Dave's Anatomy: My History As a Writer #133: Fame and Simplicity: What Debussy Wrote for the Guitar

Ernest Hemingway’s famous advice is “write one story about each thing you know.” I have done him better on this because I’ve written dozens of stories about music and musicians. I’ve played guitar since I was a teenager and have performed with bands, in bars, folk clubs, and festivals; I’ve played in musicals (Fiddler on the Roof, Sound of Music, Man of LaMancha, just to name a few); even today I play weekly at various Celtic jams. I love to play and love to write about people whose lives are caught up with playing music. “What Debussy Wrote for Guitar” is one of the many tales I’ve written that center around music. But this one is a little different. It explores a musical story—or legend.

If you know much about French impressionist music, you can easily answer the question, What did Debussy write for the guitar? Answer:  Nothing. The guitar was starting to be recognized as a legitimate instrument that could play complicated classical music. Several guitarists were working to demonstrate the instrument’s possibilities. Francois Tarrega amazed people with his abilities on the fretboard; Napoleon Coste played in Paris; Dionisio Agaudo was an Italian guitar master of considerable ability. And then there was Miguel Llobet. But we will get to him later. Now a little bit on the story.

Peyton is a music student. One night at a coffee bar, he hears his friend Tito Salinas, who is from Ecuador, play what he describes as some “new pieces of music.” He is convinced by the configurations of the music that it is by Debussy. He also knows Tito is somehow related to the late guitarist Miguel Llobet.   

Artist's sketch of Miguel Llobet

Llobet had made his name as a guitarist in the late 1800s. He toured Europe and spent some time living, performing, and teaching in Paris. Claude Debussy, who was at the height of his powers as a composure and the undisputed master leader of the Paris music scene, heard Llobet perform, approached him after the concert and said, “Why don’t you come to my house for dinner some night; afterwards, you can show me what the guitar can do.” But Llobet was shy and Debussy had the reputation of being very gruff. He was afraid to follow up on the invitation and never went to be Debussy’s guest. Guitarists lament:  If he had gone and demonstrated the guitar’s musical possibilities to Debussy, the composer might have written some pieces for the instrument. Llobet never went. Debussy never wrote anything for guitar.

Or did he?

Peyton is convinced he did. He goes to Caroline, another guitar student, one with much greater ability than he. The two have dated on and off, and she also knows Tito. Peyton urges her to ask him about the compositions. If Tito released them, Payton says, his career would be made. Caroline tells him their mutual friend is planning to return to Ecuador to get married. Peyton thinks Tito doesn’t know the value of the compositions and urges her to try to get him to give them to her.  They spend the night together. In the morning, they talk more about the matter:

When Peyton woke in the morning he heard her in the kitchen two floors down. He smelled bacon cooking. Peyton dressed and groggily descended. She had dressed and stood at the stove. “I’m not sure I want to go through with this,” she said as he sat at the table and poured a cup of coffee.

“Can you think of an alternative way of getting the music?”

“How about asking him? Let him know he’s in possession of some valuable works of art and let him take it from there.”

                        “You’ll lose the opportunity.”

                        She went on cooking bacon and did not reply.

Caroline asks about the music. To Peyton’s astonishment, he says that he knows what the music is, that it is valuable, and that it will make his career. Then he gives it to her. They even go to a notary public, sign a contract officially transferring ownership of the music to Caroline, and have it notarized. He hands the scores over to her to do with as she pleases.

Peyton is astonished and wants to find out why Tito is willing to give the scores away. He is vague and tells them both, at different times, that he wants to return to South America, marry, and live a simple life. He leaves. His wife answers Caroline’s letters. After a while the letters are returned with “Address Unknown” stamped on them.

Peyton and Caroline take the music to a musicologist. He does some testing, finds out the paper is the sort of paper used in Paris in Debussy’s time. Handwriting experts examine the signature and conclude that it is authentic. The pieces are genuine. They are written by Debussy. Tito, for whatever reason, has given away hand-written manuscripts Llobet passed on to his relatives which he—Tito—eventually ended up in owning.

Caroline receives offers of up to a million dollars for them from music publishers. She negotiates to premier the pieces in Paris. Classical guitar magazines interview her. Owning the music, Peyton sees, will make her career. She asks him to go to Paris with her for the concert, partially because he speaks French, partially because they are in a relationship that is deepening. As he sits in the audience and watches her play, he wonders at Tito’s choice and at his decision for a simple life in contrast to a life of fame as a guitarist who has made a profound musical discover.

