Joyce Fessenden has been playing piano in public for 70 years. At the age of 83, she still plays four or five times a week at area nursing homes and assisted living centers. She has no thought of quitting.
“Music has always been a very important part of my life,” Fessenden said. “I’m very grateful for that. I don’t plan to quit playing.”
On a recent Tuesday, Fessenden played old favorites on the piano at the William S. Cohen Community Center in Hallowell. Her music blended in and enhanced the boisterous sound of lunchtime diners.
“I love it here because the food is good and the people are kind,” Fessenden said. “If somebody says ‘play the piano,’ the only thing I ask is where and when.”
Piano lore can be summarised thus: there are good and bad pianos. This is the basic fact in a pianist’s life. Both kinds are to be found in all sizes, from all manufacturers, at any price point. A concert grand costing more than £100,000 can be bad. Smaller can be better than larger, but between two good pianos, the sound of the larger will be richer and more present.
One can get used to any piano, even when the instrument is terrible, but the better the piano, the less time is required, and vice versa. Spending time with a good piano is rewarding: there is always something more to discover in its tone. A bad piano functions in what-you-see-is-what-you-get mode, producing the same sound even after hours of practice. And each piano is unique. Manufacturing involves hundreds of processes and adjustments, most done by hand, all affecting the final tone. As a result two pianos of the same model, made in the same year, will sound different to the untrained ear, despite their outward sameness. The contrast in sound between different models, or between pianos made in different years or from different companies will be even more apparent.
Audiences bade adieu to long-running CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men after 12 seemingly eternal seasons. Creator Chuck Lorre (also the mind behind other network staple The Big Bang Theory) got the last laugh by killing off his sworn enemy, Charlie Sheen, once and for all … by a falling piano, no less!
The thought-provoking talk on February 10th was given by Keith Pascoe, second violinist of the Vanbrugh Quartet, in connection with tomorrow night’s violin and piano recital by Ray Chen and Julien Quentin. Pascoe came up with a great title, David and Goliath, The Ballet of Unequals: A Stradivari and Model D Steinway Recital. Using videos from YouTube as illustrations (which unfortunately allowed in snippets of a couple of unwanted advertisements), Pascoe began at the beginning, with the emergence of the piano and violin as instruments in their own right, and traced some of the changes they have both undergone in the centuries since.
The piano has become bigger, stronger and louder. Not only were extra notes added to the keyboard, but the early wooden frames were replaced with cast iron. The violin may not have grown externally, but the shape of the body was remoulded, the neck and fingerboard realigned, and internal buttressing extended, all with the intention of producing greater sound.
What composers did with the combination of violin and piano – and before that, violin and harpsichord – changed too. In the typical baroque violin sonata, the violin was to the fore. In the classical era, the roles were reversed, although this reversal has long been dishonoured by performers. And in the 19th century, the balance as we know it today began to take hold. That balance usually presents the two performers in a master-servant relationship, the violinist usually the boss whose bidding is carried out by the pianist.
Lionel Kelly, 78, may have come late to the piano – he took it up at the age of 73 – but it’s changed his life. “I first heard Mahler performed in London in the mid-50s, when he became very popular over here,” he says. “I’m currently working on a piano transcription of the Adagietta from his Symphony No. 5. It’s a beautiful piece of music, slow and passionate, and was used in Luchino Visconti’s 1971 film of Thomas Mann’s novella, Death in Venice. To be able to play Mahler now, all these years later, is a real treat.”
Kelly, formerly director of American Studies at Reading University, practises up to four hours a day. He has lessons in Reading with Janet Sherbourne, whom he describes as “an excellent, if strict, teacher”, and is not taking grades. “Janet reckons I’m somewhere between grade four and five level, but I’m just doing it for pleasure, because I want to learn and play,” he says.
Bach, Beethoven and Mozart are among other composers tackled by Kelly…
Yury Feygin, owner of Amadeus Piano, shows off a Steinway piano on display at his business in Stamford, Conn., on Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2015. The piano company mainly deals with tuning, repairs, moving, storage, restoration and antique piano sales with locations in Westport and Long Island, NY.Photo: Jason Rearick
Yury Feygin likes playing with pianos — so much, in fact, that he occasionally forgets to eat and sleep.
