into Adrianne’s room, I have to tell you. I had to remove the screen door from the front entrance, and that’s not as easy as just popping the pin out of the hinge on a regular door. Then, to get the damn thing into her room, I had to pull a strip of case molding off the door frame.
We moved Carolyn’s dresser to the side, and the piano fit just right along the wall across from Adrianne’s bed. I’m sure you’d like to see it, so I can take you in there later. It’s a beauty.
Carolyn Geffel:
The room is technically a guest room now, but we’ve always called it Adry’s room, and the piano is still there. It hasn’t been dusted in a week—forgive me for that—but you can see the piano and even play it, if you’d like. I don’t suppose you can play any of Adry’s music, can you?
[Geffel is answered in the negative.]
I’m not surprised. No offense to you. I don’t think many other people can play Adry’s music.
Gregory Geffel:
We arranged for Nina Oberheimer to give Adrianne piano lessons on a weekly basis, here in our house. Nina already knew Adrianne, from their earlier encounters here and in school, as you’ve heard about. Nina advised us to have the piano tuned, and we learned from the tuner that the piano was an outstanding model. I know you’ll appreciate this as someone interested in history. It was an Albrecht and Company. I did some research on my own, and that was a very fine German manufacturer based in Philadelphia—top of the line for a piano in its price range.
Nina Oberheimer:
Bryce Mengener, the piano tuner for our area, called me to tell me the Geffels had purchased a piano, and I was stricken with dread. I had a vivid recollection of Adrianne’s severe adverse reaction to hearing four bars of Mozart’s third variation on “Ah, vous dirai-je, Maman,” when I played them for her several years earlier. Over the time after that, I observed her twice monthly as she was escorted from the music classes I led at First Street Elementary School, to reduce the risk of her responding problematically to the music in the classroom. I would not have expected her to take kindly to the sound of a piano. I was uncertain how to reply when Carolyn Geffel came to school on music day to see me and ask if I would provide Adrianne with piano instruction. I consented to try.
I arrived at the Geffel residence late in the morning on a Saturday—my day for enterprise, as I’ve explained. I walked up to the front door, and I could already hear the piano from a window on the side of the house. It was the sound of a piano, certainly—however, decidedly not the sound of music. Mrs. Geffel brought me into Adrianne’s room, and I found Adrianne tapping at the keyboard, using only her index fingers. She stopped when she saw us enter, she rose to greet me—her manners were everything her pianism was not—and said, “Good morning, Miss Oberheimer. Would you like to see my piano?” I was very pleased to see her taking pride in her instrument, and relieved that she had stopped playing it. Her mother left us for a moment to fetch a kitchen chair for me to sit in during the lesson. I opted to use the piano bench and offered the chair to Adrianne so she could observe me as I demonstrated the C major scale.
This did not go well. Adrianne started squirming in her chair and making little sounds. I decided in my mind to halt the lesson then and there, and tell Mrs. Geffel, “Okay—I tried.” I stopped playing. Then, Adrianne settled down. I looked over at Adrianne, sitting calmly now, and something clicked in my mind.
I got up from the bench and gestured for Adrianne to come back to the piano. I stood behind her, leaning over her, and I lay my two hands on top of hers. I said, “Adrianne, pretend you’re a bird, and make two claws with your hands.” She did, and I made claws with my hands on top of hers. I held her right hand so her right index finger was over middle C, and I pressed her finger down onto the keys. The sound of the C note rang out, and Adrianne smiled.
We continued working that way, with only Adrianne touching the keys, and the lesson went beautifully—no squirming, no humming, no drama, no trauma for either of us. As long as Adrianne was producing the music herself, the sound posed no apparent difficulty for her. To the contrary, it appeared to give her pleasure.
I continued to provide Adrianne with piano lessons on a weekly basis for eight years, until she left the county for college. I taught her straight through her high school years. The only other piano teacher she ever had during that whole time was the substitute I called in when I could not be available for a lesson—Elizabeth Beener. Mrs. Beener had been my piano teacher when I was a young student. She was retired from teaching by this time. She suffered from the gout and lost a fair amount of her hearing. Yet she was able to fill in for me with students who were willing to go to her house for the lesson, past Randall Ridge, and who could play loudly. Mrs. Geffel drove her out there once or twice, and I think Adrianne’s older brother Don brought her once, around the time he was driving age. In one way, Mrs. Beener was even better for Adrianne than I, because of her hearing loss. When Adry went off on one of her . . . improvisations . . . it could be hard on the ears.
With Adrianne, I concentrated on technique and music theory in the beginning, and then worked our way up through the piano literature. She developed quickly, because she enjoyed playing. Typically, the student has jumped up off the piano bench before the last note hits the ear, and they’re out of the room and out of the house ahead of me. In Adrianne’s case, with no exception I can recall, I would hear her playing when I walked up to the front door, and she’d still be playing when I walked back to my car. I should add that she wasn’t necessarily playing her lessons when I wasn’t in the room with her. She was always much, much, much-much-much more interested in playing her own compositions or improvising, whatever you would call it. Yet, she took well enough to sight-reading and rapidly gained proficiency as a pianist.
