When the music stops someone doesn’t get a chair.

      It’s a simple description of a game that’s been played for more than three centuries with many, many names and one outcome: Triumph and defeat all in a moment of silence.

      When the music stops someone doesn’t get a chair.

      It’s the simple line on which I’ve based an entire career. You’ve read them: The Final Rotation: Game Play in Musical Chairs, Last Seat Taken: A Winners History, The Chair-Height Dilemma: Strategies for Victory, Don’t Stop the Music: The Enduring Popularity of Musical Chairs in America and Around the World.  You’ve read them all, I hope, along with more than a hundred essays and a set of scholarly monographs on the subject.  Still there is so much we don’t know.

      1962, early morning.  My mother dresses me in a tweed suit identical to my father’s except I wear shorts.  We both had on lace-up shoes which seemed heavy on my feet.  He led me out to a large black car with a driver, and off we went.  I am 7 years old.  My father told me that when got to the studio, I was to say nothing, and during the program not to laugh nor applaud unless directed to.  I must be there and not there.  “Invisible,” my father said, “Like the man in your picture comic books.”

      The drive was not a short one and I spent my time looking out the window.  I had to work very hard not to kick the seat or squirm around because I was very excited.  You see, none of my friends, no one I knew, had ever been taken to see a broadcast of the musical chairs program.

      There were hardly any people on the street.  The few that were seemed angry as the car went past.  They looked up at us and held their glance for a moment before looking away.  My father didn’t notice what was outside at all.  He was impervious, a word I didn’t know at the time but one that I think sums up his relationship with the world.  Instead, he read from papers he took from a briefcase.  He had a habit of turning each page with his extended forefinger; a deliberate gesture.

      When it seemed like we’d been driving forever, suddenly a large complex with a building in the middle came into view.  Our car pulled onto a narrow tree-lined street and was waved through a gate topped by barbed wire, the guard tipped his hat toward my father and winked at me.  I was surprised, shocked even.  The car carried us onto the grounds of the broadcast facility.  This was the place from where the musical chairs game was televised.  To me it looked like the country homes we sometimes visited except that all around us, fences, wire with sharp hooks attached, guards walking, some with dogs.

      For my birthday I’d been taken to other shows at other places — the model farm, the drafty sports arena, the magic kitchen, the speller’s challenge — but nothing like this.  If I’d been older I might have asked, why the need for the fortress-like setting.  I can imagine glib answers following: secrecy to preserve the outcome, security for the big prize money, privacy of the players.  All those applied to the other shows as well.  Why was this one more special?  But the excitement of coming to see the game, that was all that mattered to me that morning.

      My father was greeted effusively.  A group of men nearly ran to meet the car.  Years later I came to understand that this was because he was a high government official with control over all of the state-run media apparatus.  The men and women working at that facility owed their jobs to him.  He could have had any of them replaced with a whisper or the wave of his hand.  He was never a man to raise his voice.

      Other men in darks suits shook his hand.  A young woman the same age as my oldest sister was presented to him.  She ducked her head in embarrassment as my father looked steadily at her.  I was pointed out, brought forward for a moment, and the men nodded at me.  One of them bent over with a stiff formality to shake my hand.  I don’t believe he clicked his heels together but the gesture would not have been out of place nor inappropriate to the circumstances.

      No, I didn’t know at that time how important my father was except that he was driven most everywhere as were only a very few of my friend’s fathers, and their cars were not nearly as big as ours.  My father took phone calls at all hours of the night on a special line that he alone of the family was permitted to use.  About those calls we were ordered not to listen nor say anything of.  Occasionally, the leader of the country came to our house with a truck-load of soldiers who fanned out to the doors and the driveway and the backyard.  Their guns at the ready, looking, always looking out beyond.

      From the group who received my father, I collected a few more pats on the head but as I pretended invisibility, the adults around me seemed to as well.  As I had been instructed, I was there and wasn’t there.  I was good boy.  I followed my father inside.  We were given a tour of the control room, a low-ceilinged space in semi-darkness with many many television screens and men speaking in low whispers, instructing others on angles and focus and degrees of zoom.

      This would not be the last time my father brought me to watch.  From the time I was 7 until I was 16 when circumstances changed radically for me and my family, at least once a year he took me here, and each outing was an occasion.  But this first time, well this was the most special.

      Yes, I know that you find it odd this late in my career as a musical chairs expert that I should be relating so personal a narrative.  I know, too, that you have read about none of this in my writings to this point.  I have always focused on the game.  In some sense I have acted as high judge for the rules and decorum and strategies employed.  I have maintained an emotional distance from the proceedings, something for which I have been criticized.  Certainly someone must have wondered where my great fascination for the game was derived.  Now you know: For years my father took me along with him, and we watched from special seats in an audience bleacher set back from the stage, the cameras and their operators between us and the playing floor.

