From the time I first began playing an instrument in third grade, I was taught that it was something precious to be treated with respect. Oliver Hammond, who took the above photograph, described the sound that piano made as it fell from the pickup they were using to take it to his house.
"It landed on its lid in the gutter and exploded with the most horrible screeching and wailing a musical instrument can make."
Imagine, therefore, watching as a piano which has been in your family for generations is loaded onto a truck to be donated to a retirement community, church, school, or another family, only to find out later it was "bust(ed) up with a sledgehammer" and shoved off the back of a truck at the county landfill. That is exactly what's happening to thousands of pianos each year. Â One piano mover in New York state says it takes 5-10 pianos per month to the transfer station for disposal. Â I found a dozen piano movers between the northern edge of Central Park and the Holland Tunnel in New York City. Â You can do the math. While there are times an instrument cannot be saved, there surely must be something we can do to connect people who would love to have an instrument with someone who can no longer use one, before it is shipped to the landfill. Read For More Pianos, Last Note is a Thud in the Dump (NY Times) Watch Requiem for a piano (NY Times)
Classical Music on Tap
Beer and pizza. Â Those are two words which seem to always have been joined at the hip. Â Beer and classical music? Â Not so much. Â On the other hand, no one thinks twice about pairing wine with classical music.
Chardonnay with Chopin. Â Cabernet with Kabalevsky. Â Why not Lager with Liszt? Â Pale Ale with Paderewski?
One writer thinks craft beers have reached such a level of popularity that it's high time we think in those terms. Read The Classical Kegerator: Pairing Beer with Music (NPR)
The Gold Medal Goes to Ricardo Barthelemy for the Triumphal Olympic March
Yes, there was a period of time when competition in the Arts was held in similar high esteem as those in sports, at least during the Olympic Games. Â Baron Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the IOC and the modern Games, was determined to place competition in the Arts at the same level as sport, just as the Greeks had. When the Olympic Games resumed following WWII, an American businessman named Avery Brundage took the reins of the IOC, sounding the death-knell for Olympic Arts competition. There has been an official Sport and Art Contest preceding the games since 2004, though no medals are awarded. Â The Smithsonian reports that "this year, sculptures and graphic works on the theme of Sport and the Olympic Values of Excellence, Friendship and Respect" were solicited with cash prizes at stake. Â The best works are being displayed around London during the Games. Read When the Olympics Gave Out Medals for Art (Smithsonian)