By Idil Biret
Young pianist’s hair transformation sparks legendary music teacher’s outrage
Looking at a photograph of Nadia Boulanger, white headed in her 70s with a furrowed brow, angular frown lines descending on either side of her mouth. concerned and stern expression on her face, I recognize that look. Deep preoccupation.
At times, she would be deeply preoccupied with Tasha, the cat. but more often, she was deeply preoccupied with a student who could not seem to grasp what he or she should. I remember that expression when she was deeply preoccupied with me, as well. And I knew that expression would soon produce a statement, a severe statement.
When I was 17, Brigitte Bardot was becoming popular in France. She was a liberated woman. Her hair was wild, blonde, and free. I was 15, and Brigette Bardot represented everything I wanted my life to be, free of the stern supervision of my mother, free of the careful monitoring of my behavior by Nadia Boulanger. I wanted to break out of my prison and be free like Bardot.
I thought carefully about what I could do to free myself. It occurred to me that my messy, dark brown hair expressed conformity, not freedom. So in the spirit of Bardot, I made an appointment at the hairdresser, near where I lived, not far from the military school, where the wives of colonels and generals transformed themselves into creatures more fashionable than nature had created.
No one knew. The day of my appointment, I stopped at the salon in transit from the Conservatory to my home. I knew it was impossible to totally transform my curly brown mop into Bridget Bardot sweeping blonde tresses, so I simply asked the hairdresser to transform my look into something more liberated.
The result was what I had hoped for—shaped, styled, with streaks of red and streaks of blonde, I felt a completely different person looking in the mirror.
I had only a couple hours to enjoy my new look until reactions started. My mother was infuriated.
“I like the free look of Bridget Bardot!” I told her
“That woman she is nothing! She is no one you should model yourself after!’
“What have you done?” asked Boulanger. “This is an outrage! You are not that kind of a girl!”
Okay, then, what kind of girl am I? I thought. But I kept my silence. That’s the day I became “the scandal of Rue Ballu.”
Idil Biret
December, 2023