One more thing I should add is this, and I don’t want to sound unduly critical, because Adrianne was an exceptionally skilled musician, but she generally played with more feeling when she was playing her own music, rather than scored music by real composers. She applied herself with discipline to the standard literature, and she could play with great care and precision—I can give you an example. By her third year of study with me, Adrianne was able to play the entire Allemande from Bach’s Partita No. 3, perfect to the dotted sixteenth note. Ordinarily, that would be a challenge for a fourth-or fifth-year student, and not everyone would be able to master it. Adrianne did. Nevertheless, her treatment of the piece was distinguished by more precision than emotion. I could see while I was teaching her that she was reserving her emotion for her own music.
Carolyn Geffel:
One good thing about Adry’s piano playing, from my point of view as her mother, is, it helped her social life. It gave her an outlet fo
r making music, besides humming, and she seemed happier overall. In her high-school years, it was a definite plus for her to be recognized as a talented girl. It gave her a little status boost. On occasion, another girl or even a boy would come around to hear her play. Her friend Barb even bought her a songbook of pop hits of the Seventies for Adry to play, and Barb would sing along. Barb would come to the house with a shopping bag full of clothes, and she’d dress up like Stevie Nicks or Tina Turner. She’d hold a hairbrush like a microphone, and they’d put on shows together in Adry’s room. We could hear them straight through the walls to our business office sometimes. It was like having piped-in music in a doctor’s office. They didn’t exactly do perfect renditions. Adry had never actually heard the hit records of most of the songs, because she just couldn’t take the radio or a record player, so she what she was playing on the piano was the music she read in the songbooks, at least when they started the song. She and Barb would have a ball—they would play and sing and giggle. I could always tell when Adry was really enjoying herself, because she’d take off on one of her musical adventures, forgetting all about the sheet music. You couldn’t tell what song she was playing anymore, but Barb would be right there with her, singing the words of the song to the crazy notes Adry started playing or making up her own kooky words on the spot.
Barbara Lucher (friend):
Of course I can tell you about Adry. But why should I? Isn’t it interesting that everybody wants to know all about Adry Geffel now? Everybody’s looking for her. Everybody wants to know, where’d she go? What’s she doing? What’s she thinking? Uh-huh. Fine and dandy. Isn’t that sweet? So thoughtful.
Would you like to ask me some questions? I bet you would. I’ll talk to you—I’m sitting here, aren’t I? We didn’t come to Panera’s for the fucking gluten-free bread. I’ll answer your questions, but I have one for you first: Where were all you people when Adry really needed somebody to talk to? Explain that to me.
[Lucher is prompted to offer her own explanation.]
And you’re going to answer whatever I ask you with another question? Is that how oral history works?
[Lucher is welcomed to offer her own view on this. Lucher laughs.]
That’s pretty fucking funny. [Lucher continues laughing.]
I’ll tell you something about Adry: She wouldn’t like this one bit. She was a sensitive woman—strong and sensitive. Do you get that? Doesn’t matter. That’s how she was.
I bet you don’t know much about Adry—I’m talking about the real Adry. Who have you talked to? Her brother Donny? He never knew her, not really—he wouldn’t let himself. It might get in the way of making fun of her behind her back—I saw him do it. We all ate in the same lunchroom, and I had friends in his grade. Know what he called her, behind her back? “Craz-dry.” Stupid. Cruel. Not even a good joke.
Did you talk to his parents? Big help! They can give you the facts, for sure. Birthday: May 19. High-school graduation: June 1977—we sat together at the convocation, way in the back, behind everybody else, where they put us, so we weren’t in the pictures. Mr. and Mrs. Geffel can give you all the facts. But you tell me this: What did her parents ever give her—besides the piano? That was a great thing, no question there. But it took them years to figure out that maybe, if you’re raising a musical genius, you could get her an instrument to play. And they never ever understood what she was doing when she played.
We were best friends in high school. But I wasn’t her only friend or the only girl who could have been her friend. Other girls liked her—Adry was likable—but everybody was always nervous with her and afraid she might suddenly burst into song, just because, because that’s what Adry did. We met in the library, where I always went during study hall, because I liked to read, which made me something of a weirdo at our school, and Adry was there because that’s where they sent her to keep her quiet or quiet as they could keep her. So Adry and I, the two weirdos, made friends in the library. We made funny faces at each other and passed notes. I felt like we were secret agents.
I missed her when she left. I really missed her, a lot.
[Lucher is asked to elaborate.]
