hi, below is an article by anil dharkar. it says desperate efforts for reinventing happiness may lead to disappointment. you may agree with it or not, but you will enjoy a good read regards Looking For The Holy Grail Each of us, knowingly or unknowingly, is in search of the Holy Grail. It may be a large one, such as the Meaning of Life, or a middling one, like looking for a long-lost friend. Mine was a very small one. I was looking for a CD.
"I have a strange query," i began as i had begun for years, this time in the big HMV store in London. "I am looking for a recording of a clarinet concerto written by a composer who is British and a woman. Unfortunately, i have forgotten her name. Oh yes, and the soloist was considered the greatest clarinet virtuoso of his time. But," and i added lamely," i have forgotten his name too." In the category of Helpful Hints, this would probably rate a 2 on a scale of 1 to 10. I had been doing this for years, talking to the most knowledgeable of shop assistants but drawing a blank. You might as well ask why this obsession. The reason was simple: Over 30 years earlier in a concert hall in Glasgow i happened to be in the audience for the premiere of this work. It had been a huge success and the memory had stayed with me ever since. The nearest i had come to getting my CD was 15 years ago. Walking on the main road in Birmingham, i had seen the discreet sign of a music shop in a small side street. My usual query was receiving its usual blank stare from the owner when a man with long unruly hair said, "That's the clarinet concerto by Thee Musgrave, with Grease de Payer as soloist." "Yes!" i said, "That's it! How did you know?" It turned out - and what are the odds of this happening, me coming from India, landing up at a tiny music shop in a city i had never been to before, and doing so at the exact moment when this man was there too - he was part of the orchestra at the premiere! But those enormous coincidences didn't help: the CD was not in stock. In the intervening years i had forgotten the names of the principals once again. "British woman composer..." the London HMV man said, "Hmmm...Thee Margrave?" He moved quickly to a rack, picked out a CD and gave it to me. Yes, this was it! The CD was now in my hand! For a week after that i put off listening to it. I was afraid, as those who had found the Holy Grail must have been afraid too. Whatever it contained, however good it was, it couldn't possibly live up to the anticipation of so many years. Then finally i mustered up courage and put the CD on. It began with a thunderous flurry of drums and somewhere in the distance, the clarinet made its dramatic entry... Stunning, yet it was nothing like the music i remembered. That brought back a memory: I remembered going back to a place i had last seen as a nine-year-old. To my young eyes it had been an imposing and grand and even a noble city. What i now saw as an adult was a decrepit and sad little town. Why had i come back? Why did i not just leave my memories undisturbed? Maybe i should have stopped looking for my CD too? Would the Holy Grail have been better had i never found it?
