Did your parents make you try learning an instrument when you were younger?
For many of us, taking piano, drum or guitar lessons was just as much a part of childhood as swinging on the swing set or getting a skinned knee from a bad fall learning how to ride a bike. If nothing else, we were all probably made to learn how to play a few simple songs on recorder in music classes during school hours. Still, some of us stuck with our musical experiments and have continued on to be great musicians.
Others, on the other hand, are born with such an innate talent that they’re already incredible as kids.
One of these musical prodigies is Alma Deutscher, a 14-year-old pianist and composer born in England.
Deutscher was born in England and is an accomplished player of piano and violin. When she was only six years old, she composed her first piano sonata, though it wouldn’t be her last. After that, she wrote an opera when she was only seven. Her accomplishments are incredible and have attracted the attention of all kinds of major news outlets, including 60 Minutes.
When she was 13, Deutscher appeared on the show and did a pretty special musical exercise.
Although everyone knew Deutscher could compose on her own time, the hosts of the show had something else in mind.
Rather than having her perform something she already knew, they challenged her to improvise a fully developed piece by drawing a handful of notes from a hat to serve as inspiration.
As the moment begins, the host picks out four slips of paper with notes on them. As they’re placed in front of her, Deutscher names and sings each one with perfect pitch.
After the four notes are in place, Deutscher thinks about the notes for a few moments.
As she explains in the clip, the hardest part of composing is to tell a story with the melody.
Although the four notes don’t necessarily sound like they go all that well together, Deutscher is convinced that she can make them work for her. Before she plays anything, she moves her head around to a rhythm, trying to imagine what the piece could sound like. After a few moments, she plays the four notes in a row again.
A moment later, she plays them in a slightly different rhythm—and sets off into an incredible composition!
When the host sees what she’s done, all he can do is shake his head in disbelief.
Although she only had minutes to come up with something and four unusual notes to do it with, Deutscher is more than up to the challenge! As she moves through the music, it goes through several movements and unique melodic sections. As she said at the beginning, it really does seem as if the piece is telling us a story through the notes themselves.
After playing through it for a few minutes, Deutscher hits the last few notes and finishes.
At the end, the host is blown away.
He asks Deutscher if anybody will ever hear that piece again and if she’ll write it down. She says that although she can’t remember everything she just played, she may have to write down the melody! Needless to say, videos like this one show us just how much the human mind is capable of—even at an incredibly young age. Although we may never know exactly what makes the mind of musical prodigy tick, we can at least hear and appreciate their efforts.
Congratulations to Alma on another incredible performance! Check out the full video below:
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