The Most Pleasant Sound
I was writing early this morning (posted below) about how our living room has become more and more a "parlor" through the years. It's generally a quiet room, but as I'm writing there is a most pleasant exception. Not the finch (though he is singing beautifullyalong). No, the most pleasant sound in the room is when our youngest daughter Natalie is playing the piano.
She's sitting at the old Acrosonic piano that her grandmother (Julie's mom) gave us in the late Eighties. Her Grandpa McNabb brought it all the way from Kansas in the back of a pick-up truck (the same truck we once drove through New York City loaded up like the Beverly Hillbillies—but that’s another story.) Julie’s mom played that Acrosonic when they were little girls. It’s the same piano Julie learned on when she took. (“Learned on when she took” is the way they say it in Kansas.)
This beautiful old piano came with nostalgia whispering from every faded scratch and chipped key, and we've added an additional generation of memories. Julie claims she "doesn't play" anymore. (She does but not publicly—just for pleasure—she's quite good.) Fifteen years ago, Natalie's older two older sisters sat on that very bench playing tunes like “French Children’s Song” and “The Little Flower Girl of Paris.” They still sit and play them when they think no one is listening—they're such simple, beautiful melodies they make my eyes water. I confess; the same thing is happening now.
Natalie is playing “Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again” from Phantom of the Opera. That song is often meaningful to me, but hearing it sung in her airy child-like voice is very moving. Natalie's piano skills have advanced remarkably since she started three summers ago. What’s wonderful about her playing is that she does it for the joy of doing it—sometimes for hours. We never have to tell her to “practice.” She has lots of friends and is very social, but one of her friends is music.
Most of the time, kids “take piano,” but sometimes piano takes a kid. That’s how it is with her.
She is gifted—by that I don’t mean that she has been endowed with a rare talent that the world must hear. She’s not a prodigy. (That kind of giftedness becomes one's life without necessarily enhancing it. It's as different as a cinnamon tree is from cinnamon toast.) She's gifted in that she has learned the language of music easily. [Thank you, Marcia, Angela, and Sheri.] Her fingers follow her mind with little effort; her voice joins in because… it can’t help it; and time passes at the piano with no care to be elsewhere. In that sense she has a gift. She is often oblivious to the fact that anyone is listening. Right now she seems unaware that I'm ten feet away in my wing-back recliner... listening.
She is very much a David to this King Saul when my mind lets go the burdens of the day.
She's sitting at the old Acrosonic piano that her grandmother (Julie's mom) gave us in the late Eighties. Her Grandpa McNabb brought it all the way from Kansas in the back of a pick-up truck (the same truck we once drove through New York City loaded up like the Beverly Hillbillies—but that’s another story.) Julie’s mom played that Acrosonic when they were little girls. It’s the same piano Julie learned on when she took. (“Learned on when she took” is the way they say it in Kansas.)
This beautiful old piano came with nostalgia whispering from every faded scratch and chipped key, and we've added an additional generation of memories. Julie claims she "doesn't play" anymore. (She does but not publicly—just for pleasure—she's quite good.) Fifteen years ago, Natalie's older two older sisters sat on that very bench playing tunes like “French Children’s Song” and “The Little Flower Girl of Paris.” They still sit and play them when they think no one is listening—they're such simple, beautiful melodies they make my eyes water. I confess; the same thing is happening now.
Natalie is playing “Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again” from Phantom of the Opera. That song is often meaningful to me, but hearing it sung in her airy child-like voice is very moving. Natalie's piano skills have advanced remarkably since she started three summers ago. What’s wonderful about her playing is that she does it for the joy of doing it—sometimes for hours. We never have to tell her to “practice.” She has lots of friends and is very social, but one of her friends is music.
Most of the time, kids “take piano,” but sometimes piano takes a kid. That’s how it is with her.
She is gifted—by that I don’t mean that she has been endowed with a rare talent that the world must hear. She’s not a prodigy. (That kind of giftedness becomes one's life without necessarily enhancing it. It's as different as a cinnamon tree is from cinnamon toast.) She's gifted in that she has learned the language of music easily. [Thank you, Marcia, Angela, and Sheri.] Her fingers follow her mind with little effort; her voice joins in because… it can’t help it; and time passes at the piano with no care to be elsewhere. In that sense she has a gift. She is often oblivious to the fact that anyone is listening. Right now she seems unaware that I'm ten feet away in my wing-back recliner... listening.
She is very much a David to this King Saul when my mind lets go the burdens of the day.
posted by .Tom Kapanka | 7:31 PM
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