Music That Makes Me Reminisce

 

My piano is dying. It is just fading away like an old relative with dementia. It feels to me like I need to go out to the back pasture, and shoot it in the head, so it won’t suffer any longer. Sigh. Seriously, I just got the news and I’m devastated.

I hired a piano tuner/repairman to come and see what needed to be done to fix our upright grand piano. When he got inside of it and messed around for a bit, he gave me the bad news. It can’t be fixed. Seems that pianos have a lifespan, and mine has come to the end of its. The metal string board is attached to a thick block of wood, allowing long screws to be drilled deep into the wood, thus holding it securely keeping the strings in tune. He attached his socket wrench to the metal piece holding a string set and showed me how it just twirled freely in the wood. Apparently, there are fatal cracks in the wood supporting my string board, and it cannot be repaired or replaced without taking apart the entire piano, and at great cost. So–his job here is done—can’t be fixed. He tightened up some of the strings that were really messed up, so I’ve played it for a couple of days, and it sounds a little better.

It’s a piano. I know. It’s not a dog, nor a horse, nor a human being. But…it’s been in my family for over 65 years. And it is 90 years old, we figured out from looking up the company that made it and using the serial number we found stamped on the metal soundboard. Also, now I feel like I may have aggravated its demise by moving here to the desert, because the ultra-dry air is definitely not wood friendly. Sigh….

My mother didn’t play the piano. But she really wanted all of her daughters to have the chance to learn to play. Shortly after I was born, and my parents purchased the farm on which I and my seven siblings were raised she got this piano. My two older sisters were the first to sit down to it for their practices, starting about age six or seven. I’m not really sure what the woman who taught us charged other students. We paid her in eggs, plus a dollar. It was our job to gather the eggs from the coop every evening, wash them, and box them. The hens produced about 90 every day. Eventually, my younger sister (15 months apart to the day) and I started lessons as our two big sisters got busy with high school. Over the years, there were two, maybe three sisters, taking lessons at any one time.

We’d get off the school bus on the corner of the teacher’s block in town on Friday afternoons. Then, we’d walk down the sidewalk, stopping to say hi to some relatives of my dad who lived on that street too and arrive at her house. We didn’t knock, because she was busy with other students, but just quietly went in the front door, and sat on her couch waiting our turns. She had a vast collection of comic books in a box in the foyer, and I really looked forward to reading them while my sister had her lesson. We were never allowed to buy or read comic books at our house. But the comic books at Mrs. Cranny’s house were so enlightening to me. A group of them told the stories of WWII. I read about the Bataan Death March, the Attack on Pearl Harbor, and various German campaigns. No one in school ever taught us this, and my parents didn’t talk about it, even though my dad served in the Philippines during the war. So, besides piano playing, I appreciated my lessons because I learned so many more things about recent history on those Friday afternoons! Then Mother would pick us up, and we’d help her deliver the eggs she sold to other people in town.

I am a piano player. That’s all. I’m not a pianist or a musician. I learned to identify that this dot on the staff represented this key for my finger to play. I practiced eagerly at first because it was fun to make music. I passed off book after book. The teacher would pencil a date and my initials on the corner of the page when I’d succeeded in learning a song well enough. My two older sisters’ initials and dates were there, too, with their little checks. Eventually, because I kept going, we had to buy a new piano book! I’d advanced beyond where they had finally gotten too busy with the rest of their lives to keep on with piano. My mom’s rule was the one I used with my children: You have to take lessons for at least two years, or you won’t know if you like it or not. You won’t have enough skills to be able to make a fair choice. After four or five years, I think both of my sisters knew that there were other things that they’d rather spend their time on; but they could read music, and they could play enough to understand the concepts.

I’ll never forget the yearly recital. It was a horrible time for me. I was just fine playing away in our living room, with only my mother for an audience. In fact, she’d often be ironing while I practiced, and she’d been through these same songs already twice, so she’d speak up and have me play something again because she recognized that I’d not done it correctly. But recitals…other people were there! Other people listening to me make mistakes! Other people who were so much more skilled than I at this! I was probably 12 or 13 before I could actually make it through my song without crying. More than once, I actually just left the piano in the middle of the song and ran out into the foyer of the church to hide and cry because I was too nervous to play in front of other people. I wasn’t a very good piano player. I just liked doing it. With no one listening.