Maybe Tito is just as shy as his ancestor. And maybe just as free.

"What Debussy Wrote for the Guitar" appeared in Bangalore Review, an Indian journal; it was reprinted in Blue Bear Review. Blue Bear Review maintains and archive and you can read the story here.

Read my latest novella, Sinfonia:  A Painted Lady. Here is the web address.

Happy reading.

Dave's Anatomy: My History As a Writer #116. Love and Silence: "The Space Between."

Ongoing characters find their way into literature now and then. Mark Twain created Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Both characters appeared in the sequel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Not many people know that he wrote two novels, Tom Sawyer Abroad and Tom Sawyer, Detective. Ian Fleming wrote fifteen novels about the now-icon figure of James Bond. W. Somerset Maugham wrote several short stories and a couple of novels featuring his ongoing character, William Ashenden. One of my ongoing characters, Sossity Chandler, has thirty-six published stories to her credit. An ongoing character about whom I wrote less, Martin Rollins, is the main character of the story for this blog, "The Space Between." 

Martin did not get as much space as Sossity. He appeared, though, in my first published story, "The Girl Who Knew Nick Drake," and in my first published novella, The Gallery; he is the main character in a few other stories, and in the "The Space Between."  Martin is a musician, a guitarist, not spectacularly famous, but with a solid fan base, a good reputation, and loyal fans. He easily makes a living as a musician.  In "The Space Between," he meets an old flame from high school, Talia Metzger, while he out on tour.

He and Talia had been intimate. The relationship was unusual to Martin because Talia was deaf. He and she are assigned a lab partners in a high school chemistry class. They become friends. He is amazed at the way she communicates. At first, she uses notes and an iPad to talk to him; and she can speak to some degree, even though she cannot hear what she is saying. Eventually, though, Martin learns to communicate with her through gestures, expressions, and through silences. She is beautiful and athletic. They are together two years. Things are going well. Then something splits them up. That is Martin's budding career as a musician. 

Talia cannot hear his music. He knows that those who have no hearing can comprehend music, but someone Tania's inability to hear drives a wedge between them and they split up. Martin makes a name for himself as a musician; he sees articles now and then on Talia, who has married, had children, manages a chain of charter schools, and is an advocate for the deaf. He is sitting in a coffee house, angry over a bad review of a performance when he gets a text message from her. She wants to see him.

Wealthy Street Bakery, in Grand Rapids, MI

She comes to the coffee house. Once, more the flame rekindles. He knows she wants him to make love to her. They arrange a meeting. After consummation, he surveys how things have changed and have not changed. What has not changed is his love for her; nor has her love for him. What has changed is that he has built a career; she has built a life. One more thing has changed:  she apparently now can understand and comprehend his music. 

He remembers a remark he once read (he thinks it was by Isaac Stern): In music is not the black notes on the page that mattes; it is the white space between them. This quote is usually understood to mean that in music timing is everything. But his love for Talia suggests to him that in music the silences are more importance than the sounds. Silence is a way of communicating. His relationship with her has taught him as much. She silently lets him know she wants to begin their relationship again. It will be an affair. She does not want to break up the life she has built. But he learns her husband could not reach one spot in her heart. It sat like an empty room, sending tiny impulses of discord into her soul. Only he could fill that empty space. Only the love he offered to her could complete and make her spirit whole. She told him this. She told him with her body. They part understanding they will see each other from time to time when Martin tours. Talia is organized and can arrange it. The story ends with Martin and Talia lying in bed together arms around each other, speaking with silence, their words more sure than any he had known before. The story, which I classify as one the ten or twelve best I have written, appeared in August 2013 in the journal Scholars and Rogues. Read it here.

To read more stories about Martin Rollins, read "The Girl Who Knew Nick Drake."

A novella featuring Martin is (a very good one, I'll add) is The Gallery.

New novellas coming soon. Stay tuned. 

I would love to hear your comments.

Dave's Anatomy: My History As a Writer, #111: Music and horror: "The Ghost's CD."

