Mystery Pianist Revealed
You might be one of the people who recently found themselves wondering in the early hours of a weekday morning, “Who is playing the beautiful pieces of music on the piano at the fifth floor student lounge?” While the early birds don’t necessarily get the worm, they do, however, get to hear the calming chords of the piano played by this unknown musician, who blesses us with his melodious music nearly every day at around 7:00 to 7:30 AM, right before the morning onslaught of students (and teachers).
I had the privilege of interviewing our virtuoso, who shared that among his family members, the only other person who plays the piano is his younger sister. You might be asking at this point: who is his inspiration? The answer is unexpected but pretty simple: street performers. He finds inspiration in the willingness and confidence of buskers to share their musical gifts with others, motivating him to do the same. Our New Lifer piano player further shared that his morning performances serve as a form of stress relief from schoolwork. He says that knowing the calming effect his music has on others allows him to destress and he hopes that he's doing the same for others as well.
It’s no secret to his morning listeners that our mysterious keyboardist can play a wide variety of songs and pieces. While people tend to love his Für Elise, his favorite genre to play is J-Pop (Japanese Pop) with "Dry Flower" by Yuuri and "Flower Dance" by DJ Okawari on top of his list. Our piano man also exhibits versatility in that while many musicians would very likely claim that they have a least favorite genre to play due to difficulty or simply out of personal preference, he claims to have none. He did, however, divulge that he finds it a challenge to play the aforementioned “Flower Dance” by DJ Okawari because of its constantly shifting notes and the overall complexity of its arrangement.
What takes people weeks or even months to learn, our pianist can master in a shockingly short time—10 hours!—and with only two classes a week with a piano teacher, his progress is most certainly impressive. Performing wonderful and complicated pieces such as Only Hope and La Campanella is a walk in the park for him, and although most musicians rely on reading notes to master intricate compositions he is, in fact, unable to do so as he has learned to play via Synthesia.
Synthesia is a method that facilitates piano learning by allowing users to watch a video where blocks of color “flow” into the keys as they play, in lieu of the conventional approach involving musical notes on a staff. Despite his inability to read notes, this talented pianist nevertheless proves that hard work truly trumps all—and if he can do such an exceptional thing, then surely we all can as well.
And now, after much ado, we go back to the long-awaited question: Who is this mysterious piano player?
He is none other than Grade 8 Berea’s Alphonse Gabriel Ng! And in a surprising twist of events, it turns out our mystery player is not just a mystery player as his sister has been playing for us as well. Alphonse and his younger sister Nicole from Grade 3 Jericho have been filling the air with their sweet-sounding melodies since last year, making our mornings a little livelier with their upbeat tunes. Alphonse still continues to practice tirelessly for hours on end just to have us hear his wonderful music every morning, with his music bringing peace to everyone’s lives.