Which brings me to when I actually became a functioning piano player. High school got very busy for me and I stopped my lessons. Ironically, I discovered then that I was completely comfortable performing in public as an actress! Or when participating in the Speech Club! Zoom forward a few more years to when I was a newlywed Navy wife, living in San Diego. Some folks at my church found out I could play the piano and asked me to help them with the early morning religious service they held at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot. I was an excellent candidate because I had an ID card, a base sticker on my car, and no little children, yet. I practiced the three songs they’d told me about and showed up on the base at the theater we used for church where the young men were finishing boot camp before most of them would go off to Viet Nam.

However, halfway through the meeting, the leader stood up and said, “Let’s have a little singing time. What would you brothers like to sing?” And he called on people to choose songs from our hymnal. Songs that I had not practiced! Songs that I could only play with one finger to keep the melody going! How embarrassing was that?! These young men were almost Marines, and the Marines always excel. From then on, I’d stop off at my local church building two nights a week after I got off work and practice those favorites that the Boots all wanted to sing, so that I would not be humiliated again! I got very good at playing anything in our hymnbook thanks to the Marines, and I must give credit to my mom’s chickens as well for the lessons.

It was at least nine years after that when, out of the blue, my mom asked if I’d like to have the piano. I was thrilled! My younger sisters were out of the piano lesson world, and Mother really wanted to get the big old thing out of her living room. By coincidence, a relative was moving to San Diego for a job, and The Big Old Thing was just included in their moving van. It was absolutely divine for me to have that wonderful piano sitting now in my own living room!

The two oldest children got started on piano lessons a few years later. We moved to Idaho briefly—more children grew old enough to have lessons. There was a job transfer three years after that back to a different town in California. All the children were involved in lessons, and, just like my sisters and I, as their lives got more complicated in middle school, and high school, piano lessons were gone from their schedules. However, three of them moved right into other musical instruments as school band became an option, and soon our house was filled with more than just the piano music. But many an afternoon or evening, the songs from the latest musicals were played and played on that piano: Phantom of the Opera and Les Mis were popular. One child would just put the written music aside and play his own version of whatever song he’d learned—how would it sound if he played it in a different key? So, voila–he’d play it that way! Sheesh… I kept getting asked to play music in church—who knew that hymn playing was a rare skill set for so many adults? Not that I was so great at it! But I was able to do it knowing that no one was sitting in the congregation thinking, “Well, I could do better than she is playing!” Oh, except for a couple of my teenagers, one of whom would roll his eyes occasionally at me after some serious gaffs. I actually got pretty good at it after a bit of time—but ONLY the hymn book! One evening I was practicing the songs for the next morning’s service, realizing that something wasn’t quite right, and I heard a call from the bedroom down the hall from one of our sons who somehow got every music gene the family possesses. “MOM!! In the third line, the second measure, there’s an accidental G# in the bass!!” I’d been missing it and he couldn’t bear it any longer….

That piano got moved from Wyoming to California to Idaho, back to California, then to Maryland, and finally to Las Vegas. We moved here because the grandchildren were being born in northern Utah, and I didn’t want to live 2000 miles away from them. When they grew old enough to spend time at G & G’s house, guess what was one of the big attractions? Yes! Their parents had decided that piano lessons were important, and their children should learn to play, also. So, it was pretty cool to come and play on the piano where their parents AND their grandma had learned! Three generations on these keys! Lots of music has been made!

And now, the end is near. And [the family piano] faces the final curtain…apologies to Frank Sinatra. I don’t know what I’m going to do with the huge old hulk. Nothing yet—I can still play it because that fellow tuned it a little bit. But it seems like it needs more than just to be tossed in the trash. Maybe I’ll have the wood recycled and make my coffin! Hey…a plan begins to form. I could use the pedals for handles…hmmm.

I was playing piano to relax on the morning of the day I gave birth to the fifth child.

He has so many more musical skills that I will ever have!

This man on the right is my grandfather. He is sitting in my mom’s living room talking

to his sisters and my aunt (his daughter.) The Big Old Thing is in the background.

Published in Group Writing
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  1. Gary McVey Contributor
    Gary McVey
    @GaryMcVey

    Wow, what a poignant and down to Earth post. It’s one of those brilliantly crafted pieces where you only just wish you could express things as well as the author did.

    Bravo, Cow Girl. You’re a helluva writer. Hope this post gets the attention it deserves. 

