Light From Uncommon Stars(96)

“And besides, if your precious student doesn’t go to competitions, then why not bring a competition to her? After that little thing in Temple City … how many hits have her videos been getting? Thousands? Tens of thousands? Now imagine what this can do. Would you really keep Katrina from even more success?

“By the way,” he added casually, “I know that you and your student might be too busy to make a proper introduction. So I took the liberty of providing one. It’s an honor, after all. Especially when you represent a community like hers … Good night, Shizuka. Shizuka?”

But Shizuka had hung up.

Tremon smiled. He sipped the rest of his tea, closed his eyes, and thought of his ex-student. Shizuka Satomi, returning a bow in the condition she received it?

So conscientious. So innocent.

Condition is everything, they say. The same went for souls, as well.

Shizuka’s soul? It was as worn as she said it was. But the runaway’s? With everything Shizuka Satomi had done for her, Katrina Nguyen’s soul was virtually as good as new.



* * *



Eventually, news of this competition broke into the English-speaking violin community. Most opinions were negative; the whole concept seemed silly, the selection process, an abomination.

It would have been easy to laugh off, except that the head judge was Tremon Philippe, and there was a priceless Strad at stake.

Message boards raged at Tremon Philippe, thinking he had sold out to Chinese money. The great competitions, the great music halls … they were in Europe for a reason. And, although many Asians had admirable technique, would Asians have the soul or intuition to appreciate a tradition that Tremon himself had so vigorously defended?

Some posts insisted that allowing music from other genres and parts of the world was a slippery slope. One person even said that the movie Idiocracy was coming to music and soon we’d be reduced to fart sounds and trombones.

Still others argued back that these views were exactly what was wrong with the violin community, and applauded the poetic justice of someone so stodgy as Tremon Philippe being forced to stand next to an Asian person and kiss his ass.

Friendship? Sharing? “Shining bridges between changing communities?”

Shizuka closed her laptop. This Tso person might be a successful banker, but he obviously knew nothing about the classical music world.

“Miss Satomi. The invitation is here.”

Astrid handed her a large envelope.

All this for an invitation? Well, it was sponsored by a bank, after all. At least everything was printed on paper. Shizuka rubbed her eyes. How on earth did people spend so much time staring at a screen?

Actually, like most things from a bank, much of the information was useful if one took the time to read it. Here were the backgrounds of the judges. There was Aoi Miyazawa from the Kilbourne School. Alisa Windingstadt was there from Salzburg, as well. But other judges were from gaming companies, from film studios—there was even a judge from NASA.

And here were the contestants.

Some had already won competitions this year. There were two violinists from China—in fact, Shizuka had seriously considered taking one as a student before hearing of Tamiko Grohl. There was a composer from the Sakha Republic, and a musician who had escaped persecution in Myanmar. Another was studying in Berlin and hoping to one day build a world-class concert hall in her native Cameroon.

And?

Transgender icon and video celebrity Katrina Nguyen is an exciting trailblazer in the music world. New to the realm of violin competition, with success only possible in the age of social media, she has become an Internet star on video and social media platforms. Katrina is a brave individual who, in just a few months, has bridged boundaries in music, performance, and transgender visibility.



“Transgender … icon?” Shizuka glanced at Astrid.

Astrid shrugged.

But before she could say anything, they were interrupted by the clatter of Katrina walking into the kitchen table.

“Katrina! Are you okay?”

“Miss Satomi, did you write that bio?” she said, in a voice floating somewhere far away.

“No—” Shizuka paused. Katrina had not even seen the invitation. “Wait, how did you find out?”

“It’s already online,” Katrina responded weakly. She turned and walked back upstairs.

“Katrina?”

Shizuka motioned to Astrid, and they followed Katrina to her room.

“Katrina, what happened? Katrina?”

“Here,” she said vacantly as she showed them her computer screen.

Astrid peeked over at Katrina’s screen. At first, she smiled—this was the live performance at Temple City, where the two of them had played together.

But wait, didn’t Shirley remove that?

“It’s a phone recording,” Katrina said flatly.

And then, she scrolled down to the comments.

“Didn’t Aerosmith write a song about him?”

“In the words of the great Austin Powers, That’s a MAN, baybee!!!”

“Man hands!”

And it wasn’t just the live video. Astrid’s favorite studio video was one where Katrina was some sort of elf under the sea. Earlier comments were all about the music and how Katrina in real life had to be beautiful to make music like that.

Now?

“A man is a man. A woman is a woman. And that is just ugly.”