Chances are you've never met anyone like Houston's Indra Egan. She has beautiful dark eyes that light up when she's excited. Her fingers flutter like butterflies along her jaw line when she talks passionately about a piece she is about to perform on her grand piano.

Audiences do not intimidate her, as long as she "...knows the piece well." Indra plays her heart out just the same to a few in the audience or to a packed house. Confidence is her middle name.

With close to twenty trophies and scholarships to her credit, Indra thinks for a moment when asked about her future. "We'll see what happens when I reach Grade 10," she says with a sincere smile. Tough question for someone only nine years old, yet she answered that and all questions with the poise and clarity of someone far beyond her years.

Named a child prodigy since achieving two silver awards by Toronto's Royal Conservatory of Music (one for Grade Four piano and the other for Grade Two violin), Indra's former piano instructor, Wolfgang Loschberger of Hazelton, says the girl has a "...rare combination of innate talent, familial support and willingness to work hard." In over 35 years of teaching, he has yet to see another talent like hers.