"Within the songs are found our hopes, fears, challenges ... and even our desired potential."
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“Moon river, wider than a mile I’m crossing you in style some day Oh, dream maker, You heart breaker Wherever you’re going, I’m going your way…"
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Moonlight Sonata

I’ve written before about my father Arthur who was truly a Renaissance man.  (See Saying Farewell to a Special Guy,  Six Pack,  My Dad and the Word Processor,  and  My Father, the Outsider Artist)

By profession Arthur was a family physician who when asked his medical specialty once quipped,  “I treat the skin and it’s contents.”

And by avocation my dad was a memoirist,  an artist,  and a self-taught classical pianist,  and I best remember him sitting at the baby grand in our living room.

He never had a lesson and didn’t read music very well,  yet he played beautifully,  often along with an LP from the series Symphony Minus One,   pieces performed by all the orchestra minus the piano.   Although sheet music was included,   he hardly used it rather playing his part by ear.    He revered Chopin and especially Beethoven,  and he played Beethoven’s exquisite piano sonatas with great feeling  – the Appassionata,   the Pathetique and the Moonlight Sonata.

When in his 80s he died my mother mourned him terribly,  and although I never remember her being sick,   she developed a heart condition and survived him by only two years.  In her last days,   after an unsuccessful surgery,   she was comatose.

Seeing my despair a nurse explained that unresponsive patients often hear and understand more than we realize and suggested I bring music to play for my mother.   So we brought a cassette player to her room and played a tape of the Moonlight Sonata.

Although her eyes never opened,  she smiled and I’m sure in her mind’s eye she saw my father sitting at the baby grand.

– Dana Susan Lehrman