Violinist Adrian Anantawan visits Moncton's Sistema students
Canadian violinist Adrian Anantawan, who was born without a right hand, visited students in Moncton's Sistema N.B. program on Tuesday and shared his story of becoming a world renowned musician.
Anantawan has performed at Carnegie Hall, the White House and the Vancouver Olympics, but told the young musicians it all started when he was nine-years-old and his music teacher wanted everyone to play the recorder.
He explained there was no way back then to adapt the recorder for his disability so he and his parents started looking for other musical opportunities.
"The first was singing, but I ended up not being the best singer in the world so we scrapped that. We thought about trumpet but trumpet was a little bit too loud for us and we settled upon the violin because my father was an amateur violinist," Anantawan said.
A pediatric rehabilitation hospital in Toronto created an adaptation for Anantawan which he calls "the spatula."
"It's essentially a cast that fits around my arm and attached to that cast is a little tong in which I can slip on the bow through a metal slot... it allowed me to the hold the bow to a point that I was able to make a sound on the instrument."
Anantawan says he remembers the challenges of learning to play the violin fondly.
"It was nice and empowering in a sense that I was in a position for the first time where my physical challenges were not as important as the musical ones."
He explained to the children that it was actually nice to have the exact same problem as the rest of his peers.
"It literally sounded like some cat was dying on the other side of the room and I remember my dad saying, 'What is that horrible sound?' and my mom saying, 'That's your son playing.'"
Nine-year-old violinist Pierce Wilson described the visiting Anantawan as, "really, really cool" and said he loved the acronym he shared for the word fail.
"He inspired me because fail is not how you're actually supposed to say it," Wilson explained. "[FAIL is] first attempt in learning," said Wilson.
Harley MacCormack, who is also 9, said she was amazed by the adaptations Anantawan has made to allow him to play.
"I don't know how he could survive... I don't know how the doctors made that thing up but it seemed super cool," said MacCormack.
"He's an awesome violin player and I love the violin. I always wanted to play the violin so when I'm older I'm going to ask my parents if I can play the violin instead of the viola sometimes."
