The Story of the Trapp Family Singers

by Maria Augusta Trapp

  “Sex appeal.” I memorized the words. For heaven’s sake, I mustn’t forget the precious phrase before I found out what it was. I had been too proud to admit to the girl that I didn’t even know what it was that I lacked so badly, but I would find out.

  But how? Well, in a book store. Around Christmas I had been in Scribner’s on Fifth Avenue and remarked on their vast music department. It must have to do with music, of course. “Sex appeal,” I murmured from time to time as I walked the blocks over to Scribner’s. Now after Christmas it was quite empty, and right away a nice-looking young man wanted to know what he could do for me.

  “Music,” I said, and he led me over to the big alcove which was lined from floor to ceiling on three sides with books on music. After a little searching, I discovered that they were arranged alphabetically. Quickly I moved over to “S” “Shostakovich; Sibelius; Strauss, Johann; Strauss, Josef; Strauss, Richard; String Quartet; Symphony.” I read all the titles aloud to myself, but “it” was not there.

  The young man came.

  “Can I help you with anything?”

  “Yes,” I said somewhat haughtily. “Book on sex appeal, please. Need it for concerts.”

  Why did he disappear so quickly and never come back?

  Scribner’s had disappointed me. I really had thought they had a book on everything. All I could do now was go into the lion’s den and find out right there. So back I walked to Steinway Hall. On the way I mused to myself whether “sex appeal” was something you put on your head, whether it is part of your appearance, whether you buy it by the ounce or by the inch. Shortly afterwards I found myself on the fifteenth floor of 113 West 57th Street, face to face with Mr. Schang.

  After having shown me to a seat, he was leaning back in his swivel chair, and with a big cigar he produced a smoke screen between us. What a moment! All of a sudden I became conscious that this was my last, my very last chance, and there was my bad English.

  “Why you not take us?” I started out.

  He didn’t answer right away. Then suddenly he sat up and, taking the cigar out of his mouth, he started to explain.

  “It has nothing to do with your musicianship, I want you to understand. Already at your Town Hall concert I recognized you as good artists. Still, it’s the worst program I’ve ever heard. That program. That program! That piece by Bach was forty-five minutes! That’s for a few music enthusiasts, but do you think people across the country want to listen by the hour to quaint ancient tunes? And the recorders! They sound like a calliope. But by far the worst thing is your appearance—solemn and deadly serious, you come and go like a funeral procession. No charming smile and no good looks, either,” and he continued in real disgust: “those long skirts, high necks, hair parted in the middle, braids in the back, shoes like boys, cotton stockings! Can’t you get decent store clothes so one can see your legs in nylon stockings, get pretty, high-heeled shoes and put a little red on your face and on your lips?”

  “No,” I said gravely, “we can’t.” And I was choking-full of explanations as to why we couldn’t, but I knew I would get hopelessly tangled in long English sentences without the right beginning and the right end.

  Silence.

  “This is—last word?” I finally ventured to ask.

  “Yes.”

  The battle was lost. All of a sudden I felt very tired. The strain had been great; the rehearsals of last week, the excitement of the morning, and the tension of the last minutes. And this was America, of which everyone had told us—here you can say what you want, do what you want, wear what you want. An urgent desire took hold of me to let this man in front of me know how I felt. All was lost; I couldn’t spoil anything any more. If I couldn’t say it in words, I’d say it anyhow.

  And I took a thick book lying on his desk, slammed it on the table, looked at him as crossly as I could manage, and said:

  “I thinked—America free country. Is not!”

  After this annihilating speech, I turned and walked out. My tears he should not see.

  While I was waiting for the elevator, the nice young secretary tapped me on the shoulder and asked me to come back into Mr. Schang’s office.

  “Maybe after all you’ll make it all right,” said an altogether different Mr. Schang—“win over the American audience at large, I mean. I’d like to try for one year,” and he sounded genuinely interested. “But it will need a great deal of publicity and advertising, and that is expensive. Could you spend—let’s say—five thousand dollars on advance publicity?”

