Читать книгу Strange Things Happen: A life with The Police, polo and pygmies - Stewart Copeland - Страница 8

In darkest Somerset, Millfield School celebratesChristmas in the huge stone church.I learn to serve the gift.

A thousand voices echo up the stone arches that frame the ancient stained glass windows. Floodlit from the outside, these twelfth-century images of obscure piety combine with the soaring hymns to sear the art receptors in my adolescent brain. There is nothing more beautiful than music. All of the magnificent architecture that towers overhead is just a vessel for the sound that sweeps through me.

In fact the sound forgives the overall creepiness of the church experience. All afternoon while I set up my drums amid the school orchestra and wait for the Christmas service to begin, that guilt of alienation creeps around me, pervading the cold damp air. Few places are chillier than an English church without its congregation. The cold stone statues are impassive, but they know that I am apostate.

Now it’s evening, and the cathedral is warmed by the bodies of the students, teachers, and parents. The giant candles are lit,

golden flames reflecting off the brass and glass. Flowers are everywhere. To still my autistic tip-tapping on the drums, Mr. Fox has banished me to the furthest corner of our arm of the cross. We are set up in the south wing, the choir is in the north wing, and the folks are in the stem. All of the religious stuff is happening around the corner in the head of the cross. The mumbling prayers and the shuffling of the congregation from kneeling to sitting to standing are prelude to the rustling of the hymnbooks. The singing starts off ragged but builds and swells as the magic takes hold. Breathing and singing together, the thousand souls become one mighty sound.

And did the Countenance DivineShine forth upon our clouded hills?And was Jerusalem builded hereAmong these dark Satanic Mills?

I doubt it, based on what I know of Levantine cities. This bit of Blake is the least daft of the hymns and carols that are sung. Most of the lyrics are mumbo jumbo. It’s the music combined with ritual that thrills the air.

In the final cadenzas of each song the school choir kicks in for the descant, providing a silvery lining to the bellowing flock. The angels are dancing in a shimmering cascade above our heads as a shattering glory of voices lifts the roof.

Mr. F. raises his eyebrow to give me the nod; finally, it’s my moment to join the ceremony. The previous hymn has echoed off into silence and the enraptured congregants are creaking in their pews, waiting in the candlelight. They are eager to be touched by the next wave of the shaman’s wand.

I’m so ready.

TumTadadaTum, TumBumpumpum…TumDadadaTum, TumBumpumpum…

The tom-tom reverberates with a sonorous boom. Up until now drums have been about assertion and empowerment but this is new. Into my young quavering hand has been placed the rudder of this sacred ship. I can only be a servant of the powerful emotional force that has been created in this ancient stone shrine. All of us are joined at this moment by the momentum of our shared ritual, and I am the beating heart. I am nothing, no one. Just the beating heart of a larger body, enveloped by the soul of the faithful. A synapse closes in the mind of the enraptured protoshaman.

Next morning, when my head clears, it seems obvious that music isn’t just a tool or weapon, it’s what my life is for. It’s powerful juju, and I want to own it as much as it owns me.

The gatehouse lodge to the old Millfield estate is where Mr. Fox rules the music kingdom. In an annex to this quaint little house are the piano rooms, where the music geeks pore over their finger exercises and ear training. This is where the seed planted by my sister, Lennie, back at Tarazi starts to grow. Lennie taught me the connection between the music on the page and the keys on the piano. My good fortune is that my position in the school orchestra means I can schedule piano time, even though my instrument is drums—which unfortunately won’t fit into the tiny piano rooms. The school, faithful to my father’s wish, has fixed me up a drum tutor in the nearby town, but I can already play my paradiddles better than he can, so this “practice” time is my own.

I can even skive off stables duties by skulking here in music world. I can faintly hear Mozart stammering through the thinly soundproofed walls, but in my slot, I’m hammering two-finger ostinatos of unknown origin.

Bring me my bow of burning gold;Bring me my arrows of desire:Bring me my spear! O clouds unfold!Bring me my chariot of fire!

I’M LEARNING MORE THAN I ever intended to about drums.

My London tutor, the venerable Max Abrams, has never shown me his paradiddles. He exhausts my brain with endless reading and coordination exercises. He’s off drinking tea somewhere no doubt while I plod through Glenn Miller charts, learning to recognize rhythmic patterns expressed as dots on a staff. My father is grumpy about the Glenn Miller. Although he played in the Glenn Miller Army band during the war, he considers it to be a blot on his musical résumé. My dad would have preferred Stan Kenton or Woody Herman. I couldn’t care less, they all lacked raging guitar.

Breathing in the stale air of the London Underground, I’m staring blankly at my shoes. The coordination exercises are the most exhausting part of the tuition. Learning to uncouple the hands so as to free them for independent activity is the goal, but uncoupling my brain is the result. As I stagger home I’m aware that my “gift” is making heavy demands.

Still, after a lethargic dinner I’m soon down in the basement blazing away on my own drumming agenda. There is no discipline or inducement involved; it’s an unquenchable urge.