      It was not just the link to my late father and a set of golden childhood memories that prompts me to write what I must.  The game is to be expanded, changed, made more difficult, and the prizes increased proportionately.  The popular word is that these changes come in an attempt to shore up sagging broadcast ratings which have been in steady decline given the rise of the anti-game movement.

      I find it disturbing.  Deeply disturbing and believe I have to do something, say something.  Many of the anti-gamers have been jailed.  Some executed though that information is kept out of the regular government-controlled press.  I should be afraid, but I am not.  What can be done to me, really?  My family is gone or dispersed, and I have recently received a diagnosis with a deadline.  Truth must will out.

      That first time, we were led to the special seats, taped off to prevent anyone else from sitting in them.  We were led, my father and I.  He sat down only for a moment before someone came over to him with a request.  Reluctantly, he rose and instructed me to sit quiet and wait.  He would be back shortly.

      I busied myself with looking around the studio.  Again, because of my instructions to be there and not there, I didn’t feel that I could look wildly about, turning my head left and right to take in all that was new and strange.  I had to be careful.  Secretive.  I looked in one direction and saw the playing floor.  Watching at home on television, to me the playing floor looked like a shiny wondrous game room.  But here, close up, I could see that it was thinly made.  Even as I boy I could see that.  The chairs sturdy enough but the walls were plywood and covered with colored paper that was ragged at the top but that didn’t matter because the fraying was outside of what professionals call the camera “sight lines.”  There was a large grid overhead with lights clamped to metal rods, wires hanging down and plugged into various outlets.  The cameramen were already at their cameras looking over lists of what I learned later were shots but they were casual almost disinterested.  And why not?  They did this show weekly for quite some time now.  Perhaps to them it was just a job.

      Here is something that those who follow my writings do not know: though these early viewing experiences made a distinct impression on me, and I devoted years to understanding the game, I never felt anything for the losers, never thought much about them, only a wild exhilaration for those who found their way to an open seat.

      But the losers, what of the losers?  To ignore them was a mistake, a tremendous oversight on my part.  It is because of the losers that I now write.  So much disturbing information has come to light.

      Subtly, I thought, carefully, I shifted in my seat.  A readjustment for greater comfort if anyone were watching me.  But the change in angle gave me another view of the stage.  While outside there was heavy security, inside, there were only one or two guards at a couple of access points, and they were not dressed in military uniforms but trim and crisp blue blazers with the logo of the show on their breast pockets.

      The booth from which the show was directed, where I had been taken earlier, was above us and toward the back.  It had a view directly down on the stage and the game set.  There was activity up there but it was too far for me to really see.  Besides, the audience bleachers were filling up, and there was a sense of anticipation as to what was coming.

      Suddenly my father was back.  The complete audience was in its seats, and a man came out to welcome us to the show.  He said we should applaud when the signs told us to, or cheer if we got that instruction.  But we should always stay in our seats.  Anyone violating that rule would be removed immediately and subject to discipline by the authorities.  It was an odd warning, I thought, because the anti-game movement was only in its nascent stages at the time.  Its few members had not even figured out yet how to penetrate the facility and get into the broadcast.

      Still we did as we were told.  There was a drum roll, music, the host came out.  He welcomed us as he welcomed the country.  A curtain went up to the right and a row of contestants was introduced, briefly and cursorily.  Then the action stopped again.  We were apparently in a commercial break.

      When viewed at home, the show appears seamless.  The program comes on, the commercials are in between.  We watch the screen in our living rooms or our bedrooms.  In the studio, the show moved in a series of fits and starts.  Things were happening on stage but only on occasion did anyone explain anything to us, and then only in short statements:  We’re in a commercial.  We’re moving a set.  The game will start shortly.

      It’s important that you know that I never understood the consequences of the game when I was young except to know that someone won and someone didn’t.  I thought that was all there was to it.

      I’m not going to lead you through all the action because you’ve seen the show enough times to know that the players were brought out one by one and introduced.  We heard a little of their family history and then play began.

      In the first round there were few squabbles and not yet any wrestling to get into the seat.  Some well-known song of the day would be played over the sound system.  We heard in the studio what everyone heard at home.  The first round was short.  A player was eliminated.  Not much was at stake yet.  So it seemed, and outcomes were never subject to the vagaries of performance judging.  Someone ended up in the seat.  Someone didn’t.  That was clear.

