Minute by minute some thirteen-fourteen girls fill up the small room with purple benches and a cottage piano. They all stop to greet the professor, a man in his late forties, going nicely (and almost completely) bald. He checks his watch impatiently.
‘Is Dora coming today? Ah…right…she’s working late shift? What about the other two? Christine and Doina from the third voice...? Exam eh? Well, we’ll just have to do for this rehearsal.’
They practice scales for a ten minutes’ warm-up.
‘Now, my dear lassies: open your scores at page five. We’re doing Weber again; the Bride’s Coronet…that’s a thought for the future in your case.’ (He winks) ‘Anamaria! Give me a La please. Count five after Do.’He smiles.
‘Ready? Begin! Second, third, fourth voices.’ He gives the notes on the piano.
We’re making a coronet
With fine silk threads
He stops them and looks angrily at the first row of girls, the first voice. ‘Are you sleeping? You missed your entry there. Concentrate girls. There’s a concert coming in a fortnight.’
They sing. This time he is more pleased. They finish off the first stanza up to the chorus.
‘Girls, girls, girls!’ His eyes are sparkling and there is a drop of sweat on his forehead. ‘You’re not pachyderms I trust. Are you?’
They can barely refrain from bursting out laughing.
‘A bride is supposed to be fragile and agile…like a gazelle…not like an elephant!’ he shouts. ‘Come on! I want to hear you like a troop of gazelles.’ (Chuckles in the left)
‘Be serious. This is a serious rehearsal.’
In coronets of bright green leaves
We knit silk threads
‘Pay attention. Stop, first voice. Listen to me. Do you not know English? What’s the matter with you? Are you choking? There is no pause after of … did you ever hear a sentence ending in of? Stop breathing, damn it. Breathe in the middle of the words not at the end. Everyone will think you’re suffocating. Again, the chorus!’
They repeat, this time satisfactorily.
‘Good. That’s more like it. Raluca, dear. Please check our timing and tell me how long it lasts.’
‘Yes sir’ the girl replies, looking furtively at him, repressing a smile.
They sing the entire tune without interruption standing, scores in hand.
‘Fairly good, lassies. One more thing…look at my hands, will you? That’s why I’m your conductor. And stop stooping over your scores so damn much (pardon my language), you look like you wanna stick your eyes there. (To the girl with the watch) ‘How much time?’
‘One minute fifty, sir.’
‘Mmm…yes…will do, will do’ he mumbles to himself.
‘Neext! Evening Song! Don’t fall asleep on me now. You were hopping around like gazelles only a couple of minutes ago. Nice and soft, ok?’
He looks around in a pleased, self-confident manner. Then it’s the same thing all over again: sleepy second voice, outnumbered third voice, loud first voice and so on. They go on singing for another forty minutes. In the end they start for their homes. In a short time, the only one standing in the small room is the teacher beside a silent cottage piano.