The Japanese Beatle

I was listening to the classical music station the other day, when the announcer introduced a piece by Paul Chihara. That name was a blast from my past.

In 1971, Prof. Chihara had taught musicianship to my class of music majors at UCLA. Among ourselves, we called him the Japanese Beatle. He was short, dynamic, and a bit bedraggled. His elbows were coming out of his sweater sleeves, and he wore the same pair of increasingly ragged pants most days. At the end of the year, I coordinated a class ‘thank you’ gift for his teaching by sewing leather patches to the frayed elbows of his usual sweater and buying him some new pants.

The next I heard of him was the composing credit for the gripping score to the movie I Never Promised You a Rose Garden. He also wrote the score for Crossing Delancey and many other movies and TV shows. He won many awards for his composing, and has been commissioned to write pieces for many orchestras.

Nostalgia filled me when I heard his name the other day, and I wondered if he was still alive. Google told me that he was, and sent me to his website. I left him a message reminding him of our times at UCLA. No response so far, and I’m trying not to hold my breath.