That French Guy

I don’t think there’re many children in Singapore taking piano lessons who haven’t played pieces by Richard Clayderman.

Who’s he? Well, only one of the most successful romantic piano recording artistes ever, what with his 267 Gold and 70 Platinum discs. In the 80s, this guy was really popular. He’s in his 50s now but 20 years ago there were women swooning after him. If I remember correctly he had at least one performance in Singapore, and it was like a sell-out concert months at crazy ticket prices before even actually arriving here.

Like most other persons learning piano at the age of 8 to 15, both my elder brother and myself got hooked on his music, even buying and collecting those expensive scores of his music and learning to play them.

There was one strange thing I never understood back then though. Both of my music teachers (they were sisters – the younger sister took me from Grade I to VI, her elder sister the remaining grades) hated Clayderman’s music. They found it awful, repetitive, and the kind of music that makes hair stand. They steadfastly refused to include his piano pieces as part of our learning repertoire. So, it was Bach Preludes & Fugues, Chopin waltzes, Mozart and Beethoven sonatas for me.

Here’s the funny thing: 20 years later, I can’t stand this guy’s music now too. I find them awful, repetitive, and makes my hair stand LOL. There’s no subtlety, and there’s just so much sanguinity in these music before I feel like puking. It’s the same feeling I get when listening to stuff by Kevin Kern: stuff that I can listen to for maybe for 5 minutes once a year and no more.

The damnest thing is that even now in 2009, there’re still students learning the piano around our apartment block who’re not just playing but practicing Ballade pour Adeline, many, many, many times until they think they’ve got it right. Ling calls them evergreen music, and laughs when she sees my facial reaction: it’s a grotesque and contorted mix of pain as though hot pokers are getting stabbed in my eyes LOL.