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| pianos: too heavy for their own good. | 02.09.2004 | |
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 [the following post was inspired by xander’s article: “waste of my 4/4 time.” the phrensick writing staff doesn’t have any particular personal vendettas against pianos and does not wish to incite the wrath of the powerful piano mega-corporations.] for the post-adolescent of yesterday’s youth, to raise a family within a white-picket fence—in a house with a piano—is everyone’s dream. but as the sixth chapter of any parenting: 101 book clearly states: every couple wants to have a child prodigy. not to have to find a way to move a grand piano. fortunately, most middle class houses come complete with a piano. whether it exists as part of every house’s construction and design, purely out of some inexplicable, other-worldly mandate, or by the desire of the previous owners to abandon it and not to have to find a way to move a grand piano, it is there. and for now, everyone’s happy. then, interest in the piano starts to wane. no one plays it. you can’t move the damned thing... even just to push it aside to have company over. it commands the uselessness of an entire room. you can’t sit around it, as a coffee-table, because of it’s awkward amebic shape. and despite your impulses, you cannot lay on it, because you have to have that top propped up... as if the piano was to say: “hey, i’m a piano. i am the non-walking, non-talking essence of “a good idea, at the time.” now, i’m here because... well... i’m pretty fucking heavy. and no one wants to move me. or, frankly, has any idea how to move me. look into my propped-up top... see all that stuff in there? all of that stuff looks real heavy doesn’t it. something to the tune of five hundred pounds? a half ton? you could just go back to watching the seventh inning of the yankees’ game... or you could grab some sort of power saw, cut me up, and leave me in a bathtub as an even messier problem.” and, even though that piano is treating you like a complete jackass, you know, deep down, that it is totally right on the money. what the hell are you going to do with a thousand pound mess of wood, metal, brass, felt, leather, and the tusks of illegally killed endangered elepants. you can't leave it outside on a thursay morning. then you hear another whisper—which may or may not have come from the piano—“PSST! if you had children, they could play me... err, the piano. they could learn to read music, score a school play, win scholarships, become a child prodigy like beethoven and mozart... handel and gretel, or possibly even reach multimedia superstardom like john tesh.” which gets you to thinkin’... about sex. so, after a couple of years of waiting through the boring parts... the carrying, the birthing, the weaning, the rearing. all of this time is spent with the new child while exchanging awkward glances and frustrated glares with a piano... in a room that you can’t use for anything. that you are paying to keep clean, illuminated, heated in the winters and cooled in the summers. god, that piano pisses you off. finally, you notice that your three year old likes to toss half-used batteries into the piano's guts through that propped-up top. hmm... you think. is my child showing an early interest in this larger-than-life paperweight... or is he/she just doing what every kid loves to do: toss batteries into pianos? you decide that now is the time for the leap of faith. yes, you hire a piano teacher to craft and mold your child into god’s next (and greatest?) gift to the millions upon millions of people, waiting with bated breath, and just dying for more contemporary piano music. but, this dream will be interrupted by an alarm clock. it’s years later. your child now not only hates the piano. but also hates you... and themselves. enter: suicidal teenager (stage right). you should have never had that piano. you knew it was going to be a bitch to move. you saw jane campion’s early nineties film about moving a piano. you watched in agony as the characters attempted to move that piano... across seas, beaches, and rocky cliffs... [pause for dramatic moment between characters]. then, attempting to escape the clutches of death as they again moved the piano through dense forests on muddy paths [pause for more dramatic moments]. only to have to move the piano again... the film was like five hours long... why didn’t you learn? the history of pianos is anchored in it’s elegance... and slight weight problem. this is the genius of all of the people in the lucrative piano design and maintenance business. trumpets were popular in the 1920s. there was even trumpets in “the jazz singer,” the first full length film to feature sound. but, since trumpets weigh, on average, about 990 lbs. less than a grand piano... you can just toss them up into the attic without being afraid that they’ll crash back down into your living room. so, why are so many young children forced to become indentured piano students (while still so susceptible to failure... and boredom)? to become prodigies? to explore the arts? to become “cultured”? to offer an outlet for their personal expression? no. millions of homes contain an idle, big-ass piano. and the adults of these homes are stuck between a piano and a hard place. do you let the piano use you... forcing you to find some rational way of getting rid of it? or do you use the piano... forcing your kids to learn it. and dust it off before every practice. pianos are really, really heavy. and don't forget it. |
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| 1:16 am | sui generis said this. | |
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