Beating The Blues Of Autism With Musical Talent, UAE Child Creates Magical Music

Ahmed Al Hashemi ,the 15-year-old Emirati pianist and composer is autistic and considered a child prodigy with several accolades to his name.

He won the first place in the Ammar Talents Competition, chosen from more than 18 thousand participants from the Gulf area; the first place in the Abu Dhabi Talents competition and the Game Show, Win The Crowd, a Bronze medal in the International Competition for Composers, won the International competition for Mozart Music, the International Chopin Piano Competition, earned the Gold medal in Lipton Music competition, earned his diploma in the Global Awards competition for the Best Youngest Musician, holds the sixth degree at the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM) and holds grade five at Trinity. He has performed in more than 40 events in the UAE and in KSA, South Korea, Canada and Egypt.

His mother Eiman al Aleeli was a bank manager with ADIB when her second son, Ahmed, was born. Though normal at birth, the child wouldn’t speak or make eye contact and it started getting tough to handle. “Most nurseries refused to admit him and we didn’t know what to do. One day, at work, I was on the phone with my ex-boss when two-year-old Ahmed, at my office creche, was throwing things around and screaming. My ex-boss asked me some other questions to which I said yes. His son was autistic and he knew the signs”. At his advice we took Ahmed to special needs counsellors in the UAE, US and France to discover that he was autistic.

“I was devastated but to help my child, I educated myself and set out to find a good autistic centre for him. Nearly all of them were booked and there was no space,” she says. Eiman then found a nursery and employed a special needs therapist. “I resolved that Ahmed wouldn’t be in that situation. I found activities for him that included drawing and swimming and started doing it with him. In fact, in six months of swimming, Ahmed won first position in the UAE’s Special Needs Swimming Competition.” By the age of five, Eiman observed that every time Ahmed heard music, he would behave like a maestro. “I bought a small piano at home and played the tune, ‘Happy Birthday to You’ to him. At that time, he wasn’t interested. The next day when I came home, he was playing the piece by himself. I was shocked.” He took to music like fish to water.

Eiman lined up music teachers for him but they would all leave. “I have been through 300 teachers for Ahmed and advertised in magazines and newspapers. Finally, one teacher from Italy identified his genius and said he had the ability to recognise all music notes without notations and that he was gifted like Beethoven and Mozart. Another teacher from Russia marvelled at the way he played the piano. Today, all those teachers follow him on Instagram. All music schools who refused to take him in want him to be their student.”