Second Piano Concerto

The doors and windows of the room were open, and the air conditioner was working hard. The choking smell of smoke soon faded away, and only a trace of smoke was still hanging on the half of the cigarette in Yu Tan Shuo's hand.Qin Haiou didn't expect that Tan Shuo would take the initiative to apologize, which was what he should have done, but now he didn't know what to say.But there is one sentence that must be said no matter what, he must at least let Tan Shuo know that he didn't mean to say those words in the morning, and he is on Tan Shuo's side on the issue of plagiarism. Whether this matter can be clarified in the future, he will stand by Tan Shuo.

"I'm sorry." Qin Haiou said.At this time, he especially hopes that he can speak more fully and skillfully like many people around him, instead of such dry words. In fact, he still has a lot to say to Tan Shuo.

"It's nothing," Tan Shuo said. His tone was very calm, and he no longer had the sense of resistance from the morning conversation, but he looked very haggard. "It's useless for you to know about this, it will only increase your troubles."

Qin Haiou carefully observed Tan Shuo's expression.It seems that Tan Shuo still refused to tell him what happened, which inevitably disappointed him.But now these experiences are not so important to Qin Haiou.The conversation in the morning must have put Tan Shuo in a bad mood, as evidenced by the cigarette butts in this place.Qin Haiou blamed himself a lot. Since Tan Shuo refused to tell, he would not ask about those past events that Tan Shuo didn't want to mention.

However, even if Tan Shuo didn't want to mention it again, even if the fact of plagiarism could not be clarified, Qin Haiou still believed that the matter could not be left alone.If it is impossible to confront Sun Chen on the bright side, then it is always possible to reduce the influence of "Song of the Long Night" to a certain extent.Thinking of this, he asked Tan Shuo: "Does anyone else know about this?"

"Qiangzi knows," Tan Shuo said, "it's the one who asked me to write something last time. But he can't do anything about it. It's impossible to reverse this matter, so don't think about it."

Qin Haiou frowned, how could he not think about it?This matter was originally a mistake, and now instead of being able to correct it, he has to watch Tan Shuo being wronged. If he doesn't make any effort, how can he be reconciled!

"That's not right." Qin Haiou frowned.

"But this is the reality," Tan Shuo said, "Whether you accept it or not, you can't change it."

Qin Haiou didn't answer immediately.He thought of a possibility.In this matter, neither Lu Liqiu nor Chen Xu could provide much help.Although they are all famous performers and Qin Haiou trusts them, they are not pianists after all, so it is difficult for them to exert substantial influence on the performance of piano works.However, Wang Yifu and Xiao Cong are different.As a leading figure in the piano industry, Wang Yifu's influence goes without saying. If he knows about this matter, he will definitely be able to find a proper and effective way with his rich experience.And Xiao Cong, as the premiere performer of "Song of the Long Night" and the pianist who performed this work most frequently, once he knew about this, he would definitely stop playing this work immediately.Although Qin Haiou couldn't stop all the performers, he hoped to persuade those he was sure to persuade, at least within his ability.And the first thing he thought of was his most trusted teacher and senior brother.

He asked Tan Shuo, "Can I tell my teacher and senior brother about this?" After he finished speaking, he worried that Tan Shuo had lost his impression of Xiao Cong, so he hurriedly added, "My senior brother is Xiao Cong. Played this piece for many years..."

"No!" Tan Shuo interrupted him sharply, with a sudden look of anxiety on his face.

Qin Haiou was a little taken aback.Tan Shuo glanced at him hastily, lowered his head and took a puff of his cigarette, his tone softened: "The old man is getting old...he can't bear this excitement."

Qin Haiou digested the words for a while, he felt that Tan Shuo's reaction was a bit strange, and the words he used were a bit exaggerated.Although "Song of the Long Night" is a plagiarized work, Wang Yifu didn't know it back then. He was only entrusted by the organizer of the competition to act as a judge and recommend candidates for the premiere, and the final candidate was not recommended by him. It was appointed by Sun Chen.In this matter, Wang Yifu has no responsibility, not to mention that he has been in the music world for decades, what kind of things have he not seen?Qin Haiou felt that if the teacher knew about this, he might be shocked and feel ashamed that Sun Chen did such a despicable act even though he was a teacher. There are many emotions, but it is unlikely that he will be hit by it, or think that the truth of the matter is too bad to bear.

But these thoughts just flashed through Qin Haiou's mind. He thought that maybe Tan Shuo didn't want to disturb and trouble the teacher, so he said that.He didn't delve into the details, and quickly asked: "What about my senior brother? Can I tell him?"

"No." Tan Shuo still had these two words.

"Why?" Qin Haiou was puzzled, "If senior brother knew about this, he wouldn't play "Song of the Long Night" again..."

As he spoke, his voice became quieter, because he saw a very complicated expression on Tan Shuo's face, as if a boulder was suddenly thrown into the calm lake, and all the calm appearances were smashed. It was shaken all the way to the bottom of the lake, and countless emotions surged up in an instant, but this time Tan Shuo seemed unable to hide anything.His brows were tightly frowned, his eyes were looking at the ground, he looked flustered, hesitating to speak, his expression of extreme pain intertwined with contradictory hesitation, and gradually turned into a feeling of being driven to a dead end. of despair.

Qin Haiou stared at Tan Shuo intently, not daring to miss any change on his face, but he didn't dare to say another word.He didn't know what went wrong with the conversation, which suddenly made Tan Shuo like this.He didn't know what to do, he could only wait.

