What We're
Reading
Frank Conroy,
Body and Soul
 Reviewed
by
Lois Ferrari, Professor of Music
Sarofim School of Fine Arts
Picture yourself a child prodigy. Then
picture yourself seated at a piano.
The piano is old and dilapidated, dusty
and dingy, and, worst of all...out
of tune! You're sitting on a wobbly,
splintered bench that secrets a stash
of dog-eared sheet music and a few
bloated spiders. The dirty barred basement
window of your niche ('room' is a bit
too generous) looks out onto a busy
New York City street, and the noise
from the subway "el" provides
impromptu percussive accompaniment
to scales, arpeggios, and dreams alike.
Your mother is a paranoid delusional
taxi driver who sees communist conspiracies
in her beer foam. Your pals know every
trick there is to finding deposit bottles
for a penny apiece. Your best friend
is the eccentric owner of the music
store with the tinkling bell. The guy
who discovered the talent locked away
in your untapped soul. The man who
taught you finger position and how
to talk to girls. The father you never
had.
 The
setting of Body and Soul by Frank Conroy
is Depression-era New York, where Claude,
a poor frail boy with a rich robust
heart, discovers he has a phenomenal
gift. Yet Claude has no way to unwrap
it until he meets the one man who will
change his life forever and set him
upon a path that few ever travel. A
path paved with wonderfully rich experiences
which illustrate, like no other book
I've ever read, what it's truly like
to be a dedicated musician. The joy
of discovering this divine form of
expression-part emotion, part intellect,
part intangible art. The pain of sacrifice.
The loneliness of devotion. The sublime
exhilaration of performance. For every
musician who ever felt "no one
understands," Frank Conroy does.
What We're Reading
features reviews by members of the Southwestern University
community. Some reviews were previously published in the Library's
annual Summer Reading List.
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more reviews.
What
We're Reading is a regular
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