Susan

“Precision and technique can be learned,” she told him. “That’s just practice. A lot of practice, but it’s still just practice. What we can’t teach is how to make a musician actually connect—emotionally connect—with the pieces he’s playing. To really care about the music, and let the music tell its story.”
― Brendan Slocumb, The Violin Conspiracy

“grandmother’s Thanksgiving words to him, seasoned with love, potato peels, and sliced squash: that he work twice as hard as everyone else, that he stand tall and treat others with respect, and that he stay the same “sweet Ray” that Grandma Nora loved so much. He didn’t know if he’d succeeded, but he never stopped trying. He had to believe that she would be proud.”
― Brendan Slocumb, The Violin Conspiracy

“the Saint Jacques Hotel. Revolving doors led into a stark white lobby with an artificial fireplace that took up almost the entire length of one wall; on the other wall a concierge desk stretched forever. Janice asked the doorman where the business service center was and disappeared, heels clattering, down”
― Brendan Slocumb, The Violin Conspiracy

“He say to me but if I free you who will play for me at nite. I say to him I will play for you master Thomas sir. I wont leev you. I will play for you as a free man. He thot about that and he took out some papr and he rote out what he tol me was my freedom paprs and he gav me them with my fiddle. I never let them paprs out o my site. Them papr and my fiddle kept me alive. I beggd him on my hands and nees to let my momma be free too and she wood stay here and hep him. He tol me he coodnt do that. I went to tell momma that I was free. I tol her I was goin to find work after master Thomas past and that I was comin back for her to buy her freedom when I made enuff money from my playing. You no what my momma tol me? She tol me dont Never come back to this place. You go be free and dont you Never look back. Master Thomas died in his Bed. The Missus made me play that song he loved. I lef a few days later. The nex yeer I did come back to find momma but she was Gone. You no why I tol you all this and made you rite it down? Because Master Thomas was a teribl man. He did teribl things to my momma and to my brother and to many other slaves. Even tho he did all that I still lookt him in the eye and treetd him with respekt. No mattr how mad I was. No mattr how bad things got. I was always respektfl. Even when I didnt get no respekt. I dont never want you to forget that girl. I wont”
― Brendan Slocumb, The Violin Conspiracy