Like his father, Mikhail, and grandfather, Semyon, Feygin is an expert at restoring, tuning and repairing antique pianos.
Feygin and his workers have built a first-of-its-kind double-decker storage system at their Lenox Avenue warehouse. They have stashed dozens of pianos in the racks, legs removed, filed side-by-side like massive dominos as they await restoration.
“Getting pianos off the ground isn’t a comfortable thing — you’ve got to worry about it falling when you’re handling it, but we have it down to a science,” said Feygin. “People were saying, my dad was saying, `Don’t do this, let me store your stuff.'”
. 1571 ~ Michael Praetorius, German organist, composer and theorist
More information about Praetorius
. 1797 ~ Heinrich Engelhard Steinway, German piano manufacturer
More information about Steinway
. 1847 ~ Robert Fuchs, Austrian composer and music teacher
. 1905 ~ Harold Arlen, (Hyman Arluck) American composer of musicals and songs
More information about Arlen
. 1918 ~ Hank Locklin (Lawrence Hankins Locklin), Country singer
. 1932 ~ George Burns and Gracie Allen debuted as regulars on The Guy Lombardo Show on CBS radio. The couple was so popular that soon, they would have their own Burns & Allen Show. George and Gracie continued on radio for 18 years before making the switch to TV. All in all, they were big hits for three decades.
. 1941 ~ Brian Holland, Songwriter
. 1941 ~ Duke Ellington and his orchestra recorded one of big band’s all time classics on this day. Take the “A” Train was recorded at Victor’s Hollywood studio and became the Duke’s signature song.
. 1944 ~ Mick Avory, Drummer with The Kinks
. 1951 ~ Melissa Manchester, Singer
. 1958 ~ Get A Job, by The Silhouettes, reached the top spot on the music Tunedex. It remained at #1 for two weeks. Talk about sudden change in American popular music! One week earlier, the number one song was Sugartime, by The McGuire Sisters, a song that definitely was not classified as rock ‘n’ roll. Get A Job was replaced by Tequila, an instrumental by a studio group known as The Champs.
. 1959 ~ Ali (Alistair) Campbell, Guitarist, lead singer with UB40
. 1965 ~ This was a sad day in music, as singer Nat ‘King’ Cole died in Santa Monica, CA. The music legend was 45.
. 1986 ~ Whitney Houston reached the #1 spot on the music charts. Her single, How Will I Know, replaced a song recorded by her first cousin, DionneWarwick (That’s What Friends Are For). Whitney is the daughter of singer Cissy Houston.
. 1992 ~ William Schuman passed away. Schuman was an American composer and arts administrator.
. 1914 ~ Gypsy Rose Lee (Rose Hovick), Actress, dancer, stripper, subject of Broadway show and film, Gypsy, sister of actress, June Havoc
. 1914 ~ Ernest Tubb, Country Music Hall of Famer, headlined 1st country music show at Carnegie Hall
. 1923 ~ Kathryn Grayson, Singer, actress in Kiss Me Kate, Show Boat, The KissingBandit, It Happened in Brooklyn, Anchors Aweigh
. 1937 ~ Hildgarde Beherns, German Soprano
. 1939 ~ Barry Mann, Songwriter, with Cynthia Weil on dozens of ’60s and ’70s ‘Brill Building’ hits, singer
. 1940 ~ Brian Bennett, Drummer with The Shadows
. 1940 ~ The old piano played for dances in the Tattersall house in High Forest for many year – as long ago as the Civil War period – will be played once more when the Olmsted County Historical association formally opens its museum in the basement of the Rochester, MN public library.
. 1941 ~ Carole King (Klein), American pop-rock singer and songwriter
. 1944 ~ Barbara Lewis, Singer
. 1963 ~ (James) Travis Tritt, Grammy Award-winnning singe
. 1964 ~ Several days after their arrival in the U.S., The Beatles made the first of three record-breaking appearances on “The Ed Sullivan Show”. The audience viewing the Fab Four was estimated at 73,700,000 people in TV land. The Beatles sang She Loves You and I Want to Hold Your Hand. One could barely hear the songs above the screams of the girls in the audience.
. 1966 ~ Liza Minnelli brought her night club act to the Big Apple. She opened in grand style at the Persian Room of the Plaza Hotel in New York.