  “Will try,” I said, and then we shook hands.

  All I let them squeeze out of me at the Wellington was: “Mr. Schang is almost sure that he will take us; not quite, but almost.”

  Then I lapsed into silence and prayed for the money. In the bank we had exactly $250. That much I knew.

  The same evening we went over to the Drinkers’ and sang with them for two hours. Afterwards, over some ginger ale, I told my story.

  “If we can advance five thousand dollars, he will take us,” I finished, avoiding looking at my family, but looking pleadingly at Mr. Drinker. Would he have an idea?

  There—while Sophie was still laughing to tears about me at Scribner’s, Harry Drinker’s voice could be heard:

  “I’ll lend you half the money if you find somebody for the other half.”

  I closed my eyes in excitement, and also in order to think hard.

  When I opened them again, I said: “Mrs. P.”

  That was a rich lady whom we had met at a concert at the Cosmopolitan Club in New York, and she had said with such genuine cordiality: “If you ever need any help, let me know.”

  Mr. Drinker went to the telephone and called Mrs. P. She said “yes.” The miracle had happened.

  The very next morning—he had said there was no time to lose, it was late in the season—I stood in Mr. Schang’s office and handed him two checks, each one for $2,500, and said simply:

  “Here, borrowed for a year.”

  There was great quiet in the room until a warm and sincere-sounding voice came from behind deep blue clouds:

  “Congratulations!”

  Again I wanted so very badly to “say something.” I pressed his hand, and he must have seen in my eyes what was in my heart when I said:

  “You not regret—never—I r-r-r-really mean it!”

  When he walked with me to the elevator, he said:

  “I believe in you as musicians, but now we have to try to coin the gold lump of your artistry into practical currency, so that everyone may take something home from your concerts.

  “For this we shall start by changing your name. ‘Trapp Family Choir’ sounds too church-y. I am the manager of the ‘Trapp Family Singers.’”

  IX Merion

  WHEN I arrived in Merion Station, I didn’t go straight home, but stopped first at the Drinkers’ house. The last twenty-four hours I had lived—we all had—in a pink fog. Things were too good to be true, and didn’t yet register completely. As they slowly began to sink in, a deep gratitude took hold of me, and not only gratitude, but also a new feeling of responsibility. There were people—Mrs. P., Mr. Drinker, Mr. Schang, who, while believing in us, risked something. Not only should they not be let down, but some day they should have real reason to be proud of us. Now we simply had to become the best artists in our field for the sake of these people who trusted in us.

  And this I had to tell the Drinkers before going home.

  There we experienced in our own life what other people’s trust does to you. It releases new powers; new depths in your soul open, hitherto unknown to yourself. It sharpens your will and fixes it on the goal—it helps you to do the impossible. That’s the way God works with us. He always gives us another chance. Why do people use this magic wand so little? It would transform this world into a paradise. Communism would not be a threat, and United Nations would not be needed. The brotherhood of man would be lived, not just talked about.

  A new life had started for us when we en
tered the “house across the street.” Our application for extension of temporary stay had been granted this time on account of war conditions in Europe. It had to be renewed every six months, but no one would be forced to leave the United States during the war. And we had a new manager in whose hands we felt secure. Those troubles of last year did not cloud our sky any more. With new strength and vigor we reorganized our life. Johanna took over the kitchen; Hedwig was in charge of the laundry; Agathe started to sew; Maria took charge of the mending and darning; Martina, the housecleaning; the boys brushed the shoes of the entire family and helped with the dishes; Georg did the shopping; I took care of the correspondence; and Father Wasner, of the bookkeeping. From the day we had left Austria Georg had asked Father Wasner to take over the handling of the money. During all those critical years when we were in debt, we felt we didn’t have the right to own anything individually until we had paid back every cent we owed. Therefore, the incoming money and the incoming bills went to Father Wasner, and everyone, Georg and I included, who needed money for one thing or the other, went to him. That guaranteed, so we felt, the best use of our money.

