Chapter 7.6 - Lightly 6 (1/2)

When I remained quiet without giving a reply, teacher Ahn Kibum smiled and glanced around.

“Everyone. I’ve talked about how composing, and music in general was like a maths equation right? Even a group of notes can be either nice or bad to listen to, due to the ways they are formed, and the methods to form them are mostly already decided. That’s why I said it was like a maths equation.”

He started talking like they were having a lecture. I think he was trying to teach something using this opportunity but… for me, it was quite a puzzling situation. I hope he would just do that later when I’m not here instead, because I was just talking about what I heard and it wasn’t anything special.

With cold sweat running down my cheeks, I racked my brain on potential excuses when teacher Ahn Kibum added a follow-up.

“But there are aspects that are different from maths equations. I’ve mentioned how unlike maths that usually has just one answer, there are several answers in music, and that the person that gives the most beautiful answer out of the countless answers is a good composer.”

He stared at me with a smile.

“In that sense, I think this student has the talents to be a good composer. Now then… can you share the method you used to approach that answer?”

“Just by instinct…”

“Instinct. It is in fact the most fundamental answer to all questions, but could you talk about it in more detail perhaps? Like how the instinct of knowing that, ‘letting go of an apple from mid-air will let it drop’ had the basis of ‘seeing apples drop a lot’ behind it.”

“Ah…”

Since it would be strange to just walk away at this point, I tried reflecting deeply on the reason that I was able to catch out on the mistake alone, and the reason why the composing department students of this school who were second to no other schools couldn’t figure it out.

‘Because I was angry.’

Because I was angry, I was crazily looking out for anything that I could catch onto, which was the reason why I discovered it, I think. But if I replied with this, they would say that it was rude for a freshman and the atmosphere would be ruined in an instant…

‘Is it because I was more experienced than others in listening to music?’

If I answered with that, then they would obviously ask what nonsense this freshman was talking about so… the only option leftover was because I knew about the ‘current Kim Wuju’ beforehand but… glancing at Kim Wuju for a bit, I opened my mouth.

“I think I could figure it out because I’m in the opera department…”

“Oh, was that how it was?”

Kim Wuju.

He couldn’t see.

Although vision seemed to have no relation to music, that wasn’t really the case either, and being blind meant a huge disadvantage as an opera singer.

First, he couldn’t read the music sheets.

Although there were ‘braille music sheets’ for the disabled, they weren’t very widespread and were thus quite uncomfortable apparently. It was also hard to read musical notations.

In the sense that he couldn’t take in objective facts about the song, it was a huge minus. Like how we receive information through gestures and tones, apart from the actual sentences when talking, opera singers received various information through the music sheets.

But if he couldn’t see, it would be hard to take in those bits of information, and would have penalties in expressions and various other aspects.

Of course, there were ways around it.

If the lesson teacher stayed right next to him and taught him every single bit or if he copied other opera singers singing it, it would’ve been difficult to find any problems from Kim Wuju’s songs.

However, this was a new song that no-one had sung before, and was a song from the composing department which would be a bit strange to bring to his lesson teacher.

That’s why there were bound to be problems with the expression.

‘I had assumed such problems would occur because it was Kim Wuju.’

Glancing at Kim Wuju’s face, I threw away all those replies that had surfaced. I couldn’t embarrass a friend saying that it was because he couldn’t see.

“That highlight part… is very familiar to the opera department so I think I felt something unpleasant while listening.”

“Familiar huh… which song was it familiar to?”

“Uh…”

There were problems one after another. Quickly I racked through my brain and barely managed to think of a similar song.

“That… there was a Italian art song called compagnia that came out recently and… that was a bit similar…”

“Hmm, it’s my first time hearing that song.”

Right? It wasn’t a very famous song and I intentionally picked something that wasn’t famous, hoping that he didn’t know it. However, the teacher went as far as to look it up on the internet before playing it and checking the similar part. He then tilted his head.

“It is indeed a bit similar but… it’s a bit vague. It was your first time hearing Group 8’s song and yet you discovered this immediately on the spot?”

No. I fit it in afterwards so it was natural for you to find it strange. I was anxious thinking that he might discover my lie and was glancing around when the teacher made a face of admiration.

“Amazing. Your name is… Jo… Yunjae? I’ll remember it.”

“Huh…?”

Now what was this about? I blinked my eyes while watching teacher Ahn Kibum raising his fingers up with compliments.

“Very impressive. The memory that allowed you to instantaneously think of a song while listening to another song, as well as the musical analysing ability that allowed you to match that with the wrong part. All those instincts related to beats and figuring out where the problems lie are important abilities when composing.”

With a nod, he gave a smile.

“So… whenever you’re interested in composing, come find me at the staff room.”

“…Yes.”

“Now, let’s give a round of applause to our junior Jo Yunjae who gave us some great experience.”

Ah…

Clap clap clap.

Inside the classroom that was filled with the sound of claps, I stood embarrassedly and heaved out a sigh.

Finally… it was finished.

Looking around, I could see the class which had a great turn of mood, excluding Kim Sukwon who had the same crumpled expression. There was Kim Wuju’s intricate smile, the intrigued faces of the upperclassmen, freshmen classmates with surprise on their faces, Yu Minji clapping with a smile and Jun Shihyuk glaring at me with his arms folded.

And Song Mirae… had a somewhat blank expression and seemed to be staring at me with blurry eyes.

Was she still upset?

After finally returning to my seat, I clicked my fingers in front of Song Mirae’s unfocused eyes that were gazing at me.

“What are you doing”

“Uh? Ah, un.”