At Ease

by Jeff Ross

  At

  Ease

  Jeff Ross

  ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS

  Copyright © 2015 Jeff Ross

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Ross, Jeff, 1973–, author

  At ease / Jeff Ross.

  (Orca limelights)

  Issued in print and electronic formats.

  ISBN 978-1-4598-0800-3 (pbk.).—ISBN 978-1-4598-0801-0 (pdf).—

  ISBN 978-1-4598-0802-7 (epub)

  I. Title. II. Series: Orca limelights

  PS8635.O6928A82 2015 jC813'.6 C2015-901724-6

  C2015-901725-4

  First published in the United States, 2015

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2015935528

  Summary: Will has the talent required for a career as a classical violinist, but stage fright threatens to destroy his dream.

  Orca Book Publishers gratefully acknowledges the support for its publishing programs provided by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund and the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council and the Book Publishing Tax Credit.

  Cover design by Rachel Page

  Cover photography by Getty Images

  ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS

  www.orcabook.com

  18 17 16 15 • 4 3 2 1

  For Luca, the first person to read these pages

  and a source of endless inspiration.

  Contents

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Acknowledgments

  To play a wrong note is insignificant; to play

  without passion is inexcusable.

  —Ludwig van Beethoven

  One

  I played the final note of the sonata, letting the sound ring for an eternity.

  My teacher, Mr. Jorgensen, laughed and said, “Again.”

  “What was wrong?”

  “Nothing. It was perfect. Well, not perfect. It’s music, so it can never be perfect. Perfect in music means those little robots who play every note for exactly the right length of time and with absolutely no feeling whatsoever. No, that was quintessential, William. That was…stunning. Play it again!”

  “There’s nothing I could do better?”

  Mr. Jorgensen’s fist flew to his lips as he began hacking, almost doubling over. He held a hand up as we waited for the attack to end. “Nothing,” he said. “Except doing it again. Entirely for my amusement.”

  I placed my violin back in its spot. Set my chin on the rest. The rough, worn skin there burned a little.

  And I played.

  The piece was Bach’s Sonata No. 1 in G Minor—Presto. It’s written for solo violin, and it moves so quickly that it proves practicing scales is never a waste of time. Run after run, your fingers need to fly to make it sound right. It’s the kind of piece where, once you’re done, people might marvel at how you were able to memorize all the notes, never mind play them. But for me, it was a fairly boring, straightforward piece that lacked any real personality.

  And yet I loved it, simply because there was nothing I enjoyed more than playing violin. Nothing in my life came even close to the feeling of my fingers on the strings and the sound of the notes stretching out above me.

  I guess you could refer to what Mr. Jorgensen and I did as lessons, but it never really felt that way. He took me on as a student just after I had my fifth birthday. I’ve been told it began when I heard music coming from his apartment, which is next to my family’s. Apparently, I refused to leave his door until my mother knocked and asked what the music was.

  That was ten years ago.

  I didn’t start playing right away. At first, my parents just needed someone to watch me after school, and Mr. Jorgensen agreed to be my babysitter as long as we only listened to music—None of that garbage television stuff, as he put it. He said I needed to be well versed in all types of music first, and if I still felt a passion for violin, then it was meant to be.

  Even though Mr. Jorgensen had been the conductor of a number of orchestras, we listened to everything from Gregorian chants (weird) to Miley Cyrus (seriously? This is music?). We covered soul, country, rock, reggae—even electronic. Always circling back to classical. Once I was certain I didn’t want to play the trumpet, or twist knobs on a keyboard, or sing a Justin Bieber song in front of a TV audience, we settled down with the violin.

  First the easy pieces, starting with “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” and “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” Mr. Jorgensen would never allow me to move on to another piece until I “felt each and every note.” Which, honestly, sounds ridiculous for a song like “The Happy Farmer.”

  But he was right.

  Until I truly felt each note coming out of me, I didn’t really enjoy playing. I mean, I liked it. But there were times when I was just playing the notes to get through the song.

  Mr. Jorgensen would never stand for this. And somehow he always knew.

  I’ve never had another teacher. Never played for anyone but Mr. Jorgensen and my parents. But for the past ten years, I have spent a minimum of two hours a day focusing on getting better and learning more about the violin.

  “And around, yes, Will, yes, now to the end!” Eyes closed, hands together, Mr. Jorgensen seemed more lost in the moment than I was.

  I kept playing, feeling the music seep out of me.

  “Perfect, perfect,” he said. Laughing and clapping his hands as though I were playing some East Coast foot-stomper and not a serious, solo Bach piece.

  Bach has never been my favorite, which was why Mr. Jorgensen had me playing this. He said that if I could play a piece I didn’t enjoy, imagine what I would be able to do with the ones I loved.

  Such as Paganini’s Caprice No. 24 in A Minor.

  The first time I heard that piece, I thought my head was going to explode. It’s everything at once: motion and energy and power. Playing it is like riding a brakeless bicycle down a winding hill. Like being entirely outside of your body and only coming back to the ground when it’s over.

