Pieter-Dirk Uys: The Echo of a Noise. Pieter-Dirk Uys

we ever have spoken about that part of his life without pretence? Disguising without even embroidering? A love that was not allowed to make a noise, and so there were few echoes.

      I look back now with deep admiration for the intense commitment Pa put into his choirs for children and adults, arranging music never before heard in the dour Dutch Reformed Church, where enjoying music was never a priority. Hannes Uys would bless the believers with beautifully layered choral works in words they could understand, celebrating the Afrikaner God and his heavenly white legacy. Only much later did I realise that Pa had taken music from forbidden Catholic composers and adapted it, translating the propaganda of the Roomse Gevaar into gentle Afrikaans lullabies of faith. If only they had known it was the Antichrist’s music that was being enjoyed in this stern Calvinist environment. It helped having the songs on a record so that parents could show off their talented children and Pa could brag. Hannes Uys was very good at reminding everyone about the successes in his life. Ma just smiled that skew smile.

      1918: The Bassel children in Charlottenburg, Berlin: Maria, Helga and Gerhard.

      Ma’s father, Bertolt Bassel.

      The greatest denials in my history are the truths about my mother. I say truths because there were many versions to each story. I will never find out which one is the closest to reality. Helga Bassel’s life remains shrouded in mystery. I have managed to piece together bits of the puzzle, but have only my imagination to fill in the blank spaces. Her youth in Germany is anchored for us around the death of her older sister, Maria, at twenty. From flu? Measles? Meningitis was a word used. Where is she buried? I found Marlene Dietrich’s grave in Berlin, but didn’t know where to start to look for my Tante Maria Bassel.

      Ma falling in the snow of Germany.

      Ma with her fiancé Dr Franz Michels.

      There were few hints of their history from Oma Bassel, besides the smell, the magic, the excitement of her home-cooked food, from Wienerschnitzel to Apfelstrudel, and the folk songs she taught us. She would sit with Ma in front of our fireplace at 10 Homestead Way, knitting; once it was a yellow pullover for my birthday. Then Oma Bassel would softly start a poem by Rilke. A few words. Then a pause. Neither looked up from their knitting. Then she would repeat the words and Ma would join her, still not looking at one another, but breathing the sacred German words that anchored their minds back to a place so far away, Berlin, a home that had vanished in flames and fear in their lifetime. I started my teenage years hoping to share that love of poetry with them, but it was brutally suffocated in school and later at university.

      1952: The music room at home: Helga Bassel and Hannes Uys make music. By then Pietertjie (7) and Tessatjie (4) were upstairs in their rooms blissfully asleep, lulled into dreamland by their guardian angels.

      Helga Bassel was by far a better pianist than Hannes Uys, patiently sharing her musicianship with her temperamental husband and encouraging him to bravely attempt two-piano concertos that he would practise in a sweat of nervous energy, often muttering words that, if used by us, would end in a taai klap.

      One Sunday evening, we clustered around the gramophone. Our record was to be featured on SABC radio. Again we sat: me, Ma, Pa and Tessa – but added to the circle were the two grannies, Oma Bassel and Ouma Uys.

      The focus of all attention was on the gramophone’s square speaker inset, covered by maroon embroidered cloth, behind which the heavenly sounds resided. We and the world waited for the SABC chimes of eight to end. Sannie had washed up the dinner plates and was at the open door of her kitchen, wiping her hands with a cloth and also waiting to enjoy Master’s choir music. Maybe that’s the way to start this great trek. With music. Pa’s music. Me singing Pa’s music. Me, thirteen years old with a voice that still hadn’t broken, with a world outside that was still flat, in a country fifty shades of monochrome, with fear as the accepted perfume of daily life.

      The announcer’s voice was calming and familiar, a nice friendly oom who assured us that the Afrikaans service of the SABC would spread comfort and joy: En nou luister ons na die oulike stemmetjie van Pietertjie Uys. Hy is van Pinelands in Kaapstad en word hier op die klavier begelei deur sy vader, Hannes Uys. Pietertjie Uys sing nou ‘Maria se Wiegelied’ deur Max Reger.

      Then the crackle and hiss of needle on vinyl, allowing the child’s voice to fill the airwaves. I was that perfect Pietertjie Uys, with short blond hair, short grey pants, long grey socks up to my knees, white shirt and blue tie, even though I was now a man past middle age sitting onstage on my high stool and mouthing with the boy singing soprano. Pa’s Afrikaans translation made the meaning clear. Mary sits among the roses and holds her Jesus child. Through the trees the soft wind blows. And from a branch a small bird sings. That’s where the boy’s voice goes up and up, and most audiences would applaud the magic of this miracle. I stopped mouthing. Could never get to that note again. But it takes me right back to being nearly fourteen, and being on a stage allows you to conjure up worlds without flashbacks, smoke, mirrors, computers, apps or make-up. It’s what I also did as a child. Acting the part of a boy soprano, which I hated so much, and because of that high note everyone said my voice was purer than any boy had ever sung, certainly in Pinelands. I was still stuck in those short grey pants. I’d asked Pa more than a few times: when could I have long pants? He ignored me.