so the story goes.

Ten years ago now I think. Without a doubt the most ridiculous financial decision I have ever made. I could not explain at the time why without a place to put it living in apartments making pennies an hour twenty years old completely out of nowhere I talked myself into the idea that I must have a grand piano. And so after scrawling calculations on scraps of paper and more scraps of paper adding up and subtracting from and figuring out how to stretch every last penny maybe going without food so that I could sit at a grand piano and bang away annoying all within earshot I began The Search. This entailed Friday nights raining autumn in full swing driving from Tacoma to Seattle and all points in between including the Bösendorfer dealer (Austrian like W.A. Mozart weak and without real power) in Portland visiting every piano dealer I could find. Some took me seriously. Others told me to quiet down me hammering chords that there were lessons going on in the back what is this twenty-year-old doing looking at the grand pianos anyhow surely we could interest him in a nice electronic keyboard that one there in the window.

And then one afternoon I found myself wandering into the Helmer's Music in Tacoma in search of the six-foot version of the five-seven grand piano I had almost nailed my search down to that they had up in Federal Way. "Check out the six-footer before you buy" the guy up there told me and sent me south. And so I wandered the store from one far corner to the other of course because I had to at last finding the six-foot Weber and having a go on it. Wrapping up on it there in the back corner a mahogany 5'9" piano impeccably beautiful and so I snuck up to it for a closer look. Hmm ... "C. Bechstein" it said on the fallboard. Never heard of it. Pianoforte-Fabrick von C. Bechstein Berlin graced the soundboard. German. Beethoven. Real power. Maybe? And so I took a seat at the bench and held my breath and played exactly three chords (I even remember which ones). And that was it. I was done for.

I must have a Bechstein grand piano before I die I told myself in an instant before exhaling still sitting at the bench running my fingers across the keys.

Too bad for me scraping pennies together to pony up for a Korean-made Weber (just as good if not better sounding than the Japanese Yamahas pricier if only for their name and only the five-seven at that cos I could not hear enough of a difference in the five extra inches to scrape up a few grand more) that this particular Bechstein had a pricetag of $93,000. But it did not matter. I would own one someday. Or so the story goes.

And so completely by accident today I came across this photographic series by Robert Matzken. I of course was drawn to the incredible photography–the best I have ever seen of a Bechstein piano. Or any piano for that matter. Ever. But also his description, where he says ~

Salon Grand Piano from 1902, with the Autumn sun occasioning a warm light with all sorts of colour reflections on the faded black polish.

Wonderful. The old ones–like this one from the early twentieth century and even the late nineteenth century–are the most rare and the most precious and the most beautiful. The series is entitled C. Bechstein Flügel and it is gorgeous. And I thank him for sharing.

idea.

So the way it seems to work is some night late always I stumble over to the Bechstein and blurt out some random idea that comes to me out of nowhere. It is always an enormous idea in my head but translated to two hands on a piano recorded in Logic to hold onto and rework and assemble seems at times to me lame in comparison. But I remember this idea. It is fragmented and torn and there are notes misplayed (many notes misplayed) and mistimed (much of it mistimed) but I do not edit these first attempts at an idea in case something never intended (as in the whole of it the playing completely unintentional) might be erased and better left kept. And always a voice in my head even when the lyrics are not written always trying to rise above the piano and the orchestra and the band everything colliding in my head. Sometimes it seems there is no piano large enough and surely I am not nearly good enough to express it all. I have no idea what I was thinking as I played this. I have no idea if the final song will sound anything like this original idea but I will always have it to remember. I have no idea but am done now.





File linked here if the player does not work.

"There have been joys too great to be described in words, and there have been griefs upon which I have not dared to dwell; and with those in mind I say, Climb if you will, but remember that courage and strength are nought without prudence, and that a momentary negligence may destroy the happiness of a lifetime. Do nothing in haste; look well to each step; and from the beginning think what may be the end."

~ Edward Whymper, The Ascent of the Matterhorn, 1865

Whymper wrote about the tribulations he experienced on the ill-fated first ascent of the Matterhorn (the last so-called 'Great Problem' amongst the Alps before the next generation of climbers turned their attention to the ridges and direttissimas and then the north faces) in which he watched in horror as four men on his team fell four thousand feet down the most difficult mountain in all of Europe to their certain deaths.

But maybe his writing rings true in a greater context; certainly beyond the act of climbing mountains, in it I think perhaps a more profound meaning can be found. Particularly the last phrase. Particularly that last phrase. I can hear it repeating in my head as I commit it to memory ...

mp3_002.

So some time ago I posted an MP3. I think it lasted a few hours. Then I deleted it. And now I am trying again. Maybe it will last longer than a few hours. The one thing this has going for it is that it is a complete song. Not just a clip. Not a final mix by any means though either. But a complete song. Needs a singer. Though I hear his voice in my head. A tenor. Rising higher and higher and louder and louder during the crescendo of a chorus no way I can attempt it. Mostly recorded one night a week or two ago. Finished late tonight because everything of any substance always happens late it seems. Nothing more than a snapshot of something I fumbled on the piano one day a couple of months ago now digitized.

File linked here if the player does not work in some browser or other ...

night sky monopoly.

Yep, it has been a long time since I have played this game. But this new version that we are apparently shooting here in the studio caught my attention ~

I will be purchasing it and playing it. Boardwalk is the Milky Way Galaxy, and Park Place is Andromeda. Now how cool is that?

As a kid, I have memories of playing this and kicking *ss. I also recall my poor mom, who apparently had zero knack for this one (but don't tempt her with a game of Trivial Pursuit) and would constantly lose. As in she could not win. Ever. So she never played again.

Anyways, thought this was fun. If only one of the playing pieces was the JWST (especially since it looks so rad) ...

the climber.

We were browsing the wines at the local Top Food (at which I never shop) on our ever-present quest to find 'The Prisoner' somewhere local without resorting to a trip to Portland (which is never a bad thing and certainly not if for the only reason of picking up a bottle of this most fantastic wine) when I spotted this amongst the selection of reds ~

Who would have thought there would actually be a wine called 'The Climber?' I have not yet broken into it but am expecting it to be fabulous (with that sort of theme it has to be!). Clif Bars and red wines.

Oh, and along those lines–who also would have thought Platypus would make–along with their selection of various hydration products–a wine preserver? I noticed this little contraption when I was at REI the other night picking up last-minute items for a climb that had to be postponed due to crap weather this weekend. Oh well. It was not all in vain.

And one last little note–of all wines, this one should have a screw top.

cheers

a phrygian sky.

The moonlight it was dancing on the waves out on the sea
The stars of heaven hovered in a shimmering galaxy