What did I miss about her? Is that what you want to know? Is that your idea of a probing inquiry? I missed everything about her. I missed her laugh. She had a laugh . . . it always reminded me of TV cartoon music. You know, Sylvester lays a nasty trap for Tweety Bird and then steps into it himself—wee-wah! That was Adry’s laugh—sort of. I can’t do it justice. I missed her smile, that was kind of crooked and quavery, like it could burst wide open any second. I missed her eyes. You never met her, so you wouldn’t know, and none of the photographs, not even the Avedon, capture the look of Adry’s eyes. It was really fucking strong—like, steeeeely. Not distant or cold, but hard and bright as steel, until something made her laugh or got her upset, and her eyes would swell up and get as big as the world.
I missed talking to her. We talked about everything—books we both read, things we saw on TV. Adry watched the nightly news—she watched the fucking news. I never knew another kid who ever watched the fucking news if it wasn’t for homework. She was interested in the world, and it was good for her that the news had no background music. “Theme from Shaft”—[Lucher simulates sound of electric guitar with wah-wah effect]—and then no music for half an hour, just right for Adry.
We both liked Austen—Jane Austen, not Steve Austin from The Six Million Dollar Man, who just wasn’t our type. We read through all six of the Austen novels—Emma twice, just to see if we could find things we didn’t catch the first time. That made us want to read every book we ever read twice. But there just wasn’t the time. The library had only one copy of every book, so we couldn’t both read the same book at the same time in two different houses. We had to hand the one copy we had back and forth to each other and take turns reading it, or read the same page together in Adry’s room. We did that as often as we could do it, lying on Adry’s bed.
She saved my ass in English class once, in sophomore year. We had Mrs. Riggio. I sat behind Adry. Riggio was blathering some bullshit about John Steinbeck, and I whispered to Adry, “Fuck her.” Riggio heard me and yelled out, “Who said that?” Adry answered, “That was me. I said ‘Faulkner’—William Faulkner. I’m sorry for the outburst, but Faulkner was a superior writer, more of a modernist, and surely more deserving of the Nobel Prize for Literature than Steinbeck. Don’t you agree, Mrs. Riggio?”
She was fucking funny, and I don’t mean just weird funny. When she disappeared, I missed her so much I could barely stand it. I had to get away myself, just to keep myself together. So I did some travelling for a while—for quite a long while, actually. I didn’t come back till my mother died, in February, and that’s the only reason I even got your letter. I wish I never opened it.
Beth Platt (high-school classmate):
She was weird. I loved that. We were in Health together, sophomore year and junior year, and Chem, junior year. I always tried to get a seat in front of her, so I could hear her humming when the class got hard. It was like having my own human radio. My favorite was learning the Hess cycles and those concepts. That really got Adry going. For years after, I couldn’t go to a Hess station without hearing Adry humming in my head.
Donald Geffel:
As a person who’s three years older than my sister, I was always more advanced. I was driving age three years before her. I already had a car of my own, a ’75 AMC Pacer, orange-gold—only thirty thousand miles on it when I got it, and not a scratch from the first owner’s accident after the body work was done. I gave Adry lots of rides when she needed them. I took her all the way to the north side of Randall Ridge for a piano lesson once and waited there in the car for her for forty-five minutes. I’m not complaining. If you have to wait for forty-five minutes in a car, a Pacer is the way to go—with those giant windows, it feels like you’re not even in a car. I took her to the shopping center, to Shopping Town, when she wanted to shop. I even chauffeured her to the junior d
ance with her friend Barb Lucher, and I had to wait in the parking lot for two hours and fifteen minutes for them. There were some kids driving age in the other cars in the lot, screwing in their vehicles, and I didn’t need to see that. It’s the one time I wished I didn’t have a Pacer.
Barbara Lucher:
Junior year, time for the spring dance—the Junior Jam, short for Jamboree. Even the squares in the class know better than to use the word “Jamboree.” Everybody’s running around, fussing and planning. Adry and I, as official class weirdos, take our rightful place above it all and act like we have no time for such trivial adolescent frivolity. Ronny Fermonti asked me to go with him. I blew him off. Better that than having to actually blow him. Dennis Schoenberg asked Adry. He wasn’t a bad guy, and not too stupid. Adry might have gone with him if I were going, too, and if it weren’t for the tiny matter of the fact that the Junior Jam was a fucking dance, and dances have music. Adry couldn’t have taken the sound of all that music.
I went over to her house. We raided the kitchen cabinets for snacks and munched down a feast of Cheetos and Cokes. We just hung out and didn’t talk at all about the dance. We were in her room, figuring out what to do next, and I said, “What would you wear if you went?”
Adry opened up her clothes closet—it wasn’t very big—and started pulling out things that would be fun to put together in a sort-of-nice, sort-of-silly way. She had a super-hot off-the-shoulder peasant blouse with billowy sleeves that was maybe her favorite thing and for sure my favorite thing to see her in. She held it against her front with one hand and took down a shiny black fake-leather vest with long fringes on the bottom and pressed it on top of the blouse with her other hand, and she struck a goofy glamour pose in the mirror on her dresser. I went behind her, pulled out a pair of earplugs I bought at the drug store that day, and waved them next to her ears. Adry broke into that crooked smile of hers. I yelled through the door to Donny’s room, “Can you drive us to the high school?”