If you have read my blog with any consistency, you know I write about music quite a bit, so I won't elaborate on how and why. You can dip in past posts and won't get very far until you read about my stories that deal with music and musicians, so the one I will discuss today is one of many. It is a horror story and appeared in one of the finest horror journals on the web, The Horror Zine. In The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis talks about ghosts, spirits, and souls who cannot get into heaven and so lurk around the earth, their former home; one of the types he mentions are "library ghosts, who lurk in libraries to see if anyone is reading their books." If writer-ghosts are concerned about the writing they did while they were alive, do ghosts who were musicians show concern about the songs they did before they passed off the scene? My story "The Ghost's CD," suggests they indeed do.

"The Ghost's CD" is about a successful rock and roll singer name Alec McBride. Alec is the lead guitarists and, like Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, and many other successful guitarists, has studied and imitated the guitar styles of the old blues players who styles were foundational to rock and roll. They have hit it big with an updated recording of a song by a bluesman named River Coleman. They have ramped it up, rather like Clapton ramped up the Robert Johnson song, "Crossroads," doing it fast and with more contemporary cadences and rhythms. Alec objects to the major alterations to the song and wants to do it more traditionally, but the band overrules him. The recording goes on to be a major hit. Everything is going well for the band.

Well, almost everything. It seems like they have struck a streak of bad luck. One of the live-in girlfriends of a group member dies from an overdose. The stage collapses two weeks later, injuring Alec and some of the other band members. A couple of months after that, two groupie girls who have come home with the band members get the idea that stopping up the cold air returns in their rooms will keep them warmer. The house has an old-fashioned gravity furnace. When the cold air returns are blocked, carbon monoxide builds up and kills them. The band is exonerated of wrongdoing in the incident, but Alec is concerned at the series of misfortunes he and his colleagues are seeing unfold.

Grand Haven Pier in  winter

One night during a wild winter party in the Michigan beach town of Grand Haven, he walks out on the dock to clear his head and sees an older man there, playing blues guitar. It is cold, too cold to have a guitar outside let alone be playing it. It is dangerous to be on the pier in bad weather, but curiosity drives him on. He approaches the figure and stops to listen. They converse. Alec realizes it is River Coleman—his ghost. He congratulates him on how well he plays guitar and notes he is the only member of his band who has "respect" for the blues. Coleman tells Alec he does justice to his music; and adds, ominously, that whatever happens, justice will be done.

Alec does not understand about justice. He has no idea how to make his band render the song they did in a more traditional way. And it's too late to do that anyway. One night, Alec's girlfriend goes to bed. He goes to his studio to listen to some music by River Coleman. When he touches the button to CD, a jolt of electricity knocks him to the ground.

Alec realizes he has been hit hard. His right index finger is burned and he can barely breathe. But the CD by Coleman is playing. Then he hears Coleman's voice in his head, as he did on the pier at Grand Haven, saying he is coming for him. Though terrified, he can't get up. The jolt of electricity has immobilized him. He senses Coleman's ghost getting closer and soon sees him in the studio. Coleman appears and compliments him on how well he plays guitar and says he can tell Alec imitates his style. Alec asks if Coleman is going to kill him. The ghost of the blues players says he could have done that when the young man touched the CD controls. And he says he didn't come to kill him but to save him. He is worth saving because he has respect for the blues. The other members in the band, he says, don't. And when he says this he becomes scarier. Then he tells him, I think you’ll do fine on your own—doing your own stuff—maybe even throw in a little blues here and there.

Alex falls asleep and wakes up to find his parents, a police officer, and his girlfriend standing over him. They take him to ER and treat him for electrical shock. After he is released from the Emergency Room, they tell him the grim truth:  the other band members, whom he was supposed to join that night, were killed in plane crash on the way to Chicago.

The song they recorded by Coleman, already popular, becomes a mega-hit. His band joins the ranks of performers like Buddy Holly, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, who are cut off in the prime of their careers. Alec takes a year off to decide what to do. But he knows he will become a solo artist. He publicly announces he will never do the Coleman song again. He tells his girlfriend he will become a solo performer and not organize a new band.

He has it from a reliable source that he will be fine on his own, doing his own stuff, and maybe throwing a little blues in here and there.

The story appeared in The Horror Zine.  Read it here.

For more titles, check out my Writer's Page.

I would love to hear your comments.

