MaryWatkins_LearningfromLiberace

8/13/2019 MaryWatkins_LearningfromLiberace

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Learning from Liberace

by

Mary Watkins

A classical composer and jazz pianist reveals an unexpected turning point in her career

Up until junior high in Pueblo, Colorado, where I grew up, I mostly played the piano in

our church in Pueblo. I was asked to do it when Sunday school classes recessed and all the

children came together for singing. Bringing in the Sheaves was the hymn I had to play

almost every Sunday, and to this day I have a serious problem with it.

In this, however, I was acquiring some very fundamental skills. I had the natural ability

to hear music on a deeper level, and I learned as an accompanist to listen to others, rather than

listening only to myself while playing. I knew how to follow a singer while at the same time

leading. There were a couple of good pianists at our church, one of whom had seriously studied

music at Oberlin College in Ohio as a young woman but had recently returned to Pueblo. I was

just ten years old and quite inspired by her piano playing, and after listening to her at few

Sunday services and at choir rehearsals on Thursday nights, I started borrowingsome would

say ripping offsome of her ideas. As I got better at it, I dared to play something at church I

had heard her play, just as she had done it. Later that afternoon I received a telephone call from

her. "I was so surprised to hear you today," she said. "I was just startled! Why, I thought I was

hearing myself play!" I was very proud of thisand glad she wasn't angry with me.

Then one night I turned on the TV to see a strange man wearing a tuxedo, his thick flock

of dark, wavy hair swept back, his torso slightly bent over the keyboard of an open grand piano


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felt secret shame that they were doing what I knew I should be doing and actually could do

better if I came out of hiding. But until Liberace, I couldn't make that shift. Now I suddenly

emerged from anonymity and began letting my teachers and the other students know I could

play. I took pride in being a musician, playing the piano in assemblies and special shows,

playing trumpet in the school band, and sometimes playing trumpet solos in school assemblies.

I still had the same piano teacher, Aunt Edith, who I had when I took my very first

lesson at 3 years and 9 months. She was not a trained professional pianist or teacher, and by the

time I was ten years old, she really didnt have any idea what to do with me. But now I was

choosing what I wanted to play and how I wanted to play it .

Finally Aunt Edith and I decidedthat I would enter a classical piano contest. There were five contestants, and out of those five

there would be a first-prize and second-prize winner.

So, here I was, about to enter a world that was very new to me! Besides not really

knowing the standard repertoire for young classical piano students, I really didn't know how to

practice. I didn't know there was an actual method of approach, tested and proven, to technical

mastery. I also had no idea that I wasn't supposed to embellish on what the composers had

already written. Following the example of Liberace, I thought nothing of filling out a chord by

adding a note here and there if I so desired, or even changing the chordas long as I eventually

got back to the actual notes the composer had written. There were no recordings of any of the

great repertoire in my home or the homes of people I knew, so it wasn't like I got to hear this

music performed on a daily basis. We didn't go to concerts because "colored people" were only

allowed to sit in the most disadvantaged section of the balcony in those days. It was only on

Sunday nights on the Liberace show that I was able to watch and listen to a master playing

classical music.


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The day finally arrived when I was to play my solo piece at the piano competition. I

handed one of the judges, who was a Catholic priest and appeared the least intimidating,

Schubert's Ave Maria. This was so he could follow the music as I played it. With the greatest

display of confidence, I walked briskly to the stage, bowed, and sat down facing the huge black

9-foot Steinway & Sons grand. I positioned myself carefully, adjusting the piano bench,

focusing on the pattern of black and white key design stretched horizontally before me,

beckoning my touch. For a moment I imagined myself the female Liberace taking command,

wooing the audience, dazzling them, blessing them with my special rendition of Ave Maria.

After taking a deep breath, I began, filling the room with a flowing style of richly arpeggiatedchords accompanying that familiar melody of sweet longing and adoration. Soon I was the

observer, looking on as a swooning member of an adoring audience, lost in the wonder and

beauty of the rippling Schumanesque harmonies flowing into the hall, working their way into

the hearts, souls, and minds of the listeners. The only missing detail was that I wasnt wearing a

tuxedo. Looking back, I'm sure the judges were at least somewhat confused, wondering if I had

given them the wrong musicor perhaps was playing a version they had not yet heard.

I won second prize, which was a season ticket to the Pueblo Civic Symphony.

I was not at all happy about this: I should have won first. After all, I was far more

interesting to listen to than the winner, I thought. The girl who won first prize and received $150

had been a grade-school friend of mine; her father played principal oboe in the local symphony

orchestra. The judges assured me that I had won second place and not been disqualified because

I had played very well, displaying good technique and a fine musical sensibility. They also

insisted that since I displayed obvious "creative ability, I might have a very bright future in


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