    • #1
  2. Marjorie Reynolds Coolidge
    Marjorie Reynolds
    @MarjorieReynolds

    I had piano lessons for about 8 years growing up, unfortunately,  though I passed the grades 1 to 6, I really had no aptitude for it and was never able to feel relaxed at it, even on my own. I’m naturally inclined to laziness so I knew I didn’t practice enough, and the day before my lesson I would be feeling the tension rising inside me.  My mother (who never had the opportunity) however, was very attached to the idea that one of her children would become an accomplished player and saw the fact that I had long fingers as proof enough that I could be.

    The piano we had was bought 2nd hand from a music teacher not far away who was moving. It had a lovely dignified sort of sound, new pianos seemed to sound a bit timid compared to it. It was bought for my older brother who managed about 2 grades and then gave it up without much controversy. Shortly after that my mother decided I’d be the musical one.

    Me and that piano became locked in a bitter struggle until I reached Leaving Cert and it was easier to persuade her  that giving up the lessons would give me more time to study. The worst atrocity during this long conflict was committed by me aged 11 when frustrated by getting the same bar of music wrong again and again I banged my fist down on keys and broke 2 hammers. I was filled with remorse and received many lectures on controlling my temper. A piano tuner came out and repaired them but the two affected keys never sounded quite the same again and it always felt like a reproach from that noble object.

    That piano still stands in my parent’s living room, some of its keys have lost all power of speech now. I saw a piano on a rubbish heap once, it looked desolate , like the aftermath of a house fire or something. No, our old piano will not suffer such degradation. I feel I owe it that much.

    Another piano came into my life a few years ago when I bought my own house. The house itself needed a huge amount of renovation, the owner had recently died and her family were quite happy to throw in some of the old fashioned furniture including a delightful looking piano. I didn’t quite know what to do about it but I couldn’t let it suffer on a rubbish heap. I got a local piano tuner to take a look, he pronounced it untuneable. I contacted a Polish friend of a friend who can make a sort of Frankenstein’s monster out of various parts of different pianos but he wasn’t interested.  In the end, one of the Polish builders working on my house asked if he could try cobbling it together for his daughter. I couldn’t have been more delighted. 

    • #2
  3. KirkianWanderer Inactive
    KirkianWanderer
    @KirkianWanderer

    I’m so sorry, I know how hard it is to lose an instrument that means a lot to you. We lost my first harp in a house fire, and have been renting ever since. My dad wants to build me a new one (there are kits for it, and he’s a woodworker/cabinet maker by profession), but I have no idea where I’ll be for grad school and the career I want requires a fair bit of moving around, so I keep putting him off. I ended up buying a miniature at an early music store in London this year just so that I could keep up with practice, and naturally one of my tutors spotted it and made me play for the class.

    • #3
  4. KentForrester Coolidge
    KentForrester
    @KentForrester

    Wonderful, Cow Girl, just wonderful.  Someone could make a movie out of your piece, perhaps a short film with the piano with a talking part.

    Just the best post I’ve read in a long while.

    • #4
  5. Manny Coolidge
    Manny
    @Manny

    What a great read. Thank you for sharing. I get attached to family things like that piano. I’m sorry you have to lose it. I know how you must feel. 

    • #5
  6. Dotorimuk Coolidge
    Dotorimuk
    @Dotorimuk

    FANTASTIC piece.

    • #6
  7. Sandy Member
    Sandy
    @Sandy

    One of my grandmothers was a piano teacher in a small Indiana town, but she had her own chickens so her students had to pay in hard cash.  The last fee I knew of, which would have been in the late 6o’s, was 75 cents, which she refused to raise. I loved playing her old upright,  my bare feet resting on the dog, who liked to sleep on the bare floor near the pedals.  It was a good time and place to be a kid and I’ve no doubt that some of her students are still playing the occasional hymn.

     

    • #7
  8. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    I love your personal pieces, Cow Girl. I made a couple of stabs at instruments, but my brother was the musical talent. He learned to play strictly by ear–the piano and the marimba. Good for you that you stuck with it all those years. May your piano rest in peace.

    • #8
  9. colleenb Member
    colleenb
    @colleenb

    Thanks for this post. My family piano was a baby grand which moved with us (out of storage) from California to Virginia. As far as I know, I was the only kid who had lessons but then I was the only one where it was in the house continuously. (Military family so moving around and quarters that could not hold a grand.) I gave it away after my father died as, again, I did not live in a house that could accommodate the piano. It was hard to do but the right time as it wasn’t getting played. I feel for you. 

