🎹 How RTMC shaped a pianist — and how a pianist came to understand that none of it was unplanned

By Praveen Deepak ‘Deepu’ • Organist and Pianist, RTMC

The First Time

I first came to RTMC quite unplanned, as a child — 1977 or 1978, when I must have been six or seven. My father stopped in to experience a bit of a service. I distinctly remember it: the altar area curtains were green and seemed oppressive, making the whole atmosphere rather dark. We lived on Langford Road, just around a block away, but apart from that one visit, we didn’t even know a church existed so close to us.

The Praise Singers at St. Mark’s

Then one evening in 1979 we went to see a choir at St. Mark’s Cathedral. This choir was called the Praise Singers. They were energetic, upbeat, refreshing, full of life. One face I distinctly remember — whom I came to know later as Mrs. Linda Paul, Rev. Robin Paul’s wife — smiled her way throughout the entire programme. I have never forgotten that energy and that smile. It was infectious and liberating.

My elder sister Anita and I came home very excited. We wanted to join the Praise Singers. My parents made enquiries and found that RTMC was just around a block from our house. We came to meet the person who conducted the Praise Singers: Rev. Dr. Thomas Gnanamuthu — who in later years became my mentor and, in many ways, a second father to me. Initially, only my sister joined. I was too little.

Childhood Years at RTMC

As time went by we got involved gradually — Praise Singers, Sunday school, church services, Vacation Bible School. Pastor Vinay Moses was an instant hit with us. I became one of Chikka’s (Johnny Moses’) best childhood friends and we are still friends today.

Meanwhile, back home, my father bought an old bellows-organ from MG Road. My parents got me a tutor and I began learning. It came fairly easily to me. The first tune I really played by myself was The Old Rugged Cross.

“One day Frankie came to me and said: ‘Hey, come on and play the piano. We need you to play.’ I don’t remember being scared at all.”
— Praveen Deepak • VBS 1983

One day in 1983, at Vacation Bible School, Frankie called me out from among my friends and asked me to play. The song was an Andrae Crouch tune called Why — I only came to know it was an Andrae Crouch tune decades later. I have never forgotten it, especially because of that second chord: the A dominant 7th. From then on, without knowing it while it was happening, I had been all but officially made into a musician.

The next test was Christmas Day, 1983. The red hymnals had just been bought. There was no one to play that morning and they asked me. The carol was The First Noel — No. 383. That carol is one of the toughest to play from the score. I realised that day I’d have to put in a great deal more effort into reading music.

What Sunita Taught Me Without Teaching Me

During those early years there was Sunita Gokavi. She would play with Aunty Janet Gnanamuthu at Praise Singers. The way she played piano was pure freedom, pure joy, pure fun. I used to imitate her out of sheer admiration. She knew all those chords I was just learning, and she knew when to use them, and how to embellish them with glorious little flourishes.

To say she made me the pianist I came to be is an understatement. Her playing influenced me in ways I can detect even today.

Those were the after-dinner song service years, the Praise Singers performances — a special RTMC tradition. There would be singing, sometimes drama, always memories whose sweet legacies haunt us gently even today.

An Initiation

All this said, it is somehow difficult to actually feel the love of Jesus in a personal way — to feel loved and understood for who one is. It is easy, in any church, to get lost in the crowd. Hearing about Jesus can be impersonal and abstract; actually knowing Him is life-changing.

At RTMC, it was Pastor Arun Andrews and Mrs. Miriam Andrews who reached out personally to a struggling and confused young person quite low on self-esteem. I remember a book they gave me: No Wonder They Call Him The Saviour by Max Lucado.

📖 No Wonder They Call Him The Saviour
Max Lucado
“Dear Deepu, may this book help you understand WHY.”

Many years later, I soberly realise it was their love — shown intentionally and personally — that helped me understand Jesus’ love not just for everyone but particularly for me. To say it was life-changing would be an understatement of cosmic proportions. Never again would I struggle so deeply with low self-esteem or crippling loneliness. I had come decisively into the inner circle of Jesus’ love.

I am pretty sure my experience is not unique in RTMC. There have always been people here who cared for struggling children, young people, and even adults who struggled to come into the inner circle of His love.

Not Just a Church, Not Just People — but a Place

In those days, RTMC was a campus full of infinite variety, places to play, and so green. Stephen’s Hall with its antiquated classrooms and rickety piano; the parsonage with the pillared portico; the grassy lawn with one slender Christmas tree — we would wait for the little yellow flowers after the rain, and the dew on the grass.

It’s been many decades now. Much of the green cover has changed. But when I look up into the canopy of the two rain trees just outside the church doors, there is still space for me there — succour, sweet memory, of years that passed so delightfully in that place. God used not just an entire church of people, but also an unforgettable geographical place, to show me who He is.

Praveen Deepak ‘Deepu’

Organist and Pianist, Richmond Town Methodist Church