'We cried for years': The award-winning deaf pianist whose parents never gave up on him
Soon, the world will fall completely silent for Dr Azariah Tan.
At the age of 35, the pianist has only about 10 to 15 per cent of his hearing left. Without his powerful hearing aids, he is unable to hear high frequency sounds such as doorbells and ringtones from devices.
Eventually, he will hear nothing at all, and even listening devices will not be able to help. Azariah tries to take things "one step at a time", he told Stomp, and not fear too much for the future.
Azariah mastered the piano with the help of hearing aids that boost frequencies he is unable to hear and are tailored to the keys of his instrument. He is one of only two acclaimed deaf pianists in Singapore, alongside Ron Tan, who has about 80 per cent hearing loss.
When he performed a few pieces for Stomp in his living room, his deft yet evocative touch on the keys was clear, leaving the audience captivated.
The Tans have already prepared themselves for the day when Azariah completely loses his hearing. "We will cross that bridge when we get to it," said his father Leslie, 66. "Beethoven also composed music when he was deaf. So that's one area that he can work on."
'We cried for years'
Ludwig van Beethoven was already a brilliant composer when his hearing began to fade aged 28. Azariah, by contrast, was only four when silence gradually crept into his world.
In 1995, Leslie and his wife discovered that their only child had bilateral sensorineural hearing loss – a degenerative hearing impairment that damages the tiny hair cells in the inner ear.
The emotions they felt then remain just as raw today.
"We cried for years without telling him," recalled his wife, who only wished to be known as Mrs Tan. The couple often wished they could give their own hearing to their son, whose name means "the Lord has helped" – a blessing that came three months after Leslie's father died.
Leslie, a former sound engineer who now works in the finance sector, described the revelation as akin to receiving a cancer diagnosis – except that it was their child. "That's even worse, it's even more painful."
There were even harder things to endure. Once, his son was walking along a pavement and a cyclist rang his bell to signal him to move. Unaware that Azariah was hard of hearing, the cyclist overtook him and hurled vulgarities at him.
"We just felt very sad for him. But we teach him to just walk away," said the elder Tan.
A gradual realisation
The couple noticed that he had been unresponsive to his nickname "Aza" for some time. It was during a car ride with Mrs Tan, while a Bible story played on the radio, that their fears were confirmed.
When she asked Azariah about what he had just heard, he could not respond. Mrs Tan said she pulled the car onto the road shoulder, switched off the engine, and turned the radio volume up to the maximum.
"He still couldn't hear," she said. She went straight to Singapore General Hospital, where Azariah underwent a hearing test and was diagnosed with a moderate hearing impairment, having already lost about half of his hearing.
That very afternoon, the couple began searching for schools for the deaf.
'Every point of the journey was a doubt'
They even took leave to enrol Azariah in the John Tracy Centre, a nonprofit education centre in Los Angeles that specialises in early education for preschool children with hearing loss.
Azariah was then fitted with hearing aids, and the entire family underwent specialised training and speech therapy. He credits his parents' unwavering efforts with helping him develop speech as his primary form of communication and for enabling him to enter mainstream schools.
Despite his disability, Azariah showed an early interest in music. He enrolled in a Yamaha programme at the age of five and went on to achieve distinctions in all his examinations.
By the time he was 13, he had already completed grade eight, considered a milestone for advanced pianists. The next year, he decided to pursue music as a career.
"Every point of the journey was a doubt," said Leslie. "How does a deaf person pursue an education in the thing that he's weakest in?"
Working 10 times harder than other pianists
According to senior audiologist Isabel Low of WS Audiology, learning to play a musical instrument fundamentally relies on hearing the notes one plays and using those sounds to guide motor actions. For people with hearing loss, especially at higher pitches, sounds can be muffled or unclear, making it much harder to learn, practice and refine the skill.
Nevertheless, the Tans took their son out of primary school to home school him as they felt the mainstream education system was "not ideal" given his hearing impairment and passion for music.
Leslie gave up his sound engineering job to help their son prepare for his O Levels, in which he scored straight As. Meanwhile, Mrs Tan reached out to every pianist and music teacher she knew for advice on whether their son could pursue a career in music.
Only Dr Thomas Hecht, the head of Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music, asked to meet Dr Tan. After listening to him play, Dr Hecht said he should be given the best training possible while he still had his hearing, noting that he possessed both the "talent and auditory memory" to pursue music.
Although Dr Hecht took him under his wing as a private student, Dr Tan successfully auditioned and received a full scholarship from the National Arts Council to study at Yong Siew Toh.
The keys to success
Azariah went on to graduate with first class honours in music at Yong Siew Toh in 2012, before earning a double masters in music and a doctorate in piano performance from the University of Michigan.
"It was a lot of hard work and creativity," said Leslie, explaining that his son has to work "10 times harder" than other pianists.
To date, Dr Tan has performed at numerous outreach programmes and charity shows, including ChildAid and Community Chest True Hearts, helping to raise funds for children with hearing impairments as well as cancer patients.
Over the years, he has also won various piano competitions across Asia, America, and Europe. In 2012, he clinched three awards at The American Prize, which recognises the finest performing artists, ensembles and composers based on recorded performances.
Concert reviewers have called Azariah a "vivid storyteller" through his fingers.
'We have to give back'
In recent years, Azariah has shifted from being a concert pianist to roles as a teacher, music director for disability events, and composer. He is also a director at ARTDIS, a charity dedicated to creating opportunities for people with disabilities in the arts.
Recalling how friends and people in the disability community, alongside Azariah's teachers and medical professionals who went out of their way to help him, Mrs Tan stressed: "And so, we have to give back."
Besides charity work, the family is also collaborating with fellow deaf pianist Ron Tan on a social media project that spotlights people with disabilities who pursue careers in the arts.
Leslie added that everyone, regardless of disabilities, deserves support. "Don't sideline them. If they're interested in pursuing it, support them because with the passion they have, it can take them very far."
Azariah recalled how his father encouraged him to step out of his comfort zone, meet new people and try different projects, while his mother provided the emotional support he needed – reminding him not to give up and to stay focused.
"Every day, they are supporting me," he said. "It's really a lifetime journey with them."
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