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G<\/span>abriela Montero has collected many stories in her life so far: a baby playing the songs her mother sang on a toy piano in the crib.\u00a0 A young girl away from home at the tender age of nine in the foreign city of Miami for music education for almost 10 years.\u00a0 A human rights advocate who communicates through now<\/em>, in classical piano improvisations and compositions.<\/p>\n This Sunday, she will be sitting down at the piano in the Koerner Hall to present her latest program, \u201cInnocence and Experience.\u201d\u00a0 Gently, as the light darkens at the stroke of 3 pm, she will unfold these stories, of herself, of the world, and where her heart is \u2014 Venezuela.<\/p>\n Her connection to the piano was an immediate one. \u201cI did have an early beginning with music,\u201d Gabriela remembers.\u00a0 Seeing Gabriela playing back the songs on a two-octave toy piano in her crib, the family found her a lovely piano teacher, Lyl Tiempo, who happened to live in the apartment above Gabriela\u2019s family.\u00a0 But a few years later, Lyl moved out to Europe, and Gabriela was sent on her way to study Piano in Miami with a scholarship from the Venezuelan government; she was just nine years old.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was very difficult.\u00a0 It was really hard to leave Venezuela, my country \u2014 and my family and my home,\u201d said Gabriela. \u201cI\u2019ve always had a very strong attachment to Venezuela.\u201d<\/p>\n Unfortunately, Gabriela\u2019s experience in Miami was a negative one, and after years of studying piano there, she returned to Caracas at age 17 and stopped playing the piano altogether.<\/p>\n \u201cI hated music; I hated being a musician. It was a time of great questioning for me. I came back to Caracas and did social work.\u201d<\/p>\n But when she sent a recording to London, out of curiosity, she was immediately offered a full scholarship to study at the Royal College of Music.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was miraculous how I ended up in London. I didn\u2019t even have enough money to get there.\u201d<\/p>\n Studying with Hamish Milne, Gabriela rekindled her gift of musical narrative, especially of improvisation.<\/p>\n \u201cI always improvised. It\u2019s been the way I communicate, to tell my stories. I sit down, and music just flows out.\u00a0 I always say I get out-of-the-way\u2026 for me, music is a metaphor to life, to stories, and improvisation has always been there.\u201d<\/p>\nVenezuela<\/h3>\n