Sweet Sounds

In 1976 Jhabvala made the important decision to leave India to live in New York for most of the year, a result of which was a new documentary, Sweet Sounds, conceived and directed by Richard Robbins. Jhabvala entered her youngest daughter Firoza, an aspiring pianist, in the Mannes College of Music, then on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, and there met Robbins, Firoza’s piano teacher and the acting director of the college’s preparatory school. Robbins had an idea for a short film showing some of the small children at the school being initiated into the practice of music. —Merchant Ivory Productions