Shirley began as a kid on an ordinary clarinet. It appeared in school bands. It had music written specifically for it. Her parents understood what it was, more or less. The bass clarinet was another matter. Too large. Strange curve. When she played a low note, people in neighbouring rooms stopped what they were doing. She loved it immediately.
Years passed. She became excellent. Played contemporary music. And film scores. And operas where someone usually was murdered before intermission. Orchestras hired her when a composer wrote something requiring the sound of a forest discovering regret.
One afternoon she received a letter from the Orchestra Administration.
Dear Madam,
It has come to our attention that during Thursday’s performance you produced a low C not specifically authorized by the conductor.
Shirley remembered the note. It had been beautiful. She wrote back explaining the C was printed in the score. She showed the conductor the letter. He advised her don’t make trouble. From then on she became nervous around low C. Every time it approached she could feel the others watching. Oboes pretended not to. The percussionist appeared sympathetic but was in no position to help. Eventually she was summoned to an office and three administrators sat behind a table. Her bass clarinet was placed on another chair.
“Is that your instrument?” asked the one with the thickest round glasses.
“Yes.”
“Can you prove it?”
She opened the case.
The three administrators leaned forward.
“How does opening the case prove it’s yours?” asked the one with the thickest round glasses.
“It doesn’t.”
The administrators looked pleased.
“Then why did you open it?”
“You asked me to prove it was my instrument.”
“Correct.” said the one with the comb-over.
“So I thought you might like to hear me play it.”
The administrators looked at one another. This possibility had apparently not been considered.
“Playing an instrument doesn’t establish ownership.”
“No,” said Shirley. “But neither does owning one establish that you can play it.”
The administrator on the left wrote something down.
“What did you write?” Shirley asked.
“That’s confidential.”
“Can you prove you wrote it?”
He stopped.
The administrator with the glasses intervened.
“We’re discussing the low C.”
“Good,” said Shirley. “Which one?”
“The unauthorized one.”
“No, I mean which low C?”
There was silence.
“Low C,” he repeated.
“There are several ways of producing what people call low C depending on the instrument, transposition and notation. Do you mean concert C or written C?”
The three administrators looked at one another.
“Thursday’s C.”
Shirley nodded.
“That narrows it down.”
The comb-over shuffled some papers.
“The conductor did not authorize the note.”
“Did he prohibit it?”
“No.”
“Then it wasn’t unauthorized.”
“It wasn’t authorized.”
“Those aren’t the same thing.”
A longer silence.
The man with the glasses removed them, perhaps hoping the world would improve.
Shirley continued.
“Was the oboe’s A authorized?”
“We’re not discussing the oboe.”
“Why not?”
“Because there was no complaint about the oboe.”
“So notes become unauthorized only after somebody complains about them?”
“No.”
“Then the oboe may have played hundreds of unauthorized notes.”
The percussionist would have enjoyed this, Shirley thought.
The administrator on the left tried another approach.
“The fact remains that you played a note without specific permission.”
“Did the conductor specifically authorize every note in the symphony?”
“He authorized the performance.”
“Then he authorized my C.”
“No, that’s not what that means.”
“Excellent,” Shirley said. “Then we agree that authorization can be implied.”
The room became extremely still.
The administrator with the glasses began reading the original complaint again, hoping there was a paragraph he’d missed that contained an escape hatch. Shirley took the bass clarinet from its case and assembled it.
“What are you doing?”
“Providing evidence.”
“We haven’t asked you to play.”
“Exactly.”
She put the mouthpiece to her lips.
“Please don’t.”
Shirley lowered the instrument.
“Is that an instruction?”
“Yes.”
“Could I have it in writing?”
The three men stared at her.
“I’ve recently learned the danger of relying on verbal agreements.”
Nobody moved. Finally the administrator on the right said, “What exactly do you want, Ms. Shirley?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“I came because you summoned me.”
This seemed to trouble them most of all.
Shirley packed the bass clarinet back into its case.
“So are we finished?”
The three administrators whispered among themselves. Papers moved from one side of the table to the other and then, having accomplished nothing, moved back. Finally the man with the thick glasses cleared his throat.
“We have determined that insufficient evidence exists to establish that the low C was unauthorized.”
Shirley smiled.
“Which low C?”
He looked at her for a long moment.
“Good afternoon, Ms. Shirley.”
At rehearsal that evening the conductor avoided her eyes. The oboes had already heard the story. Even the violas knew, which meant it had travelled quickly. They reached the passage. Shirley looked down. There it was. Low C.
For weeks she had approached it timidly, almost apologizing before she played it.
Not tonight.
She filled her lungs and gave the note everything she had.
The C travelled through the orchestra, beneath the conductor’s little wooden stick, through the rehearsal-room walls and, Shirley liked to imagine, all the way upstairs to Administration.