John was in a pensive mood.
Despite the chill in the air, he stood gazing up at the moon. As he did, the thought suddenly struck him that he was looking at the very same moon that Antonio Vivaldi had looked at. He shivered with the full realisation of this unavoidable truth. In fact, so struck was he, that it caused him to turn and see the man, the composer, Vivaldi, standing next to him. He was dressed in a manner to be expected, plus a wig. He too was staring up into the heavens.
Vivaldi didn’t seem to notice him at first, then said “Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Yes. It is, but I’m not sure you should be here.”
Vivaldi smiled and said in a soft voice “Ah! The imagination is a powerful thing.” He turned and said “I don’t have to stay.”
“No! Please… stay. I have to tell you… it sounds pretty weak, but I am a great fan of your music… all of your music.”
“That’s nice. I would certainly like to think I had fans.”
Suddenly, confused, John said “Hold on; I just used the word fan, and you understood it!”
“Of course.”
“Why of course? You were composing the Four Seasons in 1725, while the word fan, being an abbreviation of fanatic, wasn’t thought of until, I don’t know, the late eighteen hundreds probably.
“Your point?”
“My point is you could not possibly know about it.”
“Ah! I see what you are getting at. I think there must be a lot you don’t understand about summoning.”
“Summoning?”
“Oh! Yes; that’s what you did you see. You summoned me.”
John reflected on this statement, then asked “Does this sort of thing happen very often?”
“No, not really. Not to me anyway. Twice before, or maybe three times, it nearly happened, but the person trying to summon me just didn’t get it right I suppose.”
“How does it all work?”
“I’m not sure really. I have full memories of my lifetime and a natural understanding of this present time; such as the date, your clothes and mode of speech, and so on, but…” he paused, shaking his head.
“But?”
“But there’s nothing in between.”
“Wow! In that case, there is so much to tell you. I mean, I’m no scholar, not at all, but I’ve always been interested in classical music, even as a kid. What do you want to know?”
Vivaldi chuckled. “If only it were that simple… there’s the time factor.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, my time here is limited.”
“Oh! How long have we got?”
“I don’t know, sorry. Not long though.” He looked back at the sky and said “Do you want to tell me what’s been going on or ask me questions?”
John shook his head. “I wouldn’t know where to start, you’d know all about the renaissance period of course.”
“Yes, an important time that preceded me.”
“Well, your era was later named the Baroque Period.”
Vivaldi smiled. “Baroque Period, I like that!”
John was pleased to be able to give him something; something in return for being here. “It lasted for well over a century.” He stopped abruptly and waved his hand around. “How long have we got? Oh! Sorry, you don’t know do you? But are we talking about minutes, hours, days?
Vivaldi shook his head. “Minutes perhaps.”
John went on, feeling more than a little silly. “The harpsichord certainly came into its own during your life-time. But listen, all this is recorded, we don’t need to go over that. Tell me what you didn’t like about your life, after all you were very successful as a composer and you worked as a priest… The Red Priest in fact; because of your hair.”
Vivaldi lifted his wig for a moment.
“Can’t see, sorry, too dark. I’ll take your word for it. Anyway, I’m pretty sure all the references to it can’t be wrong.” He sighed. “There is so much to say and ask. But like I said, what didn’t you like about it all.”
“Ah! That’s easy. Asthma. That’s what you call it now, but back then it was simply known as a ‘tightness of the chest’. It actually prevented me from being able to chant; it was with me from the day I was born.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know. Do we, I mean we of this time, know about that?”
“Yes. It seems that some of your historians have made mention of it.”
“I did notice that your voice was changing…wheezing a bit.”
“Yes. The cold. Always brings it on for me; it’s my main trigger, you would say. It’s probably best if I leave you now. Nice talking to you John.”
“You know my name then?”
“Of course; I know all about you… you summoned me.”
“Oh! OK. How does it work then; the opposite of summoning I mean.”
“Well, let’s just gaze up at the moon together.”
As they did this, John heard Vivaldi cough… and he was gone.