Introduction (and rondo capriccioso...)

By Adria Lang



I have never been to China, and though I have been to Berlin, it wasn't until after I had finished writing the first draft of this novel, in essence what you see here before you. For what, I have no doubt, would be a complicated series of legal reasons, I cannot ever publish this book. It is not my story. It is the intellectual property (in outline) of a former client. We broke before the book could be finished and the contract was never fulfilled, thus, I am left with a years worth of work, some of which I always thought held great promise, balancing the shaky legs of my desk. Today I decided to post it for posterity and for my own sanity. All the words are mine. With the exception of the lovers, their parents, and the immediate family, all the characters are mine. The title has been changed, but other then that, the book is exactly what it was when I wrote it, unedited and uncut. That being said I apologize in advance for any spelling mistakes, grammatical blunders, historical inaccuracies, or blatant bastardizations of anyone's religion or culture. It is a romantic novel, set to a romantic score -- each chapter heading is a accompanied by a different piece of music by a composer from the Romantic Era -- it was written in the spirit of its prose. I had hoped a second draft, and a well researched editor, would help me iron out the mistakes I made, though, that being said, I strove for authenticity as much as was possible within the bounds of reason at the time. I am posting this on my blog on November 9th, 2009, the twenty year anniversary of the fall of The Berlin Wall. I would never claim to have done this on purpose, but it did inspire a kind of reflection on my part, but don't worry, I will keep it to myself. Thanks so much for linking over to the home of my little lost novel. I hope you enjoy it. Don't forget to subscribe. And as I said, it is written in pretty heavy prose, so chapters tend to stand on their own. If you don't feel like reading a whole book on line, skip about, technology makes this easier than turning a page.


谢谢,
Adria Lang


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Ouverture
a novel




Prelude...


It began with a rondo capriccioso and an ever-increasing preoccupation with perspective. He had heard the story a thousand times, from when he was a small child, and he knew the melodies as well as he knew his own name, an odd name, unmusical and percussive; Igor Chang.

As a child he had hated it. He was only one-quarter German. So somehow it hadn’t seemed fair that fifty-percent of his name call to mind Doctor Frankenstein’s hunchbacked assistant. In truth he was named after Stravinsky, well, Stravinsky, and what would have been his great uncle, had he not been murdered, but try telling that to the kids on the playground.

It wasn’t until he grew older and enrolled in Juilliard (one of the few places in the world where being named after Stravinsky is terribly cool), that the name grew on him, as did his course curly hair and light eyes, not blue like his mother’s, but not black either. The girls liked them too--the pretty ones with the shoulder length hair, pencil skirts, and stickered instrument cases--that and his height, but there was more to it. His looks were part of his legacy and his legacy is what brought him out that rainy afternoon.

Did he need a ride? His father wanted to know.

“And your passport? You have your passport, right, Iggy?” His mother, who was not overly affectionate couldn’t stop touching his face.

“I’m fine, you guys.”

He was fine. He was at the beginning of a journey, a quest even, and he wanted to begin it alone, so he kissed his parents goodbye and left home, alone, for the first time.

When Igor was born his mother Shasha put her career on hold, not a new story, but it carries a bit more weight when that career happens to be world-class violinist. She stopped touring and focused her efforts on raising her son and recording. When she was in the studio, and his father-- a conductor who hadn’t stopped touring--was out of town, Igor would be left with his grandfather who everyone, including his mother, referred to as Maestro.

The whole family lived on the top two floors of a converted townhouse on 110th Street and Riverside Drive. Maestro, who lived upstairs, never slept, or at least Igor suspected that he didn’t. His earliest memories were of lying in his bed and hearing Maestro pacing softly from the kitchen to the living room and back again. He pictured him with a cup of tea between both hands, it was how he warmed them for playing, which is what he would do after the pacing.

He would play every evening, and Igor fell asleep to it every night. When he got older and followed the family tradition into music, namely the violin, he would joke with his mother that he had been subliminally conditioned, brainwashed even, to the instrument, and any other talent that may have been lying dormant within him never had a chance with Maestro playing away into the wee hours of the morning.

