Soirée du Coeur : 10 Windsor Road
What gave my cottage on Windsor Road its special character was the large voorkamer which stretched across the width of the house and gave straight onto the open stoep on the street. The green door in the centre, flanked by two. large windows with small lead-panes provided the face to No 10. Cheerful and welcoming
My grandmother’s 1901 Bechstein had moved into a prominent place on the dark parquet flooring in the long rectangular, high-ceilinged room. There was a sense of two halves to the space, which had clearly held two separate rooms in earlier times. The remains of the central corridor now led off between two more rooms and twisted past a kitchen and back courtyard room. One end of the voorkamer held floor to ceiling bookshelves and low cupboards painted white. My piano presided in this half, which also held the old yellow wood and stinkwood dining table.
The other half of the voorkamer contained a closed combustion fire unit with its long metal flue stretching up through the ceiling, which was over three metres. The seating area comprised two reddish rust two-seater couches with the deep red jeweled Turkish carpet holding the space. The other carpet created the piano space. I have described earlier how these two carpets arrived in my life when Ronald helped set up my loft living space eleven years earlier, and here they were setting up my new space.
A lovely resonant volume.
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The idea of the Soirée du Coeur was a natural progression in the life of my piano, which in the 1940s had been the heart of musical evenings in my grandparents’ home in Port Elizabeth, which was a boarding house with regular and long-term guests. Many were musicians or sang in the city choir. Now it was to be the centre of a series of such events at No 10 over the next three years.
The initial Soirée du coeur was a co-creation and was presented as ‘Not the Oscars! but a Soirée du coeur’.
Giles Griffin, Dinah Eppel and I had been meeting regularly with Dawn Garisch in follow-up sessions to the memoir writing workshops we had all done with her. There was much fertile material to share. And on the music front, Dawn’s gifted and complex son was producing exquisite songs and extraordinary music on his guitar, which needed to reach a wider public.
No 10 offered a safe space for artists to present their creations and work in progress. Hence the title ‘Not the Oscars!’ Audiences were also performers and responses were generous and encouraging. No postmortems or sharp witty critiques. Permission to play and fun was in the sub-text. But at the same time, deep soul-searching works were in progress and at each soirée (almost monthly in the initial phase) these oevres were shared and appreciated.
Many emotional wings took shape and flourished in the space. A first poem offered by a 58 year-old man drew warm responses and he was back with two more creations the next time.
On one early occasion during a fierce Cape winter, when rains were more predictable, the rain pelted down with the fireplace gently glowing and the audience settling into their seats. A bedraggled dripping bearded man entered clutching a very small guitar. It had six strings – a real guitar, not a ukulele. Roy stepped forward and entranced the gathering; delicate exquisite fingerwork sharply contrasting the large, lumbering gait of his arrival. We were enthralled. Later, when Pete was playing a Chopin piece on the Bechstein, he was suddenly inspired to ask Roy to join him in improvising – Chopin! It worked. An exciting and very creative spontaneous moment.
One of the things appreciated by these early audiences who began to come from beyond Kalk Bay and the Peninsula, as word got out and our email list got longer, was the soup. During a break or at the end we would all traipse down the long twisting corridor to the back courtyard room to find a variety of delicious soups. A choice of at least four with bread from the Olympia bakery down at the bottom of Windsor Road.
We usually had around 25 to 30 people who joined us. The ‘programme’ was always a surprise; people let me know as they walked through the door if they wanted to share something. And then the soirée unfolded, spontaneously and full of creative energy.
I loved these evenings and the familiar faces of the regulars. One beloved regular was Di who at 90 was always first to arrive and had her special seat on the sofa. When she was too ill to make the journey to Kalk Bay, we took a ‘Soirée du coeur’ to her home, where she invited close friends and family. Our core group of Dawn, Dinah, Giles, Luke and I offered our creations. By this time, Luke was working with Dinah and I in a ‘choir’ composing complex and extraordinary songs for our trio. Quite remarkable and deeply appreciated by Di.
I was very close to Di. She had known me since I was 11 and they had arrived in Port Elizabeth from East London with five daughters, who joined me at St Dominic’s Priory. Di’s stepdaughter, known as ‘Little Di’ was my best friend, and we all spent many years growing up together. In 1968, when I arrived in Cape Town to start university, I would spend weekends with them – my home from home. Di had been an active member of the Black Sash and much of my early political awakening to injustice in South Africa had to do with her conversations and committed activism.
She had met Ronald on one of his visits to Cape Town. Then later, when she visited her cousin in France close to Geneva, we made a trip to see her bringing her to our home in Thonon and had a wonderful special supper looking out over the lake. Of course, I played my piano for her.
Reflecting on her now, I feel deep gratitude that I was able to share many moments in her gracious presence over her last few years. Her unbelievably blue sparkling eyes, radiance, and gentle understanding and acceptance of all that it is to be human. It was nourishing to spend time with her. In the final stage, she accepted my visits allowing me sit in silence, holding her feet. Much peace in her presence.
And then on 22 August 2016 Di died at home. Soon after, St John’s church in Constantia was filled to overflowing with hundreds of people assembled to remember and honour her life. On my arrival, one of her daughters rushed up and asked if I was ready? Di had wanted me to play. It was printed in the programme. The priest would indicate when I should come in with the music during the procession with her coffin.
My emotions rolled off on a roller-coaster as I sat on the front bench near the piano. There were a number of candles, which I lit while taking this in. There was an organist playing something and then the procession came in and up the aisle with Di’s flower-bedecked coffin. The priest was reciting prayers and there was no pause or indication from him suggesting music. The entourage arrived at the front and he launched straight into the service.
I felt numb. Person after person lined up to have their personal farewells and moment with Di,and I was still sitting at the silent piano. Of course, with hindsight. this was when I could have gone up and said that I would play my farewell, my ‘Au revoir’ to Di, that the music would express what was in my heart and the hearts of many of those gathered.
But I was frozen. The service continued and concluded with the congregation singing Imagine by John Lennon, Di’s specific request. She’d had a specific request for my own music – and it hadn’t happened. I was fraught with a feeling of having let her down.
I rushed home as quickly as I could, lit candles and sat in silent communication at my piano, offering my music to my beloved friend and mentor, Di.
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