A star is borne

IT doesn’t always follow that today’s musical prodigy becomes tomorrow’s star. As one of the experts on view in The World’s Greatest Musical Prodigies tells us, adolescence is a dangerous time for a prodigy. They can grow up, lose their special talent and turn into ordinary musicians.

At the moment, 16-year-old Alexander Prior says: “I find it very difficult not to compose”, which is just as well as he also says: “I would rather die than not compose.”

He has already written more than 40 works, including six concertos, two symphonies and a ballet.

But he’s been through a difficult patch, illustrating the problems besetting child prodigies. At 13, he was taken out of school following clashes with other pupils. Which was probably only to be expected as he went round telling them: “I’m the best”. At 16, he still seems precocious.

Happily, he won a place at the St Petersburg conservatoire, being the youngest student admitted since Prokoviev. And now he’s got his own TV show, in which he gets to pass judgment on other child prodigies.

The idea is that he chooses the world’s greatest child prodigies and then writes a concerto in celebration of their talent.

The show’s audition process shows as much about him as it does the other youngsters.

He has veteran violinist Ida Haendel (performing for 80 years and who still plays a mean violin, as is seen and heard) and prodigy expert Giselle Brodsky to help him choose, but often sometimes chooses to ignore them.

So, we have a sort of talent contest with Alex in the Simon Cowell role of passing judgement on two young violinists, two cellists and a harpist. Along the way we get potted histories of their backgrounds.

They include Michael, 12, who says he has a boy part and a music part. He loves playing the violin, but loves dancing and baseball as well.

Another violinist, Simone, also 12, takes Harry Potter as her main inspiration, believing there is “so much you can connect to the world”.

One young male cellist provokes an intense dislike in Alex who, despite the protests of his fellow judges, declares that the prodigy’s playing is “very bad”.

Giselle finds his comments very revealing.

She thinks they’re the product of Alex’s insecurity. A bit of jealousy is involved, I wouldn’t mind betting.

NAT, seven, in Bangkok, also has something that other children don’t have, but it’s something she doesn’t want. She suffers from a condition called congenital hypertrichosis, which doesn’t mean much to a layman until you see her. Then you understand its other name – werewolf syndrome.

Her facial hair not only makes her stand out, but can also affect her health.

Her mother has to cut the hairs that cover her eyes and threaten her vision, as well as nasal hair that might worry her breathing.

No amount of trimming or shaving helps. The hair simply grows back. Laser treatment removes most of the hair, but leaves her face bruised and her eyes red.

The hair grows back within a month.

In India, 11-year-old Prithviraj wants to be a businessman when he’s older. But getting ahead means looking good and he knows that resembling a werewolf won’t go down well at the job interview.

Some villagers see him as divine, the embodiment of a monkey god, which is no consolation for looking like a refugee from a Hammer horror movie.

The local doctor tries laser treatment.

The burning and pain it causes are distressing to watch, let alone for Prithviraj to endure. He’s eventually given an anaesthetic before more laser work is carried out.

US scientists are trying to find out the cause of this condition. They believe it could help with research for baldness.

But it’s too early to say whether their findings will mean for Nat and Prithvi that it’s hair today, gone tomorrow.