Back in Belgium

Unfortunately forever back in Belgium, the whole world was grey and wet.
There were much too many houses and there was no green at all. Nowhere birds were singing, crickets were chirping nor was there a warm and blue sunny sky. The only sounds I heard were cars, motorcycles and buses.

And the rain of course.
It was miserable.

The strange and cold world in which I and my brothers and sisters suddenly lived, weighed hard on us and for long we had only one desire: back, back, back to Congo. But it was over. For ever.
But luckily we where too curious to grow up. Like all children.

On my sixteenth my parents decided to sent me to a special Music High School where near the normal matters the pre professional music studies began. I passed my entrance examination in the well known Lemmens Intstituut at Leuven. Learning to play three instruments was an obligation: I studied as a first instrument the recorder -of course-, as second and third the piano and the violoncello.

And it was than and there that I focused on music and music only. And a bit on boys also...of course.

First Music Impressions: Congo 4

Each day, on our way to the primary school in the ramshackle bus, we used to sing during the quite long trip. One day Dutch songs, the other day French ones. A nice compromise for the Dutch speaking and French speaking children. But actually we were all bilingual.

In the forth class - I was eight- my teacher was Brother René. He started each day with an hour singing. And it was at that moment that my love for singing together or choir singing began. The first time I heard Brother René sing a second voice with the whole class, it was as if my heart stood still.

Of course I had heard enough choral works with tree or four voices when I listened to my Dad's favorite choral works but what Brother René did felt 'real' to me: I could distinguish the other sounds immediately and I enjoyed how different and beautiful a song became with a second voice.

Quietly humming I tried to sing the second voice and soon I realized I could improvise by singing a 'third' higher or lower: of course I didn't know what the meaning of a 'third' exactly was, musically spoken. I just felt I could invent a harmony that was higher or lower than the first voice and that it fitted exactly with the song.
It was a big discovery for me and I remember that since that moment no other matter really interested me anymore.

After a while Brother René heard I could sing along: since that day he allowed me to sing the second voice with him in front of the class. And every time I felt that feeling of musical complacency ; a feeling that is hard to describe but which brought me in seventh heaven every time.

Since then, music predominated my mind. My head was constantly full of sounds, melodies and harmonies which made me try to invent and create new musical stuff.

Once twelve I started real musical studies: it felt so enormously good and I never stopped loving, enjoying and appreciating music.

First Music Impressions: Congo 3

There was no sunset in Africa. Suddenly, at six o'clock the whole universe went dark. Birds stopped singing and the daily sound of playing and singing children disappeared.

I liked these moments because it was so evident the day was over and the evening was ready to begin. In Europe sunsets makes me always feel sad. The slow disappearing of the sun who's warmth goes away, the twilight filling the atmosphere which seems not to be able to decide being day or night... At such moments I'm always thinking: "Come on! Go on! Please decide what you want to be: day, evening or night!"

Anyhow, the African evenings were the most musical moments of the day: Six children and six evenings where every one of us had his preferred songs per evening. We sang French, Dutch and South African children songs, with mum on the guitar or singing with the records we had. It were great and unforgettable moments because I still sing the songs until now.

First Music Impressions: Congo 2

Wednesday was swimming day: the old school bus stopped almost at each house to drop the children. Suddenly a kid's race started to be the first at the swimming pool. We took out our shoes and we ran from the bus stop to our houses, took our swim suite and continued running onto a small path through the forest.

The trees were huge, majestic and big, the crickets were chirping loudly and from everywhere birds, apes and other animals were screaming, upset to be disturbed in their daily habits. For us, running children, it was so normal that we almost didn't hear it anymore: still, the atmosphere stayed quite impressive and weird.

While I was running, I was singing loudly: "For, unto us a Child is born...' a part of 'The Messiah", Dad's favorite oratorio from Haendel. -I was too little to sing the words correctly, but for me it was not important at all -

I don't remember anymore if I sang out of fear or because I wouldn't hear the footsteps from the other running children approaching quickly...
The race ended always into Isabelle's victory: she was invincible! Although, the other boys and girls couldn't stop participating in the race: we had too much fun once arrived at the enormous swimming pool.

First Music Impressions: Congo 1

I spent my childhood in Congo and it was there that music became my best friend. A friend who never left me anymore and who made a very deep impression on my life to come.

My mother played the guitar on the "barza" (kind of big veranda) early in the morning, when the crickets were still chirping their last nightly songs. I listened to my mum's guitar playing when the birds started twittering and I felt an huge happiness. Mum didn't know I was humming the melodies she played nor did she knew that I was awake. But Africa was not a place to sleep long: my days started with the birds and my mum's music.

My father, who is a pediatrician, played the recorder some evenings with three friends to form a quatuor. It was amazing to see the bass recorder, almost as big as I was, the tenor recorder, the alto and the soprano. Hearing them play together, sonatas from Haendel, Vivaldi, Telemann and other Baroque composers, filled me with such curiosity and pleasure, that I asked my mum at the age of four to learn me to play the soprano recorder. And I learned it quickly. My little fingers running over the wholes of the simple wooden recorder my mum found for me, trying to close or open its wholes: it filled me with joy.

Every day after school our house was transformed into a big music class. Mum had a special gift to take care about ten or more children at once: she was teaching the recorder and the guitar, while she learned others to read notes and sing correctly at the same time.

The house was filled with different instruments all playing at the same time while other children where trying to sing loudly to keep singing right. Because I was too little to take part in these music lessons, I sat on the 'barza', looking at and listening to what was happening inside: the recorder lessons in particular were demanding all my attention.

Once in bed I tried to put my little fingers on a "b" flat, an "f" or a "c" sharp. After a while I saw the marks of the wholes in my fingers and I decided that I had rehearsed enough. I fell asleep waiting for another early day with singing birds and a guitar playing mum.