  Mr. Jorgensen turned in his chair as I was finishing and yelled, “Is that enough for you, Alisha?”

  I froze, letting a muddle of notes crash to the floor.

  “Alisha?” I said.

  Which was when Mr. Jorgensen’s daughter stepped out of the kitchen and my entire life changed.

  “You were right, Dad,” Alisha said.

  Alisha hadn’t heard me play before, but I’d seen her at Mr. Jorgensen’s apartment a few times. She’s tall and blond and wears a lot of rings and bracelets. She’s my parents’ age, I guess. I’ve heard a lot from Mr. Jorgensen about how she’s never given him grandchildren. It’s always left me wondering if I’m a substitute grandson for him.

  “That isn’t even his best piece,” Mr. Jorgensen told her. “Far from it.”

  “How old are you?” Alisha asked me.

  “Fifteen?” I said. Like I didn’t know the answer.

  “Fifteen, Dad? Fifteen! Why didn’t you…”

  Mr. Jorgensen pulled himself up in his chair. He tended to sink down in it as I played. “He needed to reach a certain level. I told you thi
s.”

  “But that piece is well beyond his years. I’ve never heard—”

  “He has more difficult ones in his repertoire. But that one. That one,” he said, then collapsed into another coughing fit. “That one is stunning.”

  “You don’t say.” She put a hand to her chin and stared at me the way people stare at paintings in the National Gallery.

  “The thing is, he hates it.” Mr. Jorgensen looked at me. “Don’t you, Will?”

  I was too busy trying not to be freaked out by Alisha staring at me to respond. “It’s not my favorite,” I finally managed.

  “Have you ever been to the nac?” Alisha asked. I didn’t answer right away, so she said, “The National Arts Centre. Right here in Ottawa.”

  “Once,” I said. “To see James Ehnes.”

  Her face brightened. “Do you like James?”

  “Yes,” I said, though not with the enthusiasm I felt. James Ehnes is absolutely the greatest living violinist. He may be the greatest violinist ever, but that’s impossible to say because you can’t actually see the dead ones play live. Sure, there are recordings of live performances, but they aren’t even close to the actual performances.

  You need to be in the room watching and listening to understand.

  “He’s very nice,” Alisha said. “And very good.”

  “Exquisite,” Mr. Jorgensen said. “James feels every note. Just like Will here. He inhales the music, then releases it as if it has never been played before.”

  “He was at Meadowmount at your age,” Alisha said. She seemed to be talking to herself. Her rings shone in the late-afternoon light seeping through the bay window.

  “So,” Mr. Jorgensen asked. “You’ll be accepting him to your school, of course.”

  “I’ll need his parents to fill out the registration forms. And I’ll need a recording. But when the others hear this…”

  Mr. Jorgensen stood and did something on his laptop. “I recorded today,” he said. “You’ll have to edit it. Don’t use the last one—I might have talked a little during it.”

  “You think?” Alisha said, shaking her head at her father before looking to me. “Is that okay?”

  “Is what okay?” I had no idea what was going on. It was just a Tuesday practice at the beginning of summer vacation. I had been with Mr. Jorgensen all day. We had walked around the park by the canal in the morning, fed the ducks, had a hot dog and Fanta for lunch, and been practicing in his apartment ever since.

  “He didn’t tell you?” Alisha said.

  “I didn’t want to frighten him,” Mr. Jorgensen replied.

  “Dad! You told me we were just doing a blind audition.”

  Mr. Jorgensen waved her concerns away again. “So blind he didn’t even know you were in the apartment. It was the only way, Alisha.”

  It seemed as if she was about to scold her father again, but instead she turned back to me. “I’m sorry about that. I would never have listened in without your permission.”

  “That’s okay,” I said, though it felt strange. I didn’t know whether to be angry or embarrassed, especially since I didn’t feel I’d been playing all that well.

  “I coordinate the Young Musicians program at the university. It’s a two-week summer workshop for the very best young musicians in Canada. You work with our professionals on your instrument. You practice two or three hours a day, and you take seminars, master classes and private lessons. Does that sound like fun?”

  “I guess.” I wasn’t even certain what all those things were. Seminars? Master classes? Practicing two or three hours a day was something I already did, so that didn’t faze me.

  Alisha laughed. “He guesses. Dad, where have you been keeping this kid?”

  “Under a rock and away from you people just long enough that he knows what he knows and no one will be able to ruin it.”

  “We don’t ruin anything, Dad.” She crossed the room to stand before me.

  “Sure you don’t,” Mr. Jorgensen said. “You prepare them.”

  “This could be quite the big step for you,” she said, ignoring him. “There will be representatives there from a number of universities, and from The Juilliard School for the performing arts.”

  “Okay.”

  “James Ehnes went to Juilliard. He says it’s where he truly began to understand his instrument. Do you think you’re ready?”

