Wunderkind

Wunderkind Summary | Detailed Summary

Wunderkind is the story of Frances, a gifted teen-aged pianist living in Cincinnati, Ohio in the 1930s. At first Frances exceeds all expectations but comes to discover that she can't maintain her own high standards. Her music instructor, Mr. Bilderbach, calls her Bienchen, a term of endearment and reserves her English name for those days when he is especially exasperated with her. To everyone else he refers to Frances as a wunderkind, a child prodigy.

Coming to the music studio is so much a part of Frances' daily routine that she has become like a daughter to the Bilderbachs. Mrs. Bilderbach feeds her apple cake along with other German dishes. Sometimes Frances practices until so late in the evening that she stays overnight with them and returns home on the bus the next morning.

Mrs. Bilderbach is also musically inclined, having been a lieder singer in Germany after she and Mr. Bilderbach were married. Now she cooks for her husband or lies in bed reading most of the day, always available to encourage and praise her husband and his students. She doesn't sing anymore but simply smiles all the time and greets the students in her broken English. She is the perfect foil for Mr. Bilderbach's artistic temperament, allowing him to create musical geniuses in the parlor while she bakes in the kitchen.

On the day the story takes place, Frances is glad to get in out of the bitter cold. She can hear Mr. Lafkowitz, the violin instructor, in the other room as she divests herself of her winter garments. Pulling off her mittens, she notices that her hands are trembling. One of her fingers is bandaged because of an injury stemming from the repetitive notes of the fugue she has practiced. Frances wishes the bandage could also cover up the fear that she has been feeling recently.

Mr. Lafkowitz is kind, but Frances feels clumsy in his presence perhaps it is because she is taller than he is although she suspects it is for another reason. He shoves a magazine article about Heime Israelsky at her and she reads that Heime, who is not quite 15, has been invited to play at an important concert in New York. Heime is also a pupil of the music school and because he is the only person close to Frances' age, they are friends. After seeing the article, she can't help but feel a twinge of jealousy.

Looking at the magazine article, Frances fights back the same feeling that she had that morning at breakfast. She had practiced from six to eight and her father fixed her an egg although she would have preferred to snack on chocolate bars at school. Looking at the egg, she knew that if the yellow part broke and ran into the white, she would break down and cry. Of course that is what happened and, seeing the article about Heime, the same feeling of inevitability runs over her

Once she had been the only prized wunderkind of Mr. Bilderbach's studio. She was twelve when she began her studies under him and he told other people of her talent, but never called Frances a wunderkind to her face. The other pupils called her by that name but now that she shares the title with Heime, it seems less a compliment than a taunt.

From the very first lesson, the German-born piano instructor tried to teach Frances that fingers flying over a keyboard do not make a prodigy. Technique is important but ultimately purely functional. Gifted pianists feel the music from the depths of their souls and let the emotion of a piece speak through their hands. Francis now understands that this is true because of the years she has been fascinated by how deftly Mr. Bilderbach uses his hands both on the keyboard and off.

When Heime began lessons at the studio he, too, was referred to as a wunderkind but since he plays the violin, Frances didn't feel that her status was threatened and the two young people became friends. Lately, though, when Heime and Frances perform duets in concert, Heime's performances are praised as superior to hers. Frances ignores the others and hears only that Mr. Bilderbach called her a wunderkind. Frances now hears the word in her dreams as Mr. Bilderbach, his wife, Mr. Lafkowitz, and Heime encircle her singing, the word haunting her nights as well as her days.

Mr. Bilderbach's affection for her may not show at the piano sessions but there have been times when he has treated her like his own child. Although the Bilderbachs do not have children of their own, a wunderkind like Frances would have been Mr. Bilderbach's choice if he could have had the option.

When Frances graduated Junior High School, Mr. Bilderbach took her downtown to buy white pumps and some taffeta and netting so that his wife could make her a dress to wear to her ceremony. He even interrupts the music lessons of other students to monitor the progress of the dress fittings. While perhaps unimportant to anyone else, to Mr. Bilderbach, whose whole life is music, these little interruptions are declarations of love.

On the day the story takes place, Mr. Bilderbach rejects all of Frances' selections and chooses instead a Beethoven sonata at which she is especially adept. His goal today is to get Frances to understand the music, not just the notes. All Frances can see, however, are his hands as they move through the air emphasizing the mood and tone he hopes to impart.

Frances makes her way through the sonata although her mind is foggy and her hands are limp. Mister Bilderbach's disappointment looms over her and fills the room with only one word: no. He tells her to play one of her earliest pieces, the Harmonious Blacksmith, a piece he knows that she is capable of playing. Frances watches him intently and studies the smoke from the cigarette held in his fleshy hands.

His impatience cannot give life to her empty heart and hollow bones and she cannot even look at the piano keys. She sobs quietly and admits that she cannot play anymore. Before he is able to move from his seat, she gathers all her things and leaves the studio, going in the wrong direction on the street where children laugh and ride their bicycles.