    • #9
  10. PHCheese Inactive
    PHCheese
    @PHCheese

    My mother was somewhat like yours. She bought a piano so my older sister could take lessons. Sis really never got into it and I couldn’t sit still long enough to tell the white keys from the black. When mom died however I ended up with the piano. It moved from Pennsylvania to North Carolina to five places in South Carolina. It’s board is also broken and it is now in my daughter’s garage until I figure out what I can recycle it into. When it was still in Pennsylvania on the farm my wife sat down to play a little. As she was playing five baby garter snakes emerged from behind the keyboard. That’s when we checked all the window screens and sure enough one had a hole big enough for a mother snake. I’ll let you know what I make out of the piano.

    • #10
  11. colleenb Member
    colleenb
    @colleenb

    PHCheese (View Comment):

    My mother was somewhat like yours. She bought a piano so my older sister could take lessons. Sis really never got into it and I couldn’t sit still long enough to tell the white keys from the black. When mom died however I ended up with the piano. It moved from Pennsylvania to North Carolina to five places in South Carolina. It’s board is also broken and it is now in my daughter’s garage until I figure out what I can recycle it into. When it was still in Pennsylvania on the farm my wife sat down to play a little. As she was playing five baby garter snakes emerged from behind the keyboard. That’s when we checked all the window screens and sure enough one had a hole big enough for a mother snake. I’ll let you know what I make out of the piano.

    I think on Home Town the guy made it into a desk and used the piano stool for the chair. 

    • #11
  12. Cow Girl Thatcher
    Cow Girl
    @CowGirl

    PHCheese (View Comment):
    As she was playing five baby garter snakes emerged from behind the keyboard. That’s when we checked all the window screens and sure enough one had a hole big enough for a mother snake. I’ll let you know what I make out of the piano.

    Oh gosh!! If snakes came out of my piano then I’d definitely have to get a flamethrower and burn that thing down!!! Snakes!! NOooooo….(Bucking horses-ok. stampeding cattle-ok; endless fields of hay bales to haul-ok–But NO SNAKES!

    • #12
  13. Marjorie Reynolds Coolidge
    Marjorie Reynolds
    @MarjorieReynolds

    PHCheese (View Comment):

    My mother was somewhat like yours. She bought a piano so my older sister could take lessons. Sis really never got into it and I couldn’t sit still long enough to tell the white keys from the black. When mom died however I ended up with the piano. It moved from Pennsylvania to North Carolina to five places in South Carolina. It’s board is also broken and it is now in my daughter’s garage until I figure out what I can recycle it into. When it was still in Pennsylvania on the farm my wife sat down to play a little. As she was playing five baby garter snakes emerged from behind the keyboard. That’s when we checked all the window screens and sure enough one had a hole big enough for a mother snake. I’ll let you know what I make out of the piano.

    You say it so casually like you found a litter of kittens in there. 

    • #13
  14. Jules PA Inactive
    Jules PA
    @JulesPA

    You might search for a piano tuning school, sometimes interns need a good project. Your will either get a new life, or it will have been donated to “science.”

    Also, check if the keys are ivory. If they are, that may be valuable feature to reclaim. 

    Great post.

    • #14
  15. Cow Girl Thatcher
    Cow Girl
    @CowGirl

    Jules PA (View Comment):

    You might search for a piano tuning school, sometimes interns need a good project. Your will either get a new life, or it will have been donated to “science.”

    Also, check if the keys are ivory. If they are, that may be valuable feature to reclaim.

    Great post.

    The original keys were just plastic, too. After I got the piano, one day the two year old decided that all the keys should be black so he carefully striped each white key with a permanent black marker. It was amazingly methodical for such a little kid!! Yes, we got new key tops. 

    • #15
  16. Arahant Member
    Arahant
    @Arahant

    Marjorie Reynolds (View Comment):
    You say it so casually like you found a litter of kittens in there. 

    Garter snakes are cute. My grandfather had one as a pet that he carried around in his suit pants pocket.

    • #16
  17. GLDIII Temporarily Essential Reagan
    GLDIII Temporarily Essential
    @GLDIII

    This story seems familiar.

