2011 Interview with Miss Nancy Loo

My mother studied Music and was also a pianist. She was an accompanist of a radio station. She then knew a pianist from England, Betty Drown, who had taught many musical talents before. When I was very young, Miss Drown came to Hong Kong and lived in a hotel near my home. Miss Drown wanted to teach piano; however, she could not teach piano in a hotel, so she taught piano at my home. I had nothing to do because at that time there were no computers, television and other technological devices, so I just watched Miss Drown teaching piano. One day, one of Miss Drown’s students did not show up, and Miss Drown asked me to fill the vacancy. That was how I started learning the piano. I didn’t even know the alphabet at that time so Miss Drown started to teach me with the names of my family members, my dog, etc. Then, I went for a competition after 3 months, and came third in the competition. So l continued learning the piano and I also loved joining competitions as I thought it was exciting, joyful and amazing. 

I always aimed at the championship and won in many competitions until I was 10. I lost the champion title and only came second or third in the competitions two years later. I then questioned myself whether I really loved music, and if I really enjoyed music. I later realized that this talent was a gift from God, which I should have glorified.

Then, I started playing the piano with a very different attitude. I would like to glorify God through playing music. I went to Julliard but I had an accident and my hand was seriously hurt. At the same time, I realized that friendship was only measured by one’s success. When I really needed support and encouragement from others, nobody came to me and cared about me. I was very depressed but luckily my strength was recovered through the support I got joining a Chinese fellowship in a church. I met a teacher who recruited me to attend an audition. I joined a summer camp and met another teacher and I fell in love with this teacher. 

I started learning with that teacher and went for a competition in three months. I won the competition and after that there were many people coming and talking to me, including those who had never spoken to me before. Then, I started blaming God for giving me this talent. I hoped my music could enter into people’s hearts. People would be deeply touched by my music, or they were even moved to tears because of their reflection triggered by my music. However, this could hardly happen. I doubted whether I should continue to play the piano but there were no other choices that I could think of. Coincidently, the Music Office in Hong Kong was established. The Music Office aimed to bring music to all places and it recruited professional musicians to do the administrative and promotion work of classical music. So, I became one of them. I taught the poor children and felt very satisfied after seeing the pride and hope in the children. I read a passage which says that “It is important not to estimate your achievement in relation to how you love God. The more important thing is what He wants to do through you. That can be something very big or very insignificant.” This passage as well as the experiences from teaching children changed me a lot. I treated every concert and performance as a blessed privilege and I just try to do my best. Sometimes the best is not the very best for me, but the outcome is no longer important for me.

I do not like the format of a concert as an artist on the stage seems to keep a distance from the audience. I like to talk to people about music. I want to tell others what music really is. I would like to express my feelings towards music and how particular pieces of music influenced me rather than just performing them on the stage. Then, the chance to work in a radio station came up.

I find most people regard playing piano as a skill; they only aim at playing well and winning competitions. In fact, this is just a means to an end. I think everyone should know what they are aiming at, and why they need to aim high and the reason behind them. Why I want to play well? My answer is five words – reverence, humility, passion, love and gratitude. First of all, I have the utmost reverence for music. We also need to have humility in front of the music; we can’t help but remind ourselves how insignificant we are. We should be humble. We need to have passion about what we do. We should have love towards our lives, people around us, and our country as well. If our music has no compassion, you might impress people, but never inspire them. Finally, we need to have gratitude towards our talents and opportunities.

This is because this can transform youngsters, through not only transforming their lives, but also by bringing them closer to God. I think everyone has a good and bad side; we can all be sinners or saints. Putting different people in different environments will determine what type of people they will become.

I have been able to get in touch with many prisoners and was also touched by them. I think their perseverance and kindness are far better than mine. The only issue was that they were influenced by the environment they were brought up in and those people around them. I would say, “Life has Take-2” as I could see that they really felt sorry for what they did. Instead of indulging in their self-pity, they have tried to rebuild their lives despite the poor environment in the prison. For example, they have to work much harder at their studies compared with those who are outside as they do not have many resources, like teachers and computers, to ask for information or to answer their queries. Amazingly, some of them have acquired five degrees, regardless of the adverse situation in the prison.

Some people did object to my plan to visit prisoners. They commented that I was not going to change anything. Despite the objection, I still insisted on visiting them. This is because I think that having a chance to visit the prisoners is a kind of blessing. I once read a story, which was about a boy who was picking up star fish on the beach which was full of star fish, and throwing them back into the sea. Someone told him, “It is no use throwing them back as the whole beach is full of star fish and it is not going to make any difference.” The boy then answered, “But it is going to make a difference for me!” Similarly for me, I do not know what I will get after visiting the prisoners, but I think it is worth doing, and I will accept whatever outcome.