The Sound of Music - Evelyn Glennie
Concept Map:
The chapter is
about Evelyn Glennie - a girl who lost her hearing ability but did not lose
hope. The chapter gets revealed in the form of an interview where Evelyn is
sharing her experiences. At the same time, the narrator (the interviewer) uses
the flashback technique to go in the past and come back to the present. The chapter
tells us about the trouble Evelyn has gone through, about her initial stages of
learning music and about becoming one of the greatest percussionists in the
world.
Summary:
Evelyn Glennie was
11 years old when her hearing ability got deteriorated and everything went
blank for her. However, she did not give up. One day, she noticed a girl
playing the xylophone and that made her took interest in music. She was encouraged
to listen to music using her body by the percussionist Rob Forbes. She could
feel music and vibrations through her body. She dedicated her life to music so
much that she was one of the highest scorers in music exam in Royal Academic of
Music. She started her career working with a youth orchestra and soon started
working as an individual composer. She says that she is a workaholic. She tries
to lip read people but also mentions that men with bushy beard give her trouble
as she cannot read their lips properly. She is Scottish but she fluently speaks
French and Japanese. People all over the world have praises for her. Master
percussionist James Blades says, "She feels music deeper than most of us
and expresses the same." Apart from regular concerts, Evelyn does free
concerts and teaching in charity homes and prisons as well. People with
disability look at her, get encouraged and say, "If she can, why can't
we?"
Themes:
Hope: Evelyn's life is full of struggle. A girl of 11 would lose all hope
with the thought that he is not able to hear people. As Evelyn says, "The entire world went into darkness" She almost lost everything, but hope.
Hope stands as the strongest themes of this story.
Never Give Up: Evelyn did not give up on herself. Right
from accepting her disability and the fact she is no more a common child to
becoming one of the greatest percussionists in the world, she never gave up.
She learnt music through her body parts, by feeling it. As she mentions, she is
a workaholic person.
Humility: Though Evelyn is a famous personality, we can
see that she still has the humility intact through this interview. She answers the interviewer without
having any vanity. She is humble enough to teach music and perform a free concert
at prisons and hospitals.
Textbook
Exercise:
Q. 1) Answer the following
questions: (1 Mark each)
1) How
old was Evelyn when she went to the Royal Academy of Music?
Answer:
Evelyn was sixteen years old when she went to the Royal Academy of Music.
2) When
was her deafness first noticed? When was it confirmed?
Answer:
Her deafness was first noticed when she was eight years old. It happened when
her mother observed that her name was called but Evelyn was not responding
during the piano class.
Q. 2) Answer the following in
30-40 words: (2 Marks each)
1) Who
helped her to continue with music? What did he do and say?
Answer:
The percussionist Rob Forbes spotted Evelyn's potentials. He encouraged her to
continue with music. Understanding her inability to hear music, he asked her to
feel the music through vibrations on different body parts. For that, he tuned
two large drum sets to different notes. He repeated the exercise and soon
Evelyn discovered that she could sense certain notes in different parts of her
body. In short, he helped Evelyn feel the music through her other organs.
2) Name
the various places and causes for which Evelyn performs.
Answer:
Evelyn toured the United Kingdom with a youth orchestra. She performed at
various concerts in different places and apart from that, she did free concerts
in prisons and hospitals. She gives high priority free classes to young
musicians. She teaches children with hearing disability for Beethoven Fund
for Deaf Children.
Q. 3) Answer the question in
two or three paragraphs (100–150 words).
1) How
does Evelyn hear music? (5 Marks each)
Answer:
In the beginning, Even was encouraged to feel the differently tuned drums. She
could feel the vibrations of different frequency above her legs and on her
legs. Whenever she used to play the xylophone, she could feel the sound vibrations
moving from the stick to her hand. Gradually, with encouragement from the teacher
and her hard work and dedication, he started hearing music through her
different organs. While performing on stage, she would remove her shoes and go
bare feet so that she would feel each sound through her feet.
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