  At that time the little girls wanted to start learning to play instruments, which didn’t seem to go with their being in school. At that very moment I happened to meet right in Philadelphia a former teacher of mine from Vienna. Now she was over here, a refugee, too. It was almost incredible, but how lucky we both felt! She was looking for a home, and I, for a teacher. So she came and stayed with us and grew right into the family as Tante Lene. Very soon we noticed with amazement how much time the little ones had to practice the piano, the violin, the recorder, and still spend hours every day out-of-doors.

  Mr. Schang had suggested that we give two Christmas concerts in Town Hall. That meant an entirely new program, and we started right out working on it. Father Wasner went to the big libraries in search of Christmas motets. When he brought them home, the different parts had to be copied before we could start working. Then we had to get acquainted with English and American Christmas carols, for many of which Father Wasner made new settings.

  It was the day before Christmas when we moved into our new home, the little house with the blue shutters. Very kindly, a neighbor came over to find out whether she could do anything to help.

  “Yes,” I said, “can you please tell me where I can get a goose? You see, at Christmas one has to eat a goose if one can afford it at all.”

  Good-naturedly the friendly lady, whose name was Betty, herself drove me to the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia to get that indispensable Austrian goose. She obviously didn’t want to spoil Christmas for me. But that was my last day of vacation.

  Right after Christmas school started. This was not grade school any more with our bus driver as teacher; this was high school, and these were the subjects: American Past, American Present, American Living, American Thinking; and Betty was the teacher. Soon we were good friends. From what I had told her in my halting English, she had made the hair-raising observation that I was floating around in a dream world, in which money and what it stood for had no part. As far as Americanization went, Betty saw with sharp eyes that we were freshly hatched baby chicks with eggshells still sticking to us: eggshells of European thinking and believing, European dos and don’ts. Out of pure helpfulness she decided that something had to be done about it. First she took care of my English, which still showed strong traces of my two first teachers: Dr. Johnson and the driver.

  “Betty, who are the two guys over there?” I asked the very first morning, pointing to two most dignified Main Liners.

  She almost fainted.

  “But—Maria! You can’t say that. That’s very poor English.”

  Oh, I was sorry, but I definitely remembered Dr. Johnson having told me that “guy” is just another word for “gentleman.”

  “And do never say ‘O. K.’ That’s vulgar.”

  “O. K., Betty,” I said.

  “But Maria—that’s very vulgar!”

  How often would she have to say that!

  Now I would have to learn to unlearn. No more “gee whiz,” “golly Moses,” “jeepers creepers,” “gosh,” “oh shucks,” “boy oh boy,” “jump in the lake”—at least not when Betty was around. But how many more times poor Betty almost fainted, as for instance, this afternoon when she had company for tea and looked somewhat blue, and I remembered suddenly one of Dr. Johnson’s most helpful suggestions if I wanted to cheer someone up:

  “Oh Betty, don’t be a cranky old hog.”

  But this was only one part of my education, and at that, a minor one. To make, eventually, a good citizen out of me, she would have to make me money-conscious, to teach me to appreciate the nickel, of which there were twenty needed to make a dollar.

  “Don’t say ‘buck,’ Maria, that’s very vulgar.”

  Desperately she tried to explain:

  “You are not rich any more, Maria. You are poor now, don’t you see?—poor.”

  What a sad truth, and how cruel to state it aloud like that! And, quoting Dr. Johnson once more, “If I never see you again, it’s too soon!” I went into my room and bewailed my fate with real tears, that these Americans were just hard-boiled, hard-hearted, didn’t understand us, never would, and wasn’t it awfull Betty with her sound common sense never even dreamed how my sensitive heart shrank each time at the word “poor,” and how I cried my eyes out after each application of the remedy.

