the beat up, old, out-of-tune piano that I practiced on as a youngster (It's in the picture). After college my parents gave it to me, so it moved from Canada to Michigan to Indiana to Pennsylvania and back to Indiana before I finally sold it to help pay for the move to Texas for my doctoral studies. I can't begin to calculate how many hours I spent on that piano (that's actually me sitting on the bench in the picture). When authentic performance practice became popular back in the early 70s, I thought it would be cool to convert it to a harpsichord to make the Bach piece I was learning sound more authentic (it was written for harpsichord) so one day, when my parents weren't home, I took paper clips and wrapped them around each of the hammers to get that "tingy" plucky sound of the harpsichord. It was so cool! .....until my parents had to pay to have some of hammers replaced that I damaged. By the way, I knew EVERY trick in the book to get out of practicing. Sometimes I would practice scales with hands in different keys (like C major in the right hand and D-flat in the left hand). It drove my parent crazy so they would tell me to stop. I also intentionally played wrong notes a lot because I liked the sound of dissonance. My parents hated that. I could go on and on about experiences on that piano, but I'm just thankful we had it.
I'm thankful for just about everything - i have had very dark times in life and I wanted to break that spell of depression - I learned that If I made a point of being thankful for everything every chance I could, I had many things to be happy about...it's been my mantra since.
Good story. I signed up for guitar lessons when I was 15 or so then backed out last second. My mother was so mad. I wish I had gone. :(
In a way, Steve, you were your own lil Hendrix on that piano discovering sounds that would someday develop your music in adulthood! :)
Cuff links are cool!