    My grandparents wanted one of their two boys (born in ’34 and ’37) to play the piano. They bought it from one of the many dealers at that time in Manhattan (this was prewar WWII). It was a Lester baby grand. My dad was the one of the two that was able to become reasonably proficient, and played all the way to his college years (which he also did in Manhattan). I did not see that piano show up until my folks bought their first home in Long Island. At this point it has became a fixture of my childhood, because I recall my father coming home from work several times a week, and pounding out some of his learned repertoire. Mostly classical, some jazz (sort of a forbidden fruit during his teens), and the occasional broadway/musical/movie scores).

    When we moved to Maryland in 68′ the piano stayed back at my grandparents home for a few years until the folks decided that Maryland was a permeant move since the job was initially a one year TDY. When my grandparents sold their home the piano came south in 1970, but it suffered some water damage from the grandparents basement. I remember my father and his dad striping and re-veneering the lovely walnut exterior then getting Charlie de Tuna (I never knew the guys correct name, that what dad called him) to come and get it back in shape sound wise from all the moving.

    By late 1971 was was about the right time for lessons. I had already been playing clarinet, then saxophone, but the chosen one for lessons was my sister, who is 6 year my junior, and at the prime age to pick it up. Since I was a new ordained driver, it became part of my deal for car access (back then this was a critical requirement for all young men).  I had to take her for lessons, about a 12 mile trip. The folks offer to pick up lessons for me as well and for two years I tried, really,…. but I think I was ruined by being bass clef illiterate, and brain wired for all fingers working together for one note at, one instant. I recall Dad’s occasionally playing when the family moved again to his final home on the West River in 1978, but he had not played for many years, and to say the least, his Rachmaninoff was pretty….. rocky.

    Fast forward to two years ago, Dad has been gone for 8 years by then, and my mom had a growth pressing on the side of her frontal lobe, and was losing her independence. She moved in with me in the adjacent apartment I build two and half decades earlier for my Dad’s mom. It was during one of our discussions about what she want to do with the stuff in the house that I learned some of the blanks in Dad’s piano play habits during my youth. Dad’s almost daily playing was him working off his frustration with the crappy work conditions with his first job at Republic Avaition. Uninspiring grunt stuff with a huge dollop typical DoD paper work and requirements insanity, working off period shifts with one other engineer who was a drunkard, but not quite fireable. Young married men with two children, and a stay home wife, do not just up a leave a good paying job. The piano was his outlet for blowing off steam. A few years later he managed to get a job with Grumman Aerospace building the OAO telescope, which was the precursor program for Hubble Space telescope a few decades later. He eventually went one to work on that program as well. (Interesting side note, my Brother in law, and my newly minted Daughter in law currently work to keep that program alive until the Webb telescope come on line). That job set his, as well as his children, life trajectories for the next 50 years.

    Mom passed late last summer, and last fall it was the unhappy job of clearing out a lifetime of stuff and memories from a couple of depression cognizant adults, who could never parted with anything that might have a reuse. When the last weekend before we had to be all clear came, the decision on the piano had to be faced. My sister’s home was too small and crowded for the piano. None of the grandchildren learned to play. The piano needed much TLC to restore. The the veneer job was showing it’s age, the strings were well past their fatigue live and could no longer be tuned, it sounded really sad.

    Emotionally I could not part with that piano knowing all the blanks my mom filled in on it’s history in our family. I took it home, and this spring had it completely restored, new keys, new pads, new veneer, new strings, new hammers, at probably far more than it’s worth. Strange how certain decisions can not be financially rationalized. 

    Both of my daughters in laws are residing under my roof (another story for another day) and it turns out that both have some more than rudimentary piano skills that I was unaware. One morning I came down to Hannah playing, and I am suddenly like this scene from Pixar’s Ratatouilles.

    The emotions that come bubbling up were shockingly unexpected. I had to sit and wonder why I could not see out of teary, unmanly eyes.

    Epilog:

    Since the WuFlu lock down I have been sitting at the keyboard going thru my daughter’s (I know, they married into my family, but they are now mine as well) early playing books, trying to pick up where I stopped in 1978. My wife says she can definitely hear me learning and improving, but I am not that confident (old dog, new tricks, old brain). At least my children, and perhaps my grandchildren, will carry the piano’s heritage forward. It’s cast iron sound board can last another hundred years with a few more re-stringings.

    • #17
  18. Arahant Member
    Arahant
    @Arahant

    GLDIII Temporarily Essential (View Comment):
    I took it home, and this spring had it completely restored, new keys, new pads, new veneer, new strings, new hammers, at probably far more than it’s worth.

