#14 – 1984 Week 17: If only it was April all the time.
Only the thing that throws you at the stars was any good.
Monday 23 April 1984
114-252 Week 17 Easter Monday
In the morning, I walked up to Bidborough Ridge to catch a lift to Sevenoaks for rehearsals again. 10.00-1.00. Then I got dropped off at the Baileys’ because there was no one at home. Everyone else was walking the South Downs. So I wait and wait for Bev and Stu and Sophie. (Those 3 again!) They arrive. I realise I have to practise and get changed for tonight. (Dinner jackets and black bow ties). So I walk home again with my violin and Sophie, and leave her to feed the chickens while I twist my fingers in agony trying to play Prokofiev but not succeeding.
Bev and Stu pick us up for tea at the Baileys’. And some of us rush off to a concert. No one noticed me fumbling through the hard bits of the Schubert (about 1/3 of it). And they want me to play again. Again? Oh no!
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Tuesday 24 April
115-251 Week 17
Today I wrote last Friday's entry in this diary. And I did nothing in particular. In the morning I began reading ‘A Passage to India’ by Forster. I lay in the sun trying to get brown. Luxury. After lunch, Sophie and Simon arrived on the scene. What to do? What to do? In our house, there is nothing to do for large groups of people. Two can talk but more than that just stand around doing nothing. So I went for a run. I was going to all day, but then these people came. I went anyway and on the way back I met them all. So we all went to Bullingstone Woods like when we were little children. How idyllic it was down there, never changing. Oh Debussy! I accidentally jumped into the river. It was painful.
We returned, Sophie went home, Simon went home and I did some Hamlet.
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Wednesday 25 April
116-250 Week 17
Getting up late. Sun. Work. I want to do my work but I take so long doing it. I have a complex about doing work. There is so much I could do. Learn vocabulary, read extra books, and the set work we have, but I am getting a complex against it too. And against writing. I hate writing this because I have just written a lot of English.
Just now I got up in a rage because I was feeling extremely panicky and claustrophobic. I am OK now. I read some German poetry to calm me down.
This evening, the Hermans came round to supper. We actually had a sit-down supper with knives and forks. We listened to jazz. I love jazz. And then I went to bed really early. 10.00.
Oh, I have so much work. I have exams in about six weeks. I have to revise everything. I have 10 books to learn, quote from and understand. Vocabulary. Music history. Aural. Oh, help me.
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Thursday 26 April
117-249 Week 17
It is beginning. Today I had my first driving lesson. Oh dear. Neutral. Ignition. Clutch down first. Gas. Release clutch slowly. Move off. Drive. We had about 3/4 of the lesson just talking theory, and then I drove up our road and back and halfway to Langton. It is much worse than I thought. I am terrible at steering and I keep on wanting to do anything for no reason. However, I didn't crash. This is going to be fun. Afterwards, I went to the dentist for three seconds and then I went home and got really depressed. Sophie, psychic as usual, phoned because she was really depressed. It was the only time I picked up the phone that day.
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Friday 27 April
118-248 Week 17
I am beginning only to remember things that happened in the evenings. This is terrible. This morning was, however, probably irrelevant. In the afternoon….. (I just remember I had a piano lesson this morning and it annoyed me greatly, very, to have to waste all that time for half an hour)…. In the afternoon I cycled in the countryside. England is so nice. I met Sophie. So we stopped together for a bit. A few hours.
In the evening I had to go with Jon to his girlfriend’s house to meet a friend of hers again. His girlfriend is really so nice, and he treats her so badly. We all went to the fairground in T. Wells. Useless fairground. Only the thing that throws you at the stars was any good.
Got home. There was no one in, so I listened to Mike Oldfield and looked out of the window for half an hour.
2024: That would have been Hergest Ridge, Mike Oldfield’s second album after Tubular Bells. Personally I think it’s a better album, music inspired by English countryside. Great for gazing upwards.
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Saturday 28 April
117-247 Week 17
Got up early and before breakfast at about 9:00 Ethan and I went for a short run to Simon's house. We woke him up and caused him great annoyance. But he ran back home with us and stayed the whole of the day. Therefore, during the whole of the day, I was unable to achieve much scholarly work. In the evening, surprise, surprise, I went out again. Today it was with Feralyn to a 21st birthday party, it was at the Spa Hotel and was extremely posh. I wore my white suit from Uncle Ödön, white shoes, a black bow tie, a white scarf and my grey trilby, which I got in Berlin. Feralyn wore her black ballroom gown. Oh, jolly hockey sticks! And we weren't even really out of place. Others were just as tarted up. There was an amazing jazz band, but only a few could dance. And certainly not Feralyn. Posh or what? It was a great experience. One does have to get into the right social strata. What a load of crap. Half of the guests were in jeans. The others in tails.
The food was disgusting.
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Sunday 29 April
116-246 Week 17
Ah! Good morning. After going to bed late, I had to get up at 6:30 to do the early church service. Afterwards, I sat down to do a last-minute bit of work, which was again disturbed by Jon Thorne. In the afternoon I had to go with him and Ros and Colette to Ashdown Forest. Where we did sod all apart from the lie back and look at the sky. We were pretty bad at conversation, so that worked out as a bit of a disaster. In any case, miles and miles of the heather had just been burnt away, so everything was black. Quite spectacular. We drove round and round back home until I could get away and throw myself down in a chair to read and read and read - for pleasure. If only life didn't have a future. It would be so enjoyable, so wonderful. If only it was April all the time. We have had no April showers this year, thank the fairies.
Anyway, so much for the holidays. They were great. But I missed them.
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2024: The Prokofiev piece we played in my first Lydian Orchestra concert on that Monday was his Second Violin Concerto. This has been a deep fixture in my life ever since and especially the achingly-beautiful slow second movement. Itzhak Perlman’s 1982 version with the BBC Symphony Orchestra is my go-to recording. I’m deeply grateful to the orchestra for introducing me to this work. We must find ways to encourage teenagers to engage with classical music.
”I wore my white suit from Uncle Ödön.” It was a 1930s or even 1920s silk suit with very sharp creases in the trousers, which I had been given by my Hungarian Great Great Uncle in Budapest.
The white look on a different occasion. Hmmm.
If my maths isn’t wrong, I make that going out with three girls in one week. Not bad! Though “I leave her to feed the chickens” doesn’t bode well!
Thanks Laura it was great to see your son playing a classical piece and then launching into some flamenco piano just like that!
What you picked out was my 2024 comment - which are sometimes interspersed with the 1984 diary. In fact at the time though I was immersed in music, I actually disliked music lessons quite a lot especially piano! My point is that among all the music easily available to teens today (including video games which have some awesome pieces!) I hope they will also find ways to listen to, play and understand classical music alongside other genres and make it their own.
Sebastian forty years ago you wrote on your diary,
'We must find ways to encourage teenagers to engage with classical music.'
Seeing you playing and teaching how to live a 'piece' at the piano to my teenage son this weekend (just 40 years later!) I can see your feelings about this remain unchanged.
Thank you Sebastian.