Sister Callistus Arnsby teaching piano to a student at the Sacred Heart School of Music, London, Ontario. Sister of St. Joseph Archives.
As a very shy 12-year-old I knocked on the door of the most esteemed piano teacher I ever knew. The door opened and there stood Sister Callistus Arnsby welcoming me into her piano studio. A beautiful grand piano filled most of the room. A cushion carefully embroidered with musical symbols topped the chair beside the grand. Music scores and biographies of musicians filled the open shelves, and behind the closed cupboard doors were hidden more tools of the trade: music liners for the blackboard, chalk, manuscript paper, recital notes, exam requisitions. This was truly like stepping into another world.
Though I felt overwhelmed and in spite of my shyness this seasoned professional set me at ease and encouraged me to enter more fully into the contemplative world of sound. Sister Callistus knew how to call forth a presence to the experience of making music, not just reading the notes. She was sensitive to the ebb and flow of a musical phrase. She helped me realize that the weight applied to an individual key could vary so that a phrase would take shape, a melody would lift and fall, like one crescendos and decrescendos when singing a best loved song.
This music making was not only about performing a piece for a recital or the Kiwanis Music Festival, but it also was about building confidence, and a sense of identity. When memorization became a challenge and sometime failure, she would encourage and advise new techniques for calming nerves and send me off to the next recital opportunity.
Sister Callistus led our St. Joseph’s School of Music through the height of its success and then as time warranted, helped guide all who taught with her, to a new environment in collaboration with the Western Ontario Conservatory of Music. Sister Callistus is remembered by numerous musicians. I thank her for the extraordinary ways that she helped me grow in my love of music and music-making.
On this National Teacher Appreciation Day for whom do you give thanks?
-Sister Loretta Manzara, csj
NATIONAL TEACHER APPRECIATION DAY
National Teacher Appreciation Day is on the Tuesday during first full week in May as a reminder to show appreciation for teachers everywhere. We are using this National Day to say thank you to all teachers for their time and dedication to educate our children.
image: Geert Pieters Yanna Zissiadou/Unsplash