    Theseus’ piano.

    • #18
  19. Quietpi Member
    Quietpi
    @Quietpi

    Cow Girl, don’t give up so easily.  It sounds like you got somebody who tunes pianos, and nothing else.  Try this:  Call the best piano store near you, wherever that may be, and ask who they would recommend, not just to tune, but to do repairs.  Then have him / her come out and at least give you an estimate.  To the best of my knowledge, the tuning pegs are seated in the iron “harp,” not the wood sounding board.  Replacing a tuning peg is no big deal.  That happens all the time on old pianos.  A good tuner / repair person will have a supply in his/her tool kit.  And for a good full – size upright, it just might be worthwhile to have him take it to his shop to work on it.  (And by the way, that piano stool is worth its weight in gold.  Don’t part with that easily whatever happens to the instrument.)

    I understand from a piano tuner friend that pianos do lose some degree of sound over the years as the wood sounding board loses some of the tension it is under ( the harp and the sounding board are bolted together).  And, true, low humidity doesn’t help.  But there are devices to help keep the humidity up inside the piano case.  It’s entirely possible that some or all of the damage done by low humidity can be overcome.  And given your description of you, that will likely be just fine.  Our piano is over 100 years old, and it still sounds wonderful.

    My mother taught piano and organ, and saved her lesson money for years with the goal of getting a good grand piano.  The day came, and she bought a beautiful instrument from a private party.  It had been tuned to itself for years, and was nowhere close where it should be pitch – wise.  The tuner was working on bringing it up to pitch, when the house shook with a deafening BANG!  He had tried to bring it up too much at once, and the harp broke.  He did his best to repair it, but it never did sound right, and it wouldn’t hold pitch for more than a few hours.  He never forgave himself.  A while later he took Mom back to his shop, and showed her a full – size upright he had just obtained from a bar.  It had great sound, but was really ugly.  He said he would sell it to Mom for a really good price, if she wanted it once he had finished restoring it.  She accepted the offer.  The tuner became a long – time friend, and he told me that he never forgave himself for that deal, either.  Because if he had any idea what was under all that paint and grime:

    • #19
  20. GLDIII Temporarily Essential Reagan
    GLDIII Temporarily Essential
    @GLDIII

    Cow Girl (View Comment):

    PHCheese (View Comment):
    As she was playing five baby garter snakes emerged from behind the keyboard. That’s when we checked all the window screens and sure enough one had a hole big enough for a mother snake. I’ll let you know what I make out of the piano.

    Oh gosh!! If snakes came out of my piano then I’d definitely have to get a flamethrower and burn that thing down!!! Snakes!! NOooooo….(Bucking horses-ok. stampeding cattle-ok; endless fields of hay bales to haul-ok–But NO SNAKES!

    • #20
  21. PHCheese Inactive
    PHCheese
    @PHCheese

    colleenb (View Comment):

    PHCheese (View Comment):

    My mother was somewhat like yours. She bought a piano so my older sister could take lessons. Sis really never got into it and I couldn’t sit still long enough to tell the white keys from the black. When mom died however I ended up with the piano. It moved from Pennsylvania to North Carolina to five places in South Carolina. It’s board is also broken and it is now in my daughter’s garage until I figure out what I can recycle it into. When it was still in Pennsylvania on the farm my wife sat down to play a little. As she was playing five baby garter snakes emerged from behind the keyboard. That’s when we checked all the window screens and sure enough one had a hole big enough for a mother snake. I’ll let you know what I make out of the piano.

    I think on Home Town the guy made it into a desk and used the piano stool for the chair.

    Good idea but I already have a nicer desk than I could ever make

    • #21
  22. PHCheese Inactive
    PHCheese
    @PHCheese

    Marjorie Reynolds (View Comment):

    PHCheese (View Comment):

    My mother was somewhat like yours. She bought a piano so my older sister could take lessons. Sis really never got into it and I couldn’t sit still long enough to tell the white keys from the black. When mom died however I ended up with the piano. It moved from Pennsylvania to North Carolina to five places in South Carolina. It’s board is also broken and it is now in my daughter’s garage until I figure out what I can recycle it into. When it was still in Pennsylvania on the farm my wife sat down to play a little. As she was playing five baby garter snakes emerged from behind the keyboard. That’s when we checked all the window screens and sure enough one had a hole big enough for a mother snake. I’ll let you know what I make out of the piano.