Tan Shuo was silent for a long time, so long that Qin Haiou thought he would not talk anymore, but he suddenly let go of his fingers as if giving up, the cigarette butt fell to the ground, and his head slowly drooped, and said in a low voice, "You can't Tell him about it."

He said with difficulty: "Your senior brother...you can't tell him about this. Because he knows. He knew from the very beginning that I wrote "Xinghai", and he also knew that Sun Chen took my copy. The score...he is the only one who knows the whole story."

After saying this, he fell silent again.Qin Haiou looked at him, his whole body stiffened, his thinking stopped, and he was completely stunned.

"What?" Qin Haiou asked after a while.This was purely out of conditioned reflex. He felt that he must have heard it wrong, otherwise Tan Shuo had said it wrong.In short, there must be some misunderstanding.

But Tan Shuo didn't answer.He neither denied nor repeated, but fell into a dead silence, his face as if covered with a layer of frost.

Seeing Tan Shuo's expression, Qin Haiou finally realized that it was true.

This is real.Senior Brother knows about this.Senior brother actually knew about this!If he knew from the beginning, and knew the whole story, then he is the most powerful witness of plagiarism.However, instead of testifying for Tan Shuo, he performed the premiere of "Song of the Long Night", recorded a CD, and performed it publicly for ten years!

Why?Why did he hide the truth and cover up Sun Chen?

why? !

Qin Haiou frantically searched for the answer in his mind.He had never thought about it in this direction before, but now, everything became obvious.

The candidate for the premiere of "Song of the Long Night" was appointed by Sun Chen.

Is it for this?Is it just for a chance to premiere? !

Qin Haiou couldn't believe that his senior brother whom he had respected and trusted for many years would do such a thing against his conscience.

He looked at Tan Shuo, hoping that he could say something more, but Tan Shuo seemed to be a different person. In him, he could no longer see the calm and easy-going look he used to, only the fragility after the emotional collapse was left. posture, head bowed, sitting there motionless.

This scene made Qin Haiou's chest tighten, and he felt extremely uncomfortable. He lowered his voice and asked, "Brother...Xiao Cong, he refused to testify for you in order to get the chance to premiere, right?"

Tan Shuo seemed to react for a moment before he understood what Qin Haiou was saying.He didn't answer right away, but reached out to touch his cigarette case, but it was already empty.So he grabbed the empty cigarette case and didn't put it down, but he didn't do anything with it, he just held it in his hand, his fingers trembling slightly.

Qin Haiou understood that Tan Shuo didn't really want to smoke.He could understand this feeling, maybe because Tan Shuo had to recall some very painful things next, so he needed something to distract himself so that he could continue the conversation.

Tan Shuo was silent for a while, and finally said: "I started writing "Xinghai" because I suddenly had some inspiration when I went to the grassland to collect scenery in my junior year. At first, I just wrote it for fun, but later I wrote more and more. I feel like this might be the best piece I've created since I studied composition."

He paused, then continued: "I had a good relationship with Xiao Cong at the time. After the first movement was finished, I gave him a copy of the score and asked him to play it. He was very excited and suggested some revisions, especially Cadenza, he has his own ideas. At that time, I only showed him my score, and I didn’t want to show it to others until I finished writing it all. I adopted what I thought was a reasonable opinion. The first movement was revised, and then continued to write the second and third movements. Because I was very busy, I wrote the whole work intermittently for nearly a year, and finally finished it all in the summer vacation of my senior year.”

In the summer vacation of his senior year, that is, in August 11 years ago, Qin Haiou remembered this date, which was the first date on the last page of Tan Shuo’s manuscript, which was also the date when the first draft of "Xinghai" was completed.Qin Haiou was very surprised. He didn't expect Xiao Cong to participate in this matter in the early stage of Tan Shuo's creation, and even participated in the polishing and modification of "Xinghai".He thought that if he could do such a thing to Tan Shuo, the relationship between Xiao Cong and Tan Shuo must have been bad before, but he didn't expect the fact to be the opposite.Judging from Tan Shuo's narration, he and Xiao Cong were not just ordinary classmates at that time, they should be good friends who are very familiar with each other.

But if this is the case, why did Xiao Cong do that? !

Tan Shuo added: "After finishing writing, I asked Xiao Cong to play the piano part completely. He liked this work very much. He said that I can use this work to participate in the next year's composition competition. He said that he had seen many contemporary new works. The level of "Xinghai" is not inferior to them, and has even surpassed them. If "Xinghai" enters the competition, it will definitely win the award."

"I didn't pay much attention to what he said. Later, he persuaded me several times, and I agreed, and I also agreed that if this work won an award, he would be the piano soloist for the premiere. Originally, I was very interested in this work. There are still a lot of ideas, I think this is good, I can take this opportunity to re-edit the work. I started to revise soon, and made major changes to some places, and it was not basically completed until March of the next year. But at that time, I still felt that it was not enough. I think this work can be better, and there are still many places to be further improved. In addition, I have learned a lot of new things during the creation of this work for more than a year. Some previous ideas It also needs precipitation. At that time, I was completely fascinated. I just wanted to write it well, and everything else was unimportant. I felt that I had found a treasure, and I wanted to carve it well. Come out and scare everyone."

Speaking of this, he suddenly smiled, and that smile was very bitter.

"Back then, I was such an idiot."