When Igor woke, he could still hear the music, as if it had never stopped. At breakfast he would wolf down his Apple Jacks and paddle up the steep stairs on all fours to Maestro’s flat. There he would be, as predictable as winter, in the corner by the window, ankle high in sheet music, wearing a cheongsam, his nimble fingers working the neck of the “Lion,” his priceless Stainer violin with the lion carved into the head.

Maestro had a shock of white hair and a long pointed beard. He spoke broken Mandarin to Igor who picked up his accent, a byproduct of the time they spent together that Shasha found endearing. She would show him off at family parties, “My son speaks Mandarin with a German accent, just like Maestro!” Then the boy would blush and Maestro would put his hand on his shoulder and pat it in silent solidarity.
They shared a bond, one that was particularly special to Maestro since he had never known the joys of fatherhood. He spoiled Igor in his quiet way. He taught him too, but the violin didn’t come first, not this time around. Walks along the river, trips to the zoo, it was getting to know his grandson that was important. “The music will still be here when we get back,” was his response to Igor when he knew he should be practicing and Maestro suggested a trip to the Natural History Museum.
Sometimes they didn’t get back from their excursions till late and Shasha would be worried. She would reprimand her father for spoiling Igor, to which Maestro would reply, “Relax, Shashala, it’s in his genes.”

It certainly was. Igor had what they all had, late night brainwashing sessions aside. And once Maestro was too old to instruct the boy full time, he was sent to Juilliard, his mother’s almer mata. He was a shoe in, as the son of Shasha Streng.

Everyone knew the story. How she had been her own father’s apprentice, how neither of them knew, since her mother had kept her birth a secret for fear of persecution during the Cultural revolution in China. It was a fantastical story. Those who questioned further would hear about Joshua Streng, a German born Jew who escaped the Nazi’s to Shanghai, where he met Igor’s grandmother. How he lost her, was imprisoned in Taiwan, and found her again only to leave and regret it. Igor had the stories committed to memory, because people would ask. People who had been to the concert at Carnegie Hall where Shasha played one of Maestro’s compositions on his first trip out of China in twenty years. He would tell people about the wedding of his grandparents, how it didn’t happen till they were in their seventies.

He had heard the stories thousands of times, in broad brushstrokes, from his mother, from friends, teachers and historians, the media even; the only one who didn’t ever discuss it was Maestro himself.

When Igor was thirteen and consumed with a growing desire for his grandfather’s perspective, he would badger Maestro to tell him, but he would only make silly excuses, “I don’t remember,” being the starring one.

“You don’t remember? You remember every movement of that Sibelius concerto,” or whatever he was playing at the time, “but you don’t remember any stories about China?” Then Maestro would shrug and change the subject.

For years he held tight to this stance and it wasn’t till a year before his death that he opened up to Igor. It was after the boy’s first public recital, one in which he played a very familiar tune, a melody that brought Maestro back to a smoky little bar in Shanghai. He sat and listened, eyes closed, as was his way, until his daughter touched his arm.

“Look, Maestro, isn’t that familiar?”

Igor, behind a tangle of dark hair, played a rondo capriccioso by Saint-Saëns that Maestro knew in his sleep. Everything about it was familiar, down to the flaxen-haired pianist backing him up--it brought the old man to tears. He decided Igor needed to know his story. He knew his daughter had set him up, but it didn’t matter. He didn’t have a lot of time left, so the very next day he called Igor up to his flat and over a cup of tea to warm their hands, began a narrative that would span three months.
Years later, when Igor was nineteen, he set out to backpack through China and gain some perspective of his own. It was raining the day he left, and he couldn’t contain his excitement. He felt free, on the brink of adventure, he felt the way Maestro must have felt on so many occasions. He was a man now, too. An adventurer--

“Iggy, wait!”

Igor rolled his eyes as his mother chased him down the street towards Broadway. She was ruining his exit--just a little. Then he registered what was in her hand.

“Take it. Be careful with it.”

“Mom, I can’t. What if…?”

“It belongs in China, you need to play it in China. Play it for them both.”

He took the Lion, kissed his mother for the fifth time, and tripped over puddles towards the 1/9 Train heading south.