Sybil Bruncheon's "Aren't People Fascinating?"... Melanie Cutterbert.

Melanie Cutterbert of Mozelin Falls, Tennessee had come from a large family of extraordinarily gifted musicians. They had attracted attention as early as the 1930s on the local talent shows that were broadcast on the radio stations around that part of the Western Tennessee junction with Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, Arkansas, and Mississippi, and by the 1950s, all of the Eastern Tennessee region knew about them too. They first appeared on Major Bowe's Amateur Hour in 1934, as did their children in the 40s and as their grandchildren did on television on The Ted Mack Amateur Hour. Together over four generations they played over 23 different musical instruments, and most of the Cutterberts played more than one, sometimes simultaneously!!! They were always introduced as the "Mozarts of Mozelin Falls", a title they were so very proud of ...and that was why it was imperative that they kept Melanie's terrible secret... a secret!

You see, although she was as gifted as all her cousins, her maiden aunts, a step-sister, a half-brother, an uncle who was also a third cousin twice removed, etc., etc. She also had a strange idiot-savant thing going on. She had perfect pitch and could play seven different instruments, but she couldn't name them!! And they had to be taught to her as something other than what they were... She learned the contrabassoon as a "floor-to-ceiling piccolo", her balalaika was a "really fat ukulele", and her beloved piano she referred to as her "paralyzed accordion". Melanie went so far as to spend some of her contest winnings on a visiting nurse service which would come by on Wednesday afternoons to take the "patient's" blood pressure, temperature, and other vital signs to make sure it wasn't getting "sicker". The nurses who came knew what was going on and even let Melanie listen on the stethoscope to see that the piano's "lungs" still weren't working...at all. She was heard on occasion though to scold her family if she felt their accordions were making fun of hers because of its handicap, but they loved her dearly and went along with her peculiar obsession. On some evenings, they even wheeled the piano through the garden before dinnertime with a light blanket on it while neighbors came to pay their respects... it all made Melanie very happy... especially if they brought candy and flowers with their "Get Well Soon" cards...

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