The Singing Teacher

My father couldn’t have cared less about the United States Army, but he firmly believed in their slogan ‘Be all you can be’.

We were encouraged to take any and all kinds of classes. Whilst art and accounting classes were fine and dandy, he was told that singing ups the chances of finding ‘a suitable boy’ for his girls. Now this probably holds true if you were born in a South Indian family, but methinks he should have focused on me learning how to make dhokla (or even) rotli instead. Would have stood me in good stead.

Not being endowed with the same good looks as Nina or Varsha, he thought that a melodious voice would be a sufficiently substitutive asset and look good on my bio-data. He overestimated my vocal cords, which, stentorian when used against the servants or the driver Jadav, were godawful when used for anything remotely connected to a tune or melody.

One of my favorite quotes is by Coleridge:

‘Swans sing before they die - t’were no bad thing,
Should certain persons die before they sing.’

My point exactly.

My father, however, the eternal optimist and conveniently in absentia when the singing teacher came, hired a professional to attempt the impossible with me and the possible with Nina. Varsha, for some reason, was allowed to opt out and had tabla lessons instead.

Within six months Nina had mastered the saptak, the Indian musical equivalent of DoReMi and was already practicing ‘Bol re Papi Hara’, the song from the movie “Guddi” and based on the classical raga Miya ki Malhar. It was self-evident that she was the apple of the teacher’s eye. When it was my turn, the same eye filled with tears, as the lines from the song ‘meri aankh se moti paaye’ suggested.

She was not alone in her misery. At least she was being paid. I had to listen to myself, week after week, sorrowful and suffering in the atonal sessions , continuously practicing the sargam,. That is, only part of the scale. Month after month, I warbled Sa, Re, Ga and Ma. Opening my mouth in preparation to sing the note Pa, beads of sweat would break out on her forehead, and she would shudder in an anticipatory dread.

Why don’t we just focus on Sa, Re, Ga and Ma for today, she would suggest. I never reached Pa.

Foiled by the note Pa, or Fa in the equivalent Western solfège. For Julie Andrews it meant a longer way to run, for me it meant an eternity to learn how to sing. I was not ready to continue for an eternity. Things came to a head when the woman had the audacity to ask for more money after six months. At this point my father conceded that it would be easier for Helen Keller to drive, than for me to belt out a melodious note and he tossed her out. I consoled my father, telling him that I would take my chances finding a boy, who would love me for myself and not for my voice.

I eventually did find a boy who loves me for myself. If truth be told, he loves me more when I don’t sing.