Dick Purcell

“ Obviously the concert pianist gag was a coverup for something else—some fancied wrong—perhaps plain restlessness.
Alone, Paine went back over the conversation, intrigued by John Harper's strange determination.
"This talk about being a concert pianist is a gag of course, isn't it, John?"
"No, Mr. Paine."
"But man—you're too old to start a thing like that. You never in your life studied music did you?"
"No, sir."
"Then let me tell you—first, in a thing like that, you've got to have talent. Have you got talent?" ”

“ It was given exactly seven years from the day he told Sam Paine, "I'm quitting to become a concert pianist."
The television networks found him quickly and he rocketed to fame by giving classical music an interpretation that made it understood and loved by millions.
It was said that John Harper gave more musical pleasure to the world in his brief two-year career than had any other genius in a natural span.
But of course, the seven years had taken their toll. The punishment of learning would have killed a far younger and stronger man than John Harper. ”

“ John Harper, the great concert pianist—the man who brought long-hair music into the home—the man loved by millions, will—"
The voice and the image vanished. Then the set faded, and John Harper lay tense in the bed in his shoddy little room. But a different John Harper now. In an instant he became a dedicated man knowing he had been building up to this moment for years. ”