      When I say I never understood the consequences I meant I never understood what happened to the losers.  They were shuttled out of the room with the host giving them a nice send-off.  One makes assumptions:  They were removed so the game could resume with speed.  Only the live players continued to preserve the elegant simplicity of the game and its clean-lined setting.  The choice of the phrase “live players” turns out to be an ironic one as my years of research would reveal.  My final assumption was that the losers left the room, collected the consolation prize the show announcer said was their due, and returned to wherever they lived.  They came.  They competed.  If they did not prevail, they went home, though not completely empty-handed.  Plus they always had the memory of being one of the happy few selected to compete.  No small thing was made of the competitors.

      These assumptions are wholly false.  The losers went “home” only in the broadest sense of the old saying, “He’s been called home.”  And if this comes as a shock to you, it came as no less a shock to me when I was finally able to confirm it.

      My initial thoughts on the game — before writing about it became my vocation — were from the perspective of game as play.  I had statistics about outcomes and I enjoyed analyzing the playmaking of the competitors.  But I discovered quite soon that not much research had been done on the game, very little had been written, in fact research was mostly discouraged.  Millions watched on television but few if any thought about the deeper mysteries of the game.  In order to study it, you had to come at the game slant.

      It was not possible to get a degree in musical chairs from any accredited university in the country.  The game was mentioned in various units about the country’s general history and more specific histories of the development of television.  But the inclusions were simply one of fact without analysis about any relevant aspect which might have included such subjects as the socio-economics conditions that gave rise to the game; an investigation into the reasons for its popularity; a class-based analysis of players and winners; a New Historicist investigation of players’ clothing as a subset of mass-produced couture; a cultural critique of the game and the skill set it demanded of its players.  The list was endless.

      The game was not deemed worthy of study I discovered when I began college.  No one would say why.  But all of them evaded answering almost as if there were an element of fear associated with my inquiries.  People did not want to talk about it in the same way they did not want to criticize the government.  They refused to meet my eyes.  They became fascinated by papers on their desk.  The subject made them plainly nervous.  They suddenly had other meetings that urgently needed their attendance or tasks awaiting their attention.  Several deans suggested that I pursue a more conventional line of study, something that might lead to steady employment after school or at least the possibility of a career.

      To their relief, I appeared to accept their advice though I surprised them by taking a triple major: psychology as well as economics and applied mathematics.  Though they did not know it, in this way I broadened and deepened my understanding of games and game theory.  My school advisors signed on to my study program, happy to see me occupied in fulfilling but innocuous pursuits.  Ones that would not cause them trouble then or at any other time in the forseeable future — so they thought.  For a minor, I studied music theory and took courses in music appreciation but I focused on the specific types of music most often used during play.  Then, in what seemed like a complete break from my undergraduate trajectory, I got a masters in applied kinesiology.  That was because the physical elements of the game must not be given short shrift.  I spent summers in apprenticeship to master chair manufacturers and flooring experts so that I understood the mechanics of the setting as much as I came to understand the physical, mental and emotional intricacies of the game itself.  Could the depth of wax on a particular game floor influence the outcome?  I set up a small-scale version of the playing space in a back bedroom to find out.  Did seat width play any role?  I made exact replicas from the show.  How about the height the chair backs?  All of these questions I considered in my first writings.  I was careful though, I had an extra table which I moved easily to the center of the room so if anyone came over — invited or otherwise — the room looked like a conference area, not suspicious at all.

      Videos of games series were available for purchase and I bought complete sets dating back to the first recorded events.  I became an avid collector, managing to locate silent films of games played just after the turn of the 20th century.

      I created timelines of the game, watched for patterns of movement in the rotations, determined if the players had stepping styles which helped them in the outcome.  I considered the effects of a particular kind of clothing on the game.  I asked the questions, do the bigger stronger players usually win or is it the faster more nimble players who most often prevail?

      Talking to past winners was not that difficult.  They were happy to rehearse their glories.  Many had dined out for years on tales of their ultimate victory.  The final push for the last chair.  The firm conclusion that if they’d been an inch or two more into the rotation when the music stopped, they would not have gotten the chair.  Their certainty that instinctive reflexes had played an important role.  On more than one of these visits I was tossed out of a chair by men twice my age intent on illustrating their point.

      Finding the losers, well, that was something else.  And talking to officials of the game proved much more difficult.  Requests for interviews were denied.  I was stopped outside my apartment one night by a man who shoved me against a wall and told me to stop.  I’m not a brave person but I don’t like being told I can’t do something.  I should add that by this time, my father had been eased out of his position.  Actually he had left the country on an extended goodwill mission on behalf of the government and was not expected back for some years.  I no longer had the power of his office behind me, and I was as vulnerable as any other regular citizen.  Perhaps moreso because of how low the mighty had now descended.

