The Piano Gremlin
If you've seen The Piano with Harvey Keitel and Holly Hunter, then you might understand my romanticized fantasies that I can actually play the piano that well. I've even bought Nyman's sheet music, and I've been playing plunking my way through "The Heart Asks Pleasure First" for longer than I care to admit. I take pride in the fact that I have the timing down and that I'm able to express the tone of the piece reasonably well ... at least on the parts that I know so far.
It certainly doesn't help that my piano has several sticky keys ... sticky meaning that these keys sound once, the first time that I play them, and then they stay down until I pry them back up with a fingernail. Not exactly helpful when I'm in the middle of a complicated piece that requires me to have three hands and that uses these particular sticky keys repeatedly!
As I play plunk away, I know when those sticky keys are supposed to play. I also know that, in their sticky stubbornness, they won't play. So my head has been imaginatively inserting the notes for me, and I just play on. I've reached the point where I'm OK with that. I'm OK with the fact that my piano is disabled and plays like it belongs in a haunted house amusement park attraction.
But dammit, I need the sticky keys to stay in ONE place!! My piano decided today that one sticky key -- the D right below middle C, a very necessary key -- doesn't need to stick anymore. In the middle of an Enya tune, no less. So I decide to run with it and play several more pieces ... only to find that the sticky key has just migrated one half note down to D flat, another very necessary key. Great. Like I needed that.
It certainly doesn't help that my piano has several sticky keys ... sticky meaning that these keys sound once, the first time that I play them, and then they stay down until I pry them back up with a fingernail. Not exactly helpful when I'm in the middle of a complicated piece that requires me to have three hands and that uses these particular sticky keys repeatedly!
As I play plunk away, I know when those sticky keys are supposed to play. I also know that, in their sticky stubbornness, they won't play. So my head has been imaginatively inserting the notes for me, and I just play on. I've reached the point where I'm OK with that. I'm OK with the fact that my piano is disabled and plays like it belongs in a haunted house amusement park attraction.
But dammit, I need the sticky keys to stay in ONE place!! My piano decided today that one sticky key -- the D right below middle C, a very necessary key -- doesn't need to stick anymore. In the middle of an Enya tune, no less. So I decide to run with it and play several more pieces ... only to find that the sticky key has just migrated one half note down to D flat, another very necessary key. Great. Like I needed that.