Chapter 9: Gigue

Dr. Eugene Dobra was everything rumor made him out to be.

He walked in at exactly one o'clock. Richard and Sandra had just found two seats in the back corner together, hardly having greeted each other when he asked for silence.

"Take out some staff paper," he said.

He sat at the piano in the front of the room as people shuffled through their bags for the paper. Richard borrowed a sheet from Sandra.

When the rustling and whispering had settled down, Dr. Dobra nodded.

"Please write down this melody in treble clef. The starting note is middle C, and the key is F. The meter is 3/4. I will play it three times."

Dr. Dobra played a short melody on the piano and then stopped. Richard and Sandra looked at each other in surprise, and most of the other people did the same. Richard wrote down the middle C, and then what he thought the next note was. I hope he's not going to collect this.

After thirty seconds or so, Dr. Dobra played the melody again. He surveyed the class, waiting again for people to write some more of the melody.

Richard tried to sing the melody in his head, but he was still surprised at the way class had begun. He hadn't really concentrated on the melody enough to be able to sing it, let alone write it down.

The last play through was more helpful, but still Richard only was able to write down six notes in total, a few of which he wasn't sure were correct.

Dr. Dobra let everyone write a few moments more as he looked over his roster. His moustache twitched. "Mr. Mark Morgan," he called out. He sacnned the class over his rectangular glasses.

A guy in the front row raised his hand somewhat tentatively. "That's me."

"Did you write down the melody?"

"Um, a few notes."

"Please show us what you have. On the board." Dr. Dobra held out a piece of chalk.

Mark went to the board, and copied a few notes from his paper onto the staff. He turned expectantly to Dr. Dobra, who examined it for a moment.

"There seem to be some problems with what you have written." Dr. Dobra sat at the piano, and played five notes. They were in a completely different register, and seemingly nothing to do with the five notes Mark had written.

"First, you need a clef, or it makes no sense," Dr. Dobra said. "Second, where is the key signature? Third, you neglected to notate anything rhythmically. What is your instrument?"

"Viola."

"If you were given music that looked like this, would you be able to play it?"

Mark looked at the five notes he had written. "No," he agreed.

Richard noticed several people adding things to their papers. Richard had at least gotten those things right.

"No, indeed." Dr. Dobra turned to the class. "So we need to be precise. Music notation is about precision. You can sit now, thank you," he said, gesturing to Mark.

Mark hurried back to his chair.

"Does anyone feel they can write down the melody on the board?" Dr. Dobra asked.

No one moved. Richard kept his eyes fast on the rear legs of the chair in front of him.

"I didn't expect anyone to be able to," Dr. Dobra said at last, "although occasionally someone surprises me. Names on your papers and pass them forward, please."

There were some muffled voices of surprise. Someone called out, "Is this going to be graded?"

Dr. Dobra peered at the girl for a long moment, over his glasses. "Everything is graded."

The class groaned.

"However," he said, silencing the whispers with a raised hand, "in this case, I am looking for improvement. I will keep these until later in the year, and then we will try the same melody again. Those of you who did poorly today should not worry, yet. You will have the most room to show progress."

A guy walked into the classroom, trying to take a seat quietly.

"Your name?" Dr. Dobra called out.

"Ethan Deerfield."

"You already missed a quiz," Dr. Dobra said. "Don't worry. You have the most room to show progress," Dr. Dobra said, making a marking in his book. A few people in the class tittered.

"Don't be late, folks. If you are late, don't bother to come at all. Are there any questions before we begin?"

No one made a sound.

"Please turn to page eight of your sight-singing book." He held the text up. "If you do not have the book, look on with your neighbor. After today, do not come to class unless you have this book with you. Otherwise you will be wasting your time, and my time."

Richard scooted over to look on with Sandra while Dr. Dobra scanned his roster again.

"Let's see, Ms. Sandra D'Arcy?"

Sandra jumped slightly, and then raised her hand.

"Please sing example three for us, using the syllable 'la'. Here is the first note." Dr. Dobra played a note on the piano.

Sandra hummed the note quietly to herself for a second, and looked at the melody. Then she began to sing.

When she finished, Richard realized he had been holding his breath in nervousness for his friend.

Dr. Dobra nodded. "Well done. Are you a voice major?"

"Yes."

Dr. Dobra nodded again. "Lovely. However, in this course the quality of your voice does not matter."

Richard tightened a little more than he already was. Sandra remained expressionless.

"Not all of us are blessed like Ms. D'Arcy here," he continued. "However, she sang with correct pitch, correct rhythm, and correct expression. And that is what will matter in this class. Please notice that she observed the dynamics as marked."

