To Play Again

At age twenty-one, while she was working with the legendary Nadia Boulanger in France, concert pianist Carol Rosenberger was stricken with paralytic polio—a condition that knocked out the very muscles she needed in order to play. But Rosenberger refused to give up. Over the next ten years, against all medical advice, she struggled to rebuild her technique and regain her life as a musician—and went on to not only play again, but to receive critical acclaim for her performances and recordings. Carol’s Memoir, TO PLAY AGAIN is out now.

What is it like to sit down at a lovely grand piano and play a masterpiece such as Beethoven’s magnificent Sonata Op. 110 —the one I just played this afternoon? It changes your day; it lifts your outlook on life; it puts everything else into perspective. It makes you glad to be alive, and thrilled that you can still participate in a glorious work of art at a high level.

How great a price would you pay to have something so uplifting in your life? What would it be worth to feel at one with divine art every day, if you chose? I can tell you my answer, as I have now written a book about it.

When I was 21 years old, and beginning a career as a concert pianist, my 19-year love affair with the piano came to a screeching halt. I was stricken with paralytic polio. As a music critic from the Milwaukee Sentinel described it many years later, “Polio destroyed every tool a pianist must have except heart and mind.” He called it a “musical death sentence.”

The diabolical virus had knocked out the very muscles I had built and trained during my entire conscious life until that point. Medical experts told me that I could never rebuild enough to play again. But I couldn’t give up.

I kept trying to find “workarounds” that would allow me back into the music I loved so much. There were years of physical therapy, of studying musical structure away from the piano, and acquainting myself deeply with the great opera and art song literature and its musical essence, all the while trying every possible way to find my way back to piano-playing.

Then one day, by chance, I met Amelia Haygood, a psychologist who was also a great classical music fan. She and her husband, who had died recently, and who had also been a psychologist, had for many years collected classical recordings and attended live concerts whenever possible.

Amelia persuaded me to try playing some music for her and a few of her friends and colleagues — just two or three of them at a time, after their work hours. They all kept telling me how much it meant to them to hear even one piece of classical music played by someone as devoted to it as I was. Even so, these “play-throughs” were terrifying. But they turned out to be the only path back to piano-playing.

I discovered a radical way of preparing slow-motion for the “play-throughs.” Since my normal reflexes had been destroyed, I had to prepare mentally so that I could “start” or “restart” at any point during a piece of music, or during any complex passage. Once I figured out how to prepare so carefully, I could welcome the “fight or flight” time-stretch that happens when one’s adrenaline is at a high level. I made use of that time stretch to help me find “work-arounds” that I would never have found otherwise. Astonishingly, I found my way back to playing in public, and did rebuild a career —  as concert pianist, teacher, and recording artist.

The story of fighting against the “musical death sentence,” and finally overcoming it, is the basis of my book. In the early 1980s, I began writing about the long climb back, and about the people who encouraged me. I drafted the first few chapters, and sent them to my parents, who were delighted that I was working on a book. But then my professional life got very busy, and the book project took a back seat.

In the 1990s, after both of my parents had died, my younger brother, Gary, was going through some of their things, and found the draft chapters I’d sent them. He called me immediately, and insisted that I must finish the book. By then I had collected copies of letters I’d sent to my parents, and to other close friends — about some of my treatment experiences, time studying other aspects of music in France and Vienna, and even about my tours once I’d returned to the concert stage.

I began working once again on the book, recognizing that I’d have to grab bits of time here and there to keep the project going. By the early 2000s, I was also helping with record production and editing for Delos, the classical label my friend Amelia had founded. Then in 2007, both Amelia and the label’s Chief Engineer died within six weeks of each other. I was the only one who could jump in and help to keep Delos going. After that, time to work on the book was squeezed even more.

It took another eight years, but in 2015 I finally saw the book take shape. Just as “never give up” was my motto in piano playing, it evidently became the motto for finishing my book!

One of the things I hope “To Play Again” gets across is the great gift of having sublime music in one’s life. I’ve had conversations with students who worried about what they would “do with” the ability to play an instrument, or to sing, on a high level, especially since the classical music profession is such a competitive field. My answer was then — and still is — that the goal is to have intimate access to great music in one’s life — not only as a listener but also as an active, and privileged, participant.

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Ravishing, elegant pianism” wrote The New York Times of American pianist Carol Rosenberger, whose four-decade concert career is represented by over thirty recordings on the Delos label. Many are enduring favorites worldwide, and have brought her a Grammy Award nomination, Gramophone’s Critic’s Choice Award, Stereo Review’s Best Classical Compact Disc and Billboard’s All Time Great Recording.

Carol has been the subject of articles in many leading newspapers and magazines, and as an artist teacher, was a faculty member of the University of Southern California and gave performance workshops nationwide. With Delos founder Amelia Haygood, Carol co-produced many recordings by world-class artists. After Haygood’s death in 2007, Carol became the label’s director. Learn more at www.carolrosenberger.com.

About TO PLAY AGAIN

At age twenty-one, while she was working with the legendary Nadia Boulanger in France, concert pianist Carol Rosenberger was stricken with paralytic polio—a condition that knocked out the very muscles she needed in order to play. But Rosenberger refused to give up. Over the next ten years, against all medical advice, she struggled to rebuild her technique and regain her life as a musician—and went on to not only play again, but to receive critical acclaim for her performances and recordings.

Beautifully written and deeply inspiring, To Play Again is Rosenberger’s chronicle of making possible the seemingly impossible: overcoming career-ending hardships to perform again.

“….a moving and at times heartbreaking chronicle of her achievements, offering inspiration and hope to those confronted with the seemingly insurmountable.”—Publishers Weekly
“…fascinating….Hers is an encouraging story of the losing and taking back of a dream.”—Booklist

Tags: featured, memoir

Category: On Writing