Kazuo Ishiguro - Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall  

ALSO BY Kazuo Ishiguro

Never Let Me Go
When We Were Orphans
The Unconsoled
The Remains of the Day
An Artist of the Floating World
A Pale View of Hills

for DEBORAH ROGERS

T HE MORNING I SPOTTED Tony Gardner sitting among the tourists, spring was just arriving here in Venice. Wed completed our first full week outside in the piazzaa relief, let me tell you, after all those stuffy hours performing from the back of the cafe, getting in the way of customers wanting to use the staircase. There was quite a breeze that morning, and our brand-new marquee was flapping all around us, but we were all feeling a little bit brighter and fresher, and I guess it showed in our music.

But here I am talking like Im a regular band member. Actually, Im one of the gypsies, as the other musicians call us, one of the guys who move around the piazza, helping out whichever of the three cafe orchestras needs us. Mostly I play here at the Caff Lavena, but on a busy afternoon, I might do a set with the Quadri boys, go over to the Florian, then back across the square to the Lavena. I get on fine with them alland with the waiters tooand in any other city Id have a regular position by now. But in this place, so obsessed with tradition and the past, everythings upside down. Anywhere else, being a guitar player would go in a guys favour. But here? A guitar! The cafe managers get uneasy. It looks too modern, the tourists wont like it. Last autumn I got myself a vintage jazz model with an oval sound-hole, the kind of thing Django Reinhardt might have played, so there was no way anyone would mistake me for a rock-and-roller. That made things a little easier, but the cafe managers, they still dont like it. The truth is, if youre a guitarist, you can be Joe Pass, they still wouldnt give you a regular job in this square.

Theres also, of course, the small matter of my not being Italian, never mind Venetian. Its the same for that big Czech guy with the alto sax. Were well liked, were needed by the other musicians, but we dont quite fit the official bill. Just play and keep your mouth shut, thats what the cafe managers always say. That way the tourists wont know youre not Italian. Wear your suit, sunglasses, keep the hair combed back, no one will know the difference, just dont start talking.

But I dont do too bad. All three cafe orchestras, especially when they have to play at the same time from their rival tents, they need a guitarsomething soft, solid, but amplified, thumping out the chords from the back. I guess youre thinking, three bands playing at the same time in the same square, that would sound like a real mess. But the Piazza San Marcos big enough to take it. A tourist strolling across the square will hear one tune fade out, another fade in, like hes shifting the dial on a radio. What tourists cant take too much of is the classical stuff, all these instrumental versions of famous arias. Okay, this is San Marco, they dont want the latest pop hits. But every few minutes they want something they recognise, maybe an old Julie Andrews number, or the theme from a famous movie. I remember once last summer, going from band to band and playing The Godfather nine times in one afternoon.

Anyway there we were that spring morning, playing in front of a good crowd of tourists, when I saw Tony Gardner, sitting alone with his coffee, almost directly in front of us, maybe six metres back from our marquee. We get famous people in the square all the time, we never make a fuss. At the end of a number, maybe a quiet word will go around the band members. Look, theres Warren Beatty. Look, its Kissinger. That woman, shes the one who was in the movie about the men who swap their faces. Were used to it. This is the Piazza San Marco after all. But when I realised it was Tony Gardner sitting there, that was different. I did get excited.

Tony Gardner had been my mothers favourite. Back home, back in the communist days, it had been really hard to get records like that, but my mother had pretty much his whole collection. Once when I was a boy, I scratched one of those precious records. The apartment was so cramped, and a boy my age, you just had to move around sometimes, especially during those cold months when you couldnt go outside. So I was playing this game jumping from our little sofa to the armchair, and one time I misjudged it and hit the record player. The needle went across the record with a zipthis was long before CDsand my mother came in from the kitchen and began shouting at me. I felt so bad, not just because she was shouting at me, but because I knew it was one of Tony Gardners records, and I knew how much it meant to her. And I knew that this one too would now have those popping noises going through it while he crooned those American songs. Years later, when I was working in Warsaw and I got to know about black-market records, I gave my mother replacements of all her worn-out Tony Gardner albums, including that one I scratched. It took me over three years, but I kept getting them, one by one, and each time I went back to see her Id bring her another.

So you see why I got so excited when I recognised him, barely six metres away. At first I couldnt quite believe it, and I might have been a beat late with a chord change. Tony Gardner! What would my dear mother have said if shed known! For her sake, for the sake of her memory, I had to go and say something to him, never mind if the other musicians laughed and said I was acting like a bell-boy.

But of course I couldnt just rush over to him, pushing aside the tables and chairs. There was our set to finish. It was agony, I can tell you, another three, four numbers, and every second I thought he was about to get up and walk off. But he kept sitting there, by himself, staring into his coffee, stirring it like he was really puzzled by what the waiter had brought him. He looked like any other American tourist, dressed in a pale-blue polo shirt and loose grey trousers. His hair, very dark, very shiny on those record covers, was almost white now, but there was still plenty of it, and it was immaculately groomed in the same style hed had back then. When Id first spotted him, hed had his dark glasses in his handI doubt if Id have recognised him otherwisebut as our set went on and I kept watching him, he put them on his face, took them off again, then back on again. He looked preoccupied and it disappointed me to see he wasnt really listening to our music.

Then our set was over. I hurried out of the tent without saying anything to the others, made my way to Tony Gardners table, then had a moments panic not knowing how to start the conversation. I was standing behind him, but some sixth sense made him turn and look up at meI guess it was all those years of having fans come up to himand next thing I was introducing myself, explaining how much I admired him, how I was in the band hed just been listening to, how my mother had been such a fan, all in one big rush. He listened with a grave expression, nodding every few seconds like he was my doctor. I kept talking and all he said every now and then was: Is that so? After a while I thought it was time to leave and Id started to move away when he said:

So you come from one of those communist countries. That must have been tough.

Thats all in the past. I did a cheerful shrug. Were a free country now. A democracy.

Thats good to hear. And that was your crew playing for us just now. Sit down. You want some coffee?