. 1969 ~ A young lady named Roslyn Kind made her quiet TV debut this night on“The Ed Sullivan Show”. Ed said she’s “…America’s teenager who wasn’t protesting or playing a guitar.” She only appeared once. Her sister appeared many times. Roslyn Kind is the sister of Barbra Streisand.
. 1970 ~ Sly and The Family Stone received a gold record for the single, ThankYou (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin). Sly (Sylvester) Stewart was a DJ in Oakland, CA.
. 1981 ~ Bill Haley died on this day in Harlingen, TX. He was 55. Haley, with his Comets, recorded what became known as the anthem of rock and roll: Rock Around the Clock, from the movie, “Blackboard Jungle”. The song turned into a multimillion dollar hit and one of many hits Haley and the Comets had, including: Dim Dim the Lights, Razzle Dazzle, Crazy Man Crazy, Rock the Joint, See You Later Alligator andShake Rattle & Roll. Bill Haley was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987.
. 1818 ~ Henry Charles Litolff, piano virtuoso, composer of Romantic music and music publisher
. 1883 ~ Herbert “Eubie” Blake, American jazz pianist, vaudevillian, songwriter and composer
More information about Blake
. 1920 ~ Oscar Brand, Folk singer, composer, music director of NBC-TV Sunday, host of Let’s Sing Out
. 1921 ~ Wilma Lee Cooper (Leary), Country singer with husband, Stoney and the group, Clinch Mountain Clan with her daughter, Carol Lee
. 1931 ~ The American opera, “Peter Ibbetson”, by Deems Taylor premiered at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City.
. 1941 ~ The Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and Frank Sinatra teamed to record Everything Happens to Me for Victor Records in New York City.
. 1948 ~ Jimmy Greenspoon, Organist with Three Dog Night
. 1949 ~ Alan Lancaster, Bass with Status Quo
. 1959 ~ Brian Travers, Saxophone with UB40
. 1962 ~ (Troyal) Garth Brooks, American Grammy Award-winning singer: In Another’s Eyes (1998 with Trisha Yearwood), Friends in Low Places and The Thunder Rolls. His LP Ropin’ the Wind was the first LP in history to debut at #1 on Billboard’s pop and country charts, The Chase, In Pieces, Fresh Horses, Sevens, Double Live has sold over 80 million albums — second only to The Beatles.
. 1962 ~ David Bryan, Keyboards with Bon Jovi
. 1964 ~ 3,000+ fans crowded the JFK airport in New York to receive the four stars of the music sensation, The Beatles. One word summarizes the reaction to The Beatles on their first US tour: hysteria.
. 1969 ~ Tom Jones, ‘The Prince of Wales’, premiered on ABC-TV after the network acquired the rights to the singing sensation’s popular United Kingdom show. The network paid a British production company an estimated $20 million for those rights. And they cried in one of Tom’s hankies all the way to the bank.
. 1974 ~ Barry White’s Love Unlimited Orchestra received a gold record for the disco hit Love’s Theme.
. 1985 ~ New York, New York became the official anthem of the Big Apple. The announcement was made by then New York mayor, Ed “How’m I Doin’?” Koch. Frank Sinatra fans rejoiced at the honor.
. 2001 ~ Dale Evans died at the age of 88. She was an actress-singer who became “Queen of the West” by starring with husband Roy Rogers in 27 cowboy films and writing their theme song, Happy Trails.
. 2002 ~ Bert Conway, an actor and director whose 60-year career included theater, movies and television, died of heart failure. He was 87. The son of vaudeville performers, Conway was born in Orange, N.J. He had a walk- on part in the original 1937 Group Theater staging of Clifford Odets’ “Golden Boy” and later had the lead as a reform school youth in Lee Strasberg’s production of “Dance Night.” After serving in the Army in World War II, Conway went to Hollywood. He began directing plays in 1947. His work included the first interracial production of “Golden Boy” for the Negro Art Theater in Los Angeles. In 1950, he returned to New York to act in and direct plays. His work included an off-Broadway revival of “Deep Are the Roots” and appearances with Joseph Papp’s New York Shakespeare Festival. He also appeared in several road company productions, had small roles in the movies “The Three Musketeers,” “Little Big Man” and “The Arrangement,” and on TV’s “St. Elsewhere.”
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