Memories of An Old Friend
A few days ago I was going through some old photos of pianos that I had purchased for resale during the first years of my career as a piano technician (a great way for a young technician to build up both experience and working capital) when I stumbled across a picture I had forgotten. It was an antique upright piano that I never bought and never sold. It was in such poor shape when I got it that I was never able to return it to the quality instrument it had been . Even so, this piano was one of my best friends for nearly ten years and I would like to tell you about our time together.
Weser Brothers #13369 was built in New York City in approximately 1888. If you are familiar with the pianos of that period you will see from the picture that it was a fine specimen of cabinetry in upright pianos of the period. Little is known about the next 80 or so years, until the youth director at the small Baptist church on the south side of San Antonio, Texas, where I served as pianist, bought it, hoping to get his two children interested in piano lessons (never happened). Shortly after he got it, I played on it and promptly began trying to buy it from him. New in the piano business, I could see great profit potential from this piano, but its tone and touch so excited me as a musician, (and I am such a poor poker-face), that I could not convince the man to sell. Time passed and the piano deteriorated. And still the owner declined to sell. Then one night he came to me after church. “David, do you still want that piano?” “Sure,” I said, reaching for my wallet, “ how much?” “Just come get it” he said.
So a few days later I picked up the instrument and started working on it. The case was refinished. Flanges were re-bushed and re-pinned. Keys were re-bushed and re-covered (had to use plastic-too much ivory was gone). Springs,straps and bass strings were replaced. Tuning pin block was treated with pin tightener since I could not afford a new block. It helped, but the instrument still never held tune like it should. A fair amount of my spare time for the next year or so was spent either tweaking some aspect of the action to make it play better or touching up the tuning. It was, in many ways, a labor of love.
This piano became my friend. Over the next few years it helped me work out arrangements for a church choir I was working with. It brought a smile back to my spirit when I sat down at it looking for relief from the blues. It helped me succeed at my one attempt at performing classical music. I was to tune the piano for a classical music festival near4 Kerrville, Texas. I was on the stage on Friday afternoon preparing the grand for that night’s recital when I was approached by the promoter with the line “David, just how good a pianist are you?” (Keep in mind here that the “classics” to me were artists like Floyd Cramer and Al Stricklin – long-time piano player for Bob Wills.) As it turned out, there was one piece on the Saturday night program that had a piano part – and he had not hired a pianist. With trepidation, I looked at the music and told him that I thought I could do it. Got home that night at about 11 pm after the recital, and between then and 3 am I washed my only white shirt to wear with the orchestra and learned a piece of music. Not a great sight-reader, if I had been less comfortable with my piano I don’t believe that I could have pulled it off, but I did. The conductor was still talking about it nearly a year later.
Our parting was a time of sadness for me. Recently married, we were moving to another city and putting most of my furniture into storage. Not enough room on the truck, and not enough money for another trip, I gave the piano to the music director at the church where I had been playing. I never heard what he did with it. If you have this piano, please leave me a comment and fill in its history since I left.