  “I guess.”

  Mr. Jorgensen stood and grabbed me by the shoulders. “Will. This is your shot. You impress those people and you’ve written your ticket. You will perform all over the world. These are the gatekeepers.”

  “Not quite, Dad,” Alisha said.

  “As close as it gets,” he said. “Without some kind of backing, you’ll become a brilliant unknown.”

  Alisha turned to me. “Would you like to work with us, Will?” she asked. “Would you like to come to the summer program and play violin every day with some of the best musicians in the country? Would you like to take the next step toward a career in music?”

  I looked at Mr. Jorgensen.

  “Absolutely,” he said. “It is time.”

  Two

  “You have to get Wolski,” a girl said. “If you play cello, you need Mr. Wolski.”

  “I have Abrams,” a girl cradling a cello said.

  We were in a lecture hall at the university on the first day of the summer program. I sat down away from everyone else, and three girls decided to sit near me and then immediately pretend I didn’t exist. It seemed as if a lot of the kids already knew one another, though there were a few like me scattered among the clusters—wide-eyed kids sitting alone, clutching their instruments.

  “Mrs. Abrams?” the girl barked. “Mrs. Abrams shouldn’t even be here. She’s never really played. She’s never done any solo work. She’s never even been in a professional orchestra. I have no idea where she trained. Probably just at a university somewhere out west.” The girl crossed her arms and shook her head. “I mean, why bother?”

  “Oh,” the cellist said. She looked back at the schedule in front of her. “I have her for two sessions.”

  “Two sessions?” It seemed like the first girl, a skinny redhead with a violin resting on her lap, was going to lose her mind. Instead, she just shrugged and gave the cellist a pitying look.

  “Do you have Wolski?” the girl sitting next to me asked the redhead. She had thick brown hair and chestnut eyes. When she caught me glancing at her, she shot me a quick smile.

  “I play violin,” the redhead said, holding up her instrument. “So, obviously, I have Powell. If you play violin, you absolutely have to have Powell.”

  “Okay,” the brunette said. She turned to me, raised her eyebrows in an exaggerated motion and mouthed “Wow.”

  “How do you know all this?” the cellist asked.

  “This is my third time here,” the redhead said. “And this is my year. The Juilliard people are going to be snatching up the best of us. I intend to blow their minds.” She nodded as though agreeing with herself. “Juilliard is where I belong.”

  Alisha walked onto the stage. It made me feel a little more secure seeing her there. I barely knew her, but we’d talked a lot since she’d asked me to join the program. There were forms to complete, questions to answer, permissions to be given. My parents were thrilled for me. And eventually, I started to see what it was I’d signed up for.

  The weird thing was that I’d never thought about where all the practice was taking me, which might sound stupid—I don’t know. I am fifteen though. I kind of doubt anyone at fifteen really has a clear picture of how they’ll spend the rest of their life. You practice something and get good at it because you love doing it. It never really feels like work. It doesn’t feel like something you need to do to get somewhere. I couldn’t imagine ever not playing.

  As Alisha had explained it, this program was a giant stepping stone to greater things. You could be the next James Ehnes, she’d said.

  Which, to me, meant I could do nothing but pl
ay violin all the time. I didn’t hate school, though I could do without all the tests we were forced to take. I liked some of the English courses, but that was because we were just reading books. My school didn’t have a music program, so that wasn’t even an option. Every day was kind of the same. I spent my time waiting to get back to Mr. Jorgensen’s apartment to practice.

  This program, once I began to understand it, felt like a gift. Before I even went in that first day, I knew Alisha was right. I needed this.

  I wanted it.

  Up on the stage, Alisha clapped her hands to get our attention. “Hello, everyone, and welcome,” she said. “It’s nice to see so many familiar faces. And just as many new ones. I’m very excited for this year to begin.” There were some cheers and clapping, and then Alisha went on to talk about the program. The two weeks we would have at the university. How we would be working with some of the very best musicians in the area. And then she dropped an absolute bomb.

  “It is also a great honor for me to announce,” she said, stopping and looking out at the audience over her glasses, “that violinist James Ehnes will be joining us for a master class on the final day of our program.”

  I almost dropped my violin. It was in its case, but still.

  “He will work with five students individually,” Alisha said after the muttering and muffled clapping ceased. “I know there are more than five violinists here, so this will be a difficult decision to make. Luckily, James has invited us all to his performance at Chamberfest on Thursday night. And he will do a Q & A, so everyone will be able to gain valuable insights from one of our country’s most accomplished musicians.”

  I set my violin down because I didn’t trust my hands. They were suddenly sweaty and shaking.

  “As some of you have heard, two representatives from Juilliard will be here with us as well. Though they haven’t signed on to do any specific sessions, they’ll be watching all of the students to see how we do things here. Now, give yourselves a big round of applause because each and every one of you has made it this far, which is, in and of itself, a huge accomplishment.”