Dr. Dobra scanned his roster again. "Mr. Callahan, example four, please?"

Richard took a deep breath. Vacation is over, he thought, as he listened to Mr. Callahan struggle through the passage.

"I have to sprint to English. Whoever made my schedule is an idiot," Richard said, as they exited Dr. Dobra's class.

"Where is it?" Sandra asked.

"Almost to the cafeteria."

"You better run then," she urged.

"Yeah. I'll see you for dinner. I'll come by the room after I practice, around six or so," he said.

"Okay. Bye!"

Sandra watched Richard hurry off, and then she headed back to the dorm. She was done with her first day of classes.

Emily was in the room practicing. Sandra went in quietly, intending to grab her books and head for a practice room, but Emily put her horn down.

"How was Doberman?" she asked.

"Crazy. Not five minutes into class he already collected the first quiz."

Emily looked at Sandra wide-eyed. "Damn!"

"Yeah. There's no messing around in there. Pretty much everyone got called on to do something."

"You should switch to my ear training class. Messerson is really laid back. He didn't even start until a quarter after."

"I wish I could switch, but I have my lesson at that time. It actually wasn't that bad. At the end of class Dobra said he was just giving us a preview of what we will be doing. I guess we start for real on Wednesday."

"Mm. Where's Richard?"

"English."

"Ah, yes, I forgot."

"Hey, I'll let you get back to practicing," Sandra said, shouldering her bag.

"No, that's all right, I need a break."

"Okay," Sandra said, dropping her bag to the bed again.

"Piano class looks like it will be easy," Emily said.

"Yeah. I've played most of that stuff already. I'm going to try and pass out of it."

"And leave me alone?"

"You can sit with Jimmy, or whatever that guy's name was that kept showing off," Sandra said.

Emily sniggered. "Jimmy Lemieux? Right. He's such a prick. The first day he was here, I saw him in the building and he just walked by like he barely knew me. It was right when I met Richard."

"You know him then?"

"Oh yeah, we played in a brass quintet in DC. He had a crush on me for a while, too. Kept asking me out."

"Oh."

"I never went for it, though. He thinks he's god's gift to the trumpet."

"Is he not very good?"

"No, he is. He's one of the best trumpet players I've ever heard. But he doesn't have to act like it!"

Sandra laughed. "He must think he's god's gift to the piano, too."

"Yeah, you'd think, by the way he was carrying on. Hey Jimmy, why don't you teach the fucking class!" Emily exclaimed.

"Richard could show him something about playing the piano."

"Mm hmm. Is he going to eat with us?" Emily asked.

"Yeah."

"Cool."

There was some silence.

"Sorry I've been hogging Richard," Sandra said suddenly.

"Hogging?"

"Well, at the fountain I just kind of, you know ... and then we did it again after you last night," Sandra said. The words came out in a nervous rush.

"It's not a contest," Emily said dismissively.

"I know. I just wanted to see if things were still okay. I've been going first with him, too."

"I don't mind. I like watching. It makes me really excited for when we do it," Emily admitted with a laugh.

"Really? You like watching too?"

"Well, yeah!"

"I didn't know if that was weird or something."

"I don't know either, but I like it. Who cares if it's weird?"

"Hmm. Do you..." Sandra hesitated.

"What?"

"Have you felt jealous? You, know, watching me and him?"

"No. Sometimes I think I should, but I don't. I mean, Richard is a great guy. He's really cool. Why would I want to share him? But for some reason it feels right."

"I've thought the same thing," Sandra admitted quietly.

"I guess I've had a lot of bad relationships where it was just me and another guy. Maybe this will be better."

Sandra was quiet.

"The last guy I went out with in high school was really romantic," Emily said.

"That's cool."

"About as romantic as a telephone pole."

"Oh!"

"Yeah, Ryan wanted to be a writer. I don't think that will work out."

"Why?"

"Ever heard that saying 'Not the brightest light on the tree?'"

"Yeah?"

"He wasn't even on the tree."

Sandra laughed. "So why did you even go out with him?"

"The other guys were even worse."

Sandra sighed. "You don't like guys that much, do you?"

"I got really tired of them in high school," Emily admitted. "Maybe it was just bad luck, or maybe I just draw the worst ones to me."

"What was the worst guy you've gone out with?"

"Worst?" Emily considered for a moment. "I'd have to say Gary. His parents were insane, and his sister hated me for some reason I couldn't figure out. He didn't want people to know we were going out. He had a lot of baggage."