Sunday, November 14, 2010
The Piano
When I was in the third grade, I asked my parents if I might take piano lessons. They were pleased with my request but let me know that my lessons would require that they invest in a piano on which I could practice. They emphasized the importance of my making a commitment if they were to purchase a piano for me. Their search for an affordable piano ended when they found an elderly lady who said that her daughter had urged her to sell their piano. So, the upright piano came to my house where I did keep my musical commitment until I left for college. During this time, my mother had passed away and my dad had remarried and brought my stepmother into our home. She was the same daughter who had uged her mother to get rid of the piano years before. The piano had returned. Since I was away in college and now using pianos in the practice rooms, I offered no resistance when my stepmother asked if I would mind her selling the piano. Now years later, when I think back nostalgically about that big black upright, I become even more grateful for the six foot Kawai grand that now sits in my living room.
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I know about those old big black pianos. Wes bought me one when we were stationed at Cherry Point and I decided to take piano lessons. I took a few then quit. That piano came to Boone and when my daughter Valerie began piano lessons we sold the old monstrocity and bought her a nice brand new piano which now sits in my living room. Val gave up her lessons but Marta plays by ear and Wes could play it. Maybe my grandkids decide to take piano lessons and can inherit the piano.
ReplyDeletePiano stories occupy my life memories as well. I should say, keyboard stories. We had a very basic spinet in my home as a kid. All 5 of us took lessons. I was the only one with any interest. Later my mother bought an organ. It remained there after I moved out on my own. Only later did I realize what a Hammond B-3 was. My mother donated it to a local church. How I wish I knew then what I know now. Courtesy of my mother, we also had a player piano and a vibraphone, a drum set and several brass instruments.
ReplyDeleteIn my adult life I have had a Baldwin console and 2 baby grands. Only one baby grand remains, which belonged to my maternal grandmother, the other musician in our family. Music is everything to me. It was my sanctuary at times when I sorely needed it.