Interviewer: What important feelings has music given you?

Ernestina: When I taught music I felt something indefinable; I felt immense pleasure when my pupils - not many of them, to tell you the truth - grasped what I wanted. I hardly had time to explain something when they understood immediately, and this gave me incredible satisfaction, difficult to express. Also, when I taught singing in the schools, especially the elementary schools, I experienced indescribable sensations that fulfilled my life.

I: How has music changed? Has our relationship to music also changed or has it stayed the same? Do you think that technology helps music?

E: Look here, I have to tell you something: I'm 99% deaf - and the hearing aid, however good it may be, has its limits - so I can't tell a Beethoven symphony from a Mozart quartet, and this makes me suffer. Sometimes I'd like to listen to concerts because I find them interesting; I sit down, but then I start to hear this noise” That's why, when I turned eighty, I closed the piano lid and I've never played again, because what I heard didn't correspond to what I'd expected. Here at Casa Verdi there's a concert every other Sunday, but I go mainly to be with people, to see people.

I: In your opinion, as a teacher, does someone who's good know it automatically or does he or she have to be told by others?

E: It depends. If you're wise, you know it yourself.

I: So most people need to be told by someone?

E: It depends: some say it just to pay compliments. But sometimes you need someone to tell you the hard truth. A good teacher knows as soon as a student begins.

I: Has your life changed since you came to this rest home, and if so, how?

E: Here, too, I live a very peaceful, withdrawn life. When I was at home, too, I was alone - I was an only child - alone with my parents; I became old together with them, because I was already old when they died. My father died at the age of 95; I'm now 99. Is it possible that I'm nearly 100 years old? I was born on October 25, 1901, and math isn't a matter of opinion!

I: Has the world changed a lot?

E: When I watch television, and especially when they talk about the Internet, I ask myself how such things are possible. I would like to understand them, really, but I can't manage it. This Internet and these other things - how can they happen? Short waves, long waves - huh?

I: The last thing I'll ask you is: who is Giuseppe Verdi?

E: He was a great man, very great. I don't know how he could be such a genius. It's true that there were people who helped him in some ways, but that he was able to become what he became” What did he have inside himself, in his heart? And when you listen to Verdi's music, there are arias that you can't understand how they could have sprung from a human mind. And then there's this rest home, this splendid thing that he did! He has always been loved as a human being besides as a musician.

Interviewer: Tell me what you do in this room (creative laboratory).

Emma: We make floral compositions - little bouquets, peach flowers - we do some work. We've also adopted two little girls in Eritrea through voluntary donations and the things we sold at an exhibition. They call us the Casa Verdi grandpas and grandmas, and we like it. We're happy to be of use despite our infirmities and our age. One makes the stems, someone else cuts, another one puts things together, and then this very competent lady does a good job of finishing up the packaging of everything.

I: What did you do - di you play or sing?

E: No, I was a housewife, a little village tailor, but I was lucky enough to have had a fine husband who knew a little about music, and I had that son there [points to an autographed photo] who was a conductor: Bruno Martinotti. At the age of 18 he was already principal flute of the Milan Symphony Orchestra, then he became a fine conductor. Imagine, when he was 18, he arrived in Milan as first flute, far from home. He was timid, he found himself among older people, and he was the mascot. In his first letter, he wrote: “Mamma, during the break we're in a lovely garden at the Teatro dell'Arte in Milan; I'd really like to do somersaults.” So you see, he, too, gave up a lot, because he had too big a responsibility for his age. Since I'm not a musician, living here is something I can hardly explain to myself. But now I even have a granddaughter who is a musician. Her name is Viola, and she works for the Pomeriggi Musicali [orchestra] here in Milan. But I'm a simple person, so I feel things inside me.

I: Were you sorry that he had to sacrifice so much?

E: No, but when people tell me that they met him, and when they say, “What a fine musician he was”, I would rather have them tell me that he was a good fellow - because you can become a good musician by studying, but you don't become a good person.

I: Memories of the war must be terrible, but it's important that you [older people] tell us these things.

E: If you didn't live through them you can't understand them; it's hard enough to remember them, and if we don't start talking about them they don't come to mind. When I'm alone an image or a fact may come to me - like the time when, early in the morning, I was awakened by the sound of footsteps in the street. I got up and peeked out of the window - the Germans were marching and occupying my village. The other day I was talking about my youth with a young lady, but I couldn't remember the name of a little girl for whom I'd made a skirt. But I remembered very well that the skirt was blue.

« 2