Dave's Anatomy: My History As a Writer #58: Ghost Stories: "The Understudy"

Steven King once wrote that ghost stories are not a sub-genre within short stories; the opposite is true:  short stories—literary short stories—arose from ghost stories. Ghost stories predated the literary version of that kind of literature.  King may be overstating, but ghost tales have been with us ever since people told stories around the tribal campfire. Ghost stories are, and were, a big part of literature. And everyone from Poe to Henry James and onward has written them. My first ghost story, "The Understudy," was written a little ways into my career as a writer. After going through several revisions it finally got printed in a journal and then by a company that sold online books. That company seems to have gone defunct, though the journal is still in print. Every writer has a story that he or she likes but not many other people seem to like, and this story is one of them. The company that printed the story folded and I have not been able to find any other publishers interested in a reprint.

Ghost light burning on a dark stage

The idea for this story came from an old theater superstition. Theaters always keep a light burning backstage. The reason: if you don't, you will get a ghost. Actors can be superstitious. They won't say "Macbeth," and refer to it as "the Scottish play." And the same with the stage light. I played guitar in a pit orchestra at an evangelical Christian college a couple of times  (played for productions of The Sound of Music) and noticed they kept a light burning backstage. One would think evangelical Christians would not believe in ghosts, but apparently they do—or at least kept the light burning for the sake of tradition.

In "The Understudy" my on-going character Sossity Chandler gets a role in a stage play that requires a character who can sing and play guitar. The hard-driving director has instituted a cost-cutting program. Part of the cost-cutting got rid of the stage light—despite the objections of the actors. Sossity comes in early one night and encounters a woman wandering on the stage, looking bewildered, and greets her, thinking she is a cast member. The woman introduces herself as Elaine Boswell. They talk and, when Sossity momentarily looks away and then looks back at the woman, she is gone. The next day she goes to the theater and sees the woman, who vanishes. Upset, Sossity goes to Adrienne (the director's) office and sees a photograph of Elaine hanging on the wall with shots of the other actors who have performed there over the years.

She learns Elaine's story:  a celebrated actress with a rising career, she returns her home town of Grand Rapids, Michigan, to play a role celebrating the remodeling and expansion of City Theater. This is during the Prohibition Era. She and her boyfriend are drunk one night and her boyfriend kills her. He is eventually executed for murder and Elaine is trapped as a stage ghost. The light has kept her away for several decades. When Adrienne has it removed, she returns.

She is a benevolent ghost—for the most part. But when she gets angry, she turns into a frightening wraith with bloody hands, chains, green skin, and flaming hair. Sossity knows that ghosts haunt places because they are connected to them by bad memories. And if they can do something to disconnect, they will go to their rest. After a while, Elaine says she is attached to the theater because she never got to the play the role that meant so much to her. If she could act in a play on the stage, she would be free. But, she says, that would be impossible.

Sossity isn’t so sure.

In my "ghost universe," ghosts have bodies at night. They are transparent and specter-like the rest of the time. Since Elaine is corporal enough to play on stage during the hours the play is being performed, Sossity arranges for an audition and she gets a minor part. There are, of course, complications, dangers, obstacles to be overcome, but Elaine acts the part. Afterwards, she is free to go.

After the final performance, the two of them stand in the snow outside of the theater. Elaine thanks Sossity and asks her if her career as a singer is going well. She says it is not. Elaine assures her things will go better and, once more when Sossity is looking away, vanishes. But she leaves behind a scarf with her initials embroidered in it. Sossity takes it home with her. It is implied this good-luck object, given in gratitude for what Sossity has done for Elaine, will be what she needs to see her career as a singer pick up.

The Understudy was published in Bewildering Stories, a journal still alive and well after many years. Read it here.

 For more tales of the undead (vampires, not ghosts), pick up a copy of Sinfonia: the First Notes on the Lute.  Nelleke Reitsma is a world-renowned guitarist and lutenist. She should be:  she has had 300 years to practice. And after concerts at night, her passion for music is changed to a different set of passions and desires.

For additional titles, check out my Writer's Page.  If you are interested in the many anthologies I've printed stories in, look me up on Amazon, starting with my Amazon Writer's Page. Lots of good stuff to read.

I would love to hear your comments.

Do you like ghost stories?

Have you ever really been scared by one? Scared somebody else?

Read and keep reading.