Darryl? How could we have lost him? He was about my age. Well built, perfectly healthy — we all were about 50 years ago. And such a nice guy.

He joined SMS soon after the start of 1973, our final year, but he was a year junior. We found that he had a belt in one of the martial arts, and immediately conscripted him as coach, for the best fee a customer could negotiate. He taught us a couple of moves. The one I remember best involved a knee and a groin. Though he wasn't the fighting type.

I got to know him much better as a musician. He and Mario Esteves on guitar, and yours truly on accordion, provided instrumental background for the Easter services in 1973 as we cut the ribbon on the new chapel (architected by Br Kelly), and we became a fixture every Sunday thereafter. Sometimes we got together the previous day for a short rehearsal. Both Darryl and Mario were great guitarists. A visiting Brother taught us a new song: Suffer Little Children to Come Unto Me. We struggled to find that second chord. We might have thrown in a seventh, or a minor, and got away with it. But we kept working to get it just right. And finally figured it out. It was a Eureka moment. We found later that the chord had a name: the diminished. It's a bit like living on another planet (which Abu was, as far as music theory went) and independently discovering volumetry.

RIP, Archimedes. You're remembered fondly.

—Val Noronha (1973)