Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Teachers Forum This is depressing

Read story here.

I don't find that depressing. I find it depressing to watch a kid unable to learn or practice because their piano needs to be dumped and replaced but the parents won't accept it, or can't afford to do anything. It's depressing to watch a poor family fork out to have a free piano-like carcass delivered up the stairs to their 6th floor flat, and for them not to be able to afford to have a tuner come and declare the piano dead.

That's depressing.

To me, it's not an either/or situation, but both!

We are all passing through this life. People. And our pianos.

If it's an old piano that has been well loved and played, then it lived a full life. Parting is sad, but not depressing.

Under the topic of sad piano stories: My mother told me her dad obtained a used grand piano when she was a girl. But after a while they noticed the floor was sagging a bit under the weight. So her brothers moved the piano out to a barn. And they were all surprised to find it soon was destroyed under these conditions.

It seems the English I learned in the "old days" is different than the English they are teaching today.

LOL!

On the one hand we have pianos that might still be decent being dumped because the "have" owners don't want them anymore. On the other hand we have the poor families described by Ten Left Thumbs who need a decent piano but can't afford one. The image of waste and destruction by the affluent who have more than they need, juxtaposed by need and inaccessibility because of poverty, is disturbing and it goes beyond pianos. The destruction of a functioning musical instrument is sad. The society side is also sad.

Uh, if you find this topic insignificant - the decline of pianos, players and teachers, perhaps you're in the wrong vocation. Nothing to laugh about.

You've given me the opportunity to use my English Oxford Dictionary:
sad: unhappy
depressed: a. dispirited or miserable. b. suffering from depression

I see a difference in the degree of feeling. If I find something disappointing, I may feel sad. If I find something depressing, maybe I can't get out of bed because it's not worth the effort.

Edit: Your use of the word "depressing" is fine, although different from how I use the word. I apologize for sounding as though I was correcting your use of the word depressing. I was just giving my impression of the piano story off the top of my head.

Ann, being older, I've watched/experienced the decline of musical arts, in the USA in particular, in a big way. Not just piano playing. The arts aren't the only area of American life where the "old way" has been supplanted through progress, or at least in the name of progress. If you want to be technical, no, it doesn't rise to the definition of clinical depression, but sad seems a bit superficial and understated. There must be a better word. I need a larger vocabulary!

Hmm...

One member expresses a feeling, a visceral response to seeing old pianos discarded, chopped up, burnt, destroyed.

Then several people come in and ANALYZE those feelings.

That seems like a strange response.

I have two thoughts, opposite:

1) I have had to play on pianos that I WISHED would be burnt, and frankly now and then some of my students are playing on them, at home - right now.

2) My home was destroyed in a terrible fire, including my grand, which was cinder. I gave up playing for about five years after that.

So that was not a happy picture for me either, John.

"Dismayed" perhaps?

I find it depressing that there is more discussion about the mearning of "depression" than anything else.

John simply said "This is depressing". And a couple of us said we didn't find it all that depressing. And then we explored what we mean by the word depressing. We did not analyze the OP's feelings. We expressed our own feelings which happened to differ from John's.

I'm just saying pianos have a lifespan. Yet I admit that we'd probably feel better if we put them in an individual grave with a headstone labeling their make, model, serial number and "the beloved piano of the John Smith family".

I was not accepting the discarding of pianos as proof of decline of the arts. I was not being "technical". No one would have taken no offense if I'd written "IMO" after stating my opinion. I'll try to remember it next time.

I was born in 1962. There was little public school arts education then (in my educational experience) and that continues today IMO. But I can afford a better piano than my parents could. And teaching has greatly improved since the 60's and 70's IMO.

I do think it is sad, but I did see a resource for free piano adoptions. I looked in my area and it might be feasible (it is still a cost to have one inspected, delivered, repaired and tuned) when the time comes.

Ann, you're correct, it's not proof, it's just another nail in the coffin. And, FWIW, I didn't take offense at your statement and those of others. I simply was amazed that there are piano teachers who are not as emotionally invested in their instruments as I apparently am. I studied violin all through high school, and have similar feelings about that instrument. There are, however, some instruments in the brass and woodwind families which I would volunteer to run the crushing machine!

No, John, it was your correction of Ann's choice of words that I found nitpicky.
I take my teaching very seriously, and I resent your insinuation that I am "in the wrong vocation". I realize not everyone can be as perfect as you, but if that means becoming a pompous, arrogant windbag, then I'll pass.
Thanks.

I would help if you'd said so. Correct word usage is important in written communications, otherwise misunderstandings develop.


I'll work on being more succinct; can you work on not taking people's comments out of context?

Really? Don't get me wrong, I am emotionally invested in pianos. I don't like to see them die, but I do realise, like any piece of machinery (and that's what it is, not like a violin), there will come a point where is it makes more economic sense to replace than to repair. I don't like it, but I've seen too many kids suffer on pianos that need to be chucked...

My tuner told the story a guy he used to work for, in rural Yorkshire, used to pay customers £20 for an ex-piano. Why? Where he worked, travel to a new customer was a significant cost. So he would be called out to some farmhouse in the sticks, to find some ruined old rusty thing with loose pins and a broken sound board. He would tell the customer the piano was beyond repair and leave. No work, no fee. Six months later, he would be called out to anther farmhouse out in the sticks, to find, guess what? the same rusty old thing.

So after a while, he worked out that no one was listening when he told them the piano was worthless, they were selling it on to neighbours. Then he decided he would just say, "look it's not a good piano, it will take a lot to repair, and I'll need it in my workshop. I'll give you £20 for it". Then he would load it onto his van, take it home and use it for firewood. Apparently, they burn well.