The show must go on...

This week has been busy. Our local music school has changed the date of their end of year concert. The singing teacher, that I (as the ex voluntary president of the school) recommended them to employ, is not available to coax them through their performance. A strange moral responsibility has kicked in and I find myself singing a ballad by Metallica with 10 singers and amateur guitarists, trying to conduct them, and keep them in time without a drummer. There is an entertaining tension, perhaps not entertaining in the way that they would have wished, between the guitarists, who would like to play as slowly as possible to enable them to get all the notes in, and the singers, who have a tendency to accelerate…

We are singing Amazing Grace together, which is a much more interesting proposition. I just need to get them stable enough to sing their parts without falling into disarray if I do a spot of gospel improvisation on the last verse.

And it has been decision time for me. Do I launch my school for Business English with my shiny new qualification in teaching English as a foreign language? Or do I stick with the devil I know and do some more singing teaching but on a more professional basis. It is possible for me to gain some music qualifications here in France by something called validation of experience and professional skills. You have to perform in front of a panel of professionals instead of going off to study something that you already know how to do!

My autistic students have made the decision for me. I didn’t think it was possible to enjoy myself so much without being on a stage. I now have an excuse to spend hours playing the piano, the harmonium and the guitar. I am looking for more of the same work and for a studio in town where I can give individual singing lessons instead of having students tramping through the mess in my house up to my studio, whilst enjoying the smell of mysweet H’s experimental Indian cuisine.

Of course there is still my detective novel to get finished in a spare moment, and the complexities of my plot have spiralled out of control but at least I know who dunnit now…