      I decided that I did not need the official game imprimatur to write about it.  Between my interviews with some past winners, my own observations of the games and the wide range of my college studies I thought deeply and started writing.

      As longtime readers know, there was resistance.  At first, only very small journals published me.  My work, when sent to the larger mass circulation journals, was either immediately returned or “lost” in what I believed was a deliberative fashion.

      Eventually, I gained an audience and a following.  Perhaps my greatest good fortune was when the president — himself a music chairs winner — mentioned that he’d read one of my essays at a news conference.  That push was all it took.

      With all of my analysis and contemplation, that aspect of the game which I ignored now fascinates me.  I have devoted the last twenty-five years to finding out what happens to the losers of Musical Chairs and I can tell you it is not good.

      The lists of players is kept secret.  That was my first surprise.  Did anyone know that?  I certainly did not and I suspect if you were to ask your spouse or your neighbor, they would not know it either.  We assumed that the games are conducted with transparency.  We assumed wrong.

      At the same time, I had always assumed that I was permitted to watch the game because as a developing child, I might one day get a chance to play and should know the rules.  I did not learn until near the end of my father’s life that he brought me because he wished to instill a lesson.

      Why were the games held in secret?

      Why were so few allowed to watch in person?

      What happened to the losers?

      The winners, we know about.  As a television event, they won their game and in all the newspapers across the land a color picture of them alone in the winner’s chair was published to great acclaim.  They were given full scholarships to the best colleges, employment immediately upon graduation, a house in the gated section and a guaranteed pension for life upon retirement.  Their families were also treated handsomely.

      But the losers. . .

      When the music stops someone doesn’t get a chair.  They stand looking down at the remaining players who are sitting, many of them breathing heavily with the exertion of flinging themselves into an open chair.  One needs to be in excellent physical shape to play the game, as the rounds progress the music goes faster and faster.  But that is not now.  Not now.  Now, the host comes onstage with a handheld mike and announces the name of the loser.  The audience applause rises and if it is not enough, it is mixed with a canned effect produced in the sound booth of the control room.  The host says, “Let’s have a look at your path to Musical Chairs.”  With some suitably thoughtful music, with titles such as “I’m Going Home” or “I Gave It My All,” a montage runs.  The player at home.  His first introduction to the game facility.  Some odd gesture of endearment that a player always makes.  Training for the game.  Coaching tips.  Possibly a moment of emotion.  If the player has made it through a round or two, a highlight from the game.  Then, when it concludes with a happy headshot of the loser, the host says, “Let’s hear it one more time for ______” and off they go.  The game resumes.

      They are going to the room.  The white room.  The room that is never spoken of.  The white room that my father brought me to, only once, for his most important lesson of all.  A small room, terribly awfully small.  The room is cold but only for the first instant and then everything is cold.  The floor of the room is slippery, purposefully so, and angled and the walls slope and narrow to the back.

      The lesson is not when the music stops someone doesn’t get a chair, it’s this is what happens to boys who are not good.  Boys who are not very good.

      An assistant stage manager accompanies the loser off stage and sends them down a corridor.  This is a different corridor than the one they used to get to the stage before the game began.  If it is a surprise, the loser does not let on.  They are still pumped up from the competition, hearts brimming with adrenalin.  Throughout the process, they have surrendered to the production staff who has taken care of all their wants, providing food and drink and instruction on what comes next, what they must do.  Why question now?

      Did you know that every contestant is an orphan either directly by birth or technically through life circumstances?  They may be an older person whose parents have died.  They are at the moment single, sometimes divorced or widowed.  A substantial part of the population meets this criteria and it is an essential criteria for contestants.

      The assistant stage manager deposits the losing competitor at a small white door, almost too small to go in upright, especially for the taller individuals.  The manager holds the door open and motions the person through.

      The room is beyond.  Cold and white and small, its floor a surface designed for sliding.

      Boys who are not good.

      Perhaps they look, the losers look, at the assistant stage manager once before they duck inside, others just go.  Why not, they’ve already lost.  Their prize is there, beyond, they’ve been told.  But as they enter, they receive a final rough push.

      Electricity is involved, a massive jolt of current. Some kind of disposal device.  Whirling blades.

      How horrible it is for me, a lifetime student of the game, to discover that the tragedy is not in the losing. Oh the radiant selves who rush in a circle of carved wood chairs in time to music.