I came out of the Urology department at Guys, my eyes watering, my hands, thrust deep in to my pockets giving what comfort they could to those parts so recently offended to various insertions, and set my steps in the direction of a series of signs showing the words 'Way Out'.
The spaces between the buildings in Guys Hospital have been turned in to atria. This saves a vast amount of energy, and makes the passage of enfeebled patients more comfortable, but the atria have been filled in a haphazard way. An exhibition here, vast palm trees in pots there. They're low lit, which means that at half past five the night presses down in to each glass box, giving an 'end of the day' air to them.
In one atrium a man played a baby grand piano. The acoustics didn't do his playing any favours, but it stopped me in my tracks. He was playing variations.
Piano variations grab my senses by the scruff. Maybe it's a childish love of patterns. It might be that I like a game of hide and seek. Whatever - this was clearly an original piece of work based on Gershwin, and his take on Gershwin was both ferocious and delicate.
I sat (carefully) on a low brick wall and listened. I was joined by a man who had been hauling a squeaky palette jack across the atrium, a sort of David Lean 'rustic by way of RADA' touch.
At the end of the piece I went over and thanked him. We spoke for a while. He was Australian, about 65, with long swept back hair that reminded me of the first Doctor Who. His fingers were proper pianist's finger - etiolated, wan, almost phthisic, but still formidable. He played Chopin variation, and then a piece by Busoni that re-worked a Beethoven Ecossaise. And I asked him about Frederic Rzewski.
I'd gone to a recital of Rzewski's work some fifteen years ago. My intention had been to sleep with the girl who invited me. Her piano playing and my drawing sustained an affair of surpassing erotic adventure. Days, nights, weeks and months slid in to one another. But, if you had asked me what I expected of the recital the answer would have been 'not much' because it was one of the conditions of our attachement that she should not play any music composed by those whose names began with R. Think Ravel and Rachmaninov.
The Rzewski piece was a revelation. Complex, convoluted even, but always a song. X and I have long since parted, but not a month goes by without my listening to the CD that I bought after the recital. And from Rzewski I went back to Beethoven and Bach.
The Australian leant back in his chair. 'Ah, Fred....a throwback....the last of the great nineteenth century virtuosos. He's playing in England soon'. And then he played some more.
So I went home and ferreted around the internet. Indeed he is playing in England - in Huddersfield at lunchtime on the Saturday after the final FNRttC of the year. If I leave Brighton at seven I might just make it....
So the more astute of you will have realised that bicycles don't really feature in this post. All I can say is this - the evening light, the music, the conversation and the recollection all conspired to put me in the happy frame of mind that a spell on my beloved Colnago inspires. It's usually about the bike, but it's not always about the bike.