  Another thing we had to learn from scratch: that no work, as long as it is decent, can ever disgrace anybody. We were still so Europeanly prejudiced, that we didn’t want to be caught at manual labor. When company came and we were busy in the kitchen, pantry, or basement, we went out the back door and came in the front door, not to give away the secret that we had been working. What a blessing, however, that we had no money at all, and simply had to jump in and swim. I remember the sad number of fellow refugees whom we met occasionally in New York. One such refugee had been a director or inspector or professor in Europe, and now, of course, he was waiting for a “leading position.” He had brought with him a little money, too much to die with, and too little to live on; but it kept him, unfortunately, from starting all over again from the bottom. And there they were, huddled together in shabby apartments, starving, cold, but still wearing old fur coats and leather gloves and wasting precious time waiting for that “leading position,” which might never come. This misfortune we were spared. We just had to learn the hard way, and that is one of the things we are most grateful for now. Now when we are driving the manure or lime spreader on our farm and see a fancy Cadillac drive up with some unexpected company, we only wave and shout: “We’ll be right with you!” without the slightest shade of embarrassment on either side.

  But that was not so on that morning in Merion. The night before, we had been invited for dinner at a friend’s house, and my partner on the left had been an extremely nice-looking young man in evening clothes. The next morning a coal truck came with a load, and who can describe my horror when my elegant left-hand neighbor, black all over, started to shovel the coal into the cellar. I was all bewildered and looked away discreetly, not to embarrass him. Embarrass him? Why?

  “Good morning, Baroness. Don’t you remember me?” he shouted through the rumbling of the coal. Well, he wanted to get into the coal business, and had started from the bottom. What a completely different world, but what a wholesome one!

  Betty rejoiced when I cheerfully announced one day that I would rather walk into town (ten miles!) to save the fare, and almost tenderly she started to caution me not to overdo my thriftiness, only to be most cruelly disappointed by the finishing of my sentence: because I wanted to buy a color film.

  “But you can’t afford that, Maria. Don’t forget, you are poor.”

  And now something funny happened. I must have shed the last tear which was in me for that particular subject. Without being the slightest bit offended, I looked at her triumphantly and said sweetly:

  “No, we
are not poor. We just don’t have any money.”

  In this moment I had somehow passed from freshman to sophomore.

  Johannes was so cute now with his blond curls, waddling like a penguin all over the place. If I wanted to take colored pictures of him in that state, I just had to do it then, and couldn’t wait until we might one day have real money in the bank. Johannes might be in college then. This I tried to explain to Betty in the most poetic terms, but didn’t succeed. I thought if I showed her my colored slides, that would make my point clear, but—wow!

  “You have a projector, Maria, and a screen?”

  “The screen was a present, Betty, but the projector—” and I lighted up with eagerness to show off what I had learned most recently—“the projector we bought, and the sewing machine, and the victrola, and the washing machine, without any money. American installment plan buying is something wonderful. Only five dollars a month—just imagine! In three years they will be really our own.”

  Betty was torn between feeling proud of her hopeful pupil and mad at the projector. The sewing and washing machines she let pass right away. The victrola I had to explain as being absolutely necessary in our business. We had to listen to other choirs. All right then. But the projector remained a sore spot.

  But how many delightful hours we spent together, teacher and disciple, between tears and laughter, as I slowly advanced into the senior class.

  Our life did not allow much social activity, but there was a small circle of real people with whom we loved to spend our Sundays and free evenings. And there were the Drinkers across the street. Nothing was more gratifying to us than to have found such genuine music-lovers. Harry’s enthusiastic “Let’s do it again!” still sounds in our ears, and his radiant smile whenever we performed for him for the first time one of our newest motets or songs was applause in itself.

  Nothing demonstrates more his sincere love of music than the fact that he had made, beside other translations, new English translations of the entire vocal works of Johann Sebastian Bach. These translations are a more correct rendering of the German originals, especially those taken from the Scriptures, and are more singable.