    You say it so casually like you found a litter of kittens in there.

    We usually had a litter of them around as well. The cats are supposed to eat the mice so there aren’t any for the snakes. Balance of nature and all that stuff.

    • #22
  23. Quietpi Member
    Quietpi
    @Quietpi

    If anybody knows how to enlarge that photo, please do it, or tell me how.  

    Mrs. Quietpi’s a music teacher, and all our grandchildren play violin.  They always bring their instruments when they come to town, and love to have Grammy accompany them as they show off their newest pieces.  

    • #23
  24. PHCheese Inactive
    PHCheese
    @PHCheese

    Arahant (View Comment):

    Marjorie Reynolds (View Comment):
    You say it so casually like you found a litter of kittens in there.

    Garter snakes are cute. My grandfather had one as a pet that he carried around in his suit pants pocket.

    Did he ever run into Mae West?

    • #24
  25. Cow Girl Thatcher
    Cow Girl
    @CowGirl

    GLDIII Temporarily Essential (View Comment):

    The photo that is at the top of the story was placed there by the Ricochet editors. I wish I had that stool! BUT…I will talk to a piano store here and see about the rest of what you told me. If I could save this wonderful beast, I will!

    • #25
  26. Arahant Member
    Arahant
    @Arahant

    PHCheese (View Comment):

    Arahant (View Comment):

    Marjorie Reynolds (View Comment):
    You say it so casually like you found a litter of kittens in there.

    Garter snakes are cute. My grandfather had one as a pet that he carried around in his suit pants pocket.

    Did he ever run into Mae West?

    That’s a good question, and I can’t say for certain, but probably not. I don’t know of any trips he took to New York or LA. Maybe he did, though, or maybe she took a vacation in Georgia. They were about the same age, though.

    • #26
  27. Southern Pessimist Member
    Southern Pessimist
    @SouthernPessimist

    How did that old song go? You know, the one by John Denver. Wasn’t it This old piano taught me to sing a love song, showed me how to laugh and cry…and it helped me make it through some lonely nights. What a friend to have on a cold and lonely night.

    • #27
  28. PHCheese Inactive
    PHCheese
    @PHCheese

    Arahant (View Comment):

    PHCheese (View Comment):

    Arahant (View Comment):

    Marjorie Reynolds (View Comment):
    You say it so casually like you found a litter of kittens in there.

    Garter snakes are cute. My grandfather had one as a pet that he carried around in his suit pants pocket.

    Did he ever run into Mae West?

    That’s a good question, and I can’t say for certain, but probably not. I don’t know of any trips he took to New York or LA. Maybe he did, though, or maybe she took a vacation in Georgia. They were about the same age, though.

    If he had she would have said “is that a snake or are you just happy to see me”?

    • #28
  29. Stina Inactive
    Stina
    @CM

    Man. It’s like reading my own story. My upright is over 100 years old… 1910s. Beautiful carvings on the front.

    My sound board is not cracked yet. The pins are a bit loose, but so far, they are holding.

    A piano restore looks around $5000 for something I could replace for half the cost, but it’s so beautiful and they just don’t make them like this anymore!

    Ours hasn’t been in the family for generations… my dad bought it for my mom for their 5th wedding anniversary for $300, but it was her first piano since marrying him (she was a music education major).

    I found a place that does full restorations for 10s of thousands of dollars. I want this piano to make it to my daughter’s house…

    But maybe it really is time to say goodbye.

    • #29
  30. Gary McVey Contributor
    Gary McVey
    @GaryMcVey

    Stina (View Comment):

    Man. It’s like reading my own story. My upright is over 100 years old… 1910s. Beautiful carvings on the front.

    My sound board is not cracked yet. The pins are a bit loose, but so far, they are holding.

    A piano restore looks around $5000 for something I could replace for half the cost, but it’s so beautiful and they just don’t make them like this anymore!

    Ours hasn’t been in the family for generations… my dad bought it for my mom for their 5th wedding anniversary for $300, but it was her first piano since marrying him (she was a music education major).

    I found a place that does full restorations for 10s of thousands of dollars. I want this piano to make it to my daughter’s house…

    But maybe it really is time to say goodbye.

    Sounds like car restoration. They don’t style them the way they used to, so thousands of men will cheerfully pay $50,000 to make a $20,000 old car into a $40,000 restored car. 

    • #30
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