The Music Room
This attic is easily my favourite. I discovered the path to it in what was possibly my worst year at Hogwarts - the year that Sirius Black almost killed me when I followed him down the tunnel beneath the Whomping Willow. I felt then, as I do even now, that The Music Room had revealed itself to me because it was a wonder… a secret… that I needed to call my own. Indeed, I even gave this remarkable attic its modest name of The Music Room.
The Music Room is clearly, like most of the attics one might find, not entirely large or overwhelming… at first. Almost all the attics seem to react to the person within it. If there is more than one person that attic chooses the most dominant thinker as its blueprint for how it is seen. Thus, all the attics have a central theme to them but they will subtly change to accommodate its visitor(s).
The Music Room is perhaps the best example of this, and the dreaded Library of the Attics is next. For your consideration: The Music Room is replete with every sort of instrument to be found since… possibly… time began. However, one cannot see all those instruments at one time. The Music Room will select several instruments one might find intriguing unless, as I have learned, you think carefully and request to be shown other instruments in your thoughts.
The Music Room never over-crowds itself with its inventory. It prefers to settle a certain amount of instrumentation into a pleasing display against a backdrop of a nearly wall-to-wall mural of an Italian villa. The view of the villa, its gardens, and fountains is broken up by tall, Doric columns that reach to a balcony above that is lined with arched windows of stain glass.
Besides the instruments of The Music Room there are scattered marble benches between the columns, and the centre of the room has seven Louis XIV chairs upholstered in green velvet. No doubt the chairs are there for the pleasure of a listening audience.
Of course no music room would suit its instrument if the acoustics were not just perfect. A quick look at The Music Room, and one would easily think that the acoustics are not there. This is another facet to the magic of the room for when an instrument is finely played the notes surround the listener without deafening them.
One last aspect to The Music Room that I learned of as I taught myself to play the piano, teased the clavichord, and strummed the strings of a guitar, was that this attic would take upon the mood of the music played. Anger would bring lightning, and perfectly accompanying thunder, joy would cause the blooming of a profusion of flowers, melancholy would bring the calmness of dusk to the room replete with lonely crickets playing their own tune. Oddly, when I was in The Music Room simply to practice the piano, I would find myself comfortably ensconced within an Edwardian drawing room with a window that looked out upon a sun-warmed garden.
There were times, during the War, when I needed to escape. Not always was I able but when I could, more often than not, I would find my way to The Music Room. I nearly always went to just sit within its peace but invariably did I end up filling the room with music.
END