Hot Keys

Granny and I on the piano, 1982.

Hey gang.

As you know, my grandma passed away at the beginning of last month, and for a couple weeks afterwards our family had to schedule memorial/funeral services and, for lack of better term, loot her house.

Besides the three car-loads of plunder I amassed over those two weeks, the main prize I was after was my granny's piano, which she had in her house out in Iowa and that I used to play on whenever I'd visit her.  I called dibs on that right from the get-go, and was ready to fight any of my siblings or cousins for it, but I think being the eldest in my generation - and the only one who can actually play a piano, and who has children that play the piano - it didn't come to that.

Granny's piano, in her house

After the dust had settled from Granny's passing, I scheduled the piano to be moved from her house in Clare to ours in Midland, and used a guy my brother had previously used (when they had his wife's piano moved up from Detroit.)  This guy, Ray, was a real pro, and was decently priced for the moving and tuning of Granny's piano.

Long story short, we have a piano in our house now. . . finally.  Granted, we'll have to go through this whole Goddamn process again in a year or so when we actually buy a home, but at least now it's among piano-playing Houghs once more.

Behold. . .

This is a vintage Kimball Console piano, and is a pretty middle-of-the-road instrument.  Not a piece of shit by any means, but not top-shelf, either.

When it came time to plan the move, Ray and I both came to the conclusion that we couldn't move the instrument through the front door - the turn was way too tight.

Instead, we went through the garage door and through the kitchen.  It took awhile getting the instrument up those two steps into the house, and unfortunately we scratched the front of the instrument on the way in through the door.

No, that's not Bernie Sanders.  The piano was pretty out of tune (it had probably been at least five or six years since anyone had touched it), so it took him awhile to bring it back into shape.  He gave it a 'rough tune,' as it was too far out of tune to give it the perfect tune (still, playing it you couldn't tell - he said unless you really knew what you were doing you wouldn't.)

Yes, of course I bought a Star Wars songbook for our new piano.  Here you can see (if you really look close), about a third of the way from the left front of the piano, the quick touch-up job Ray did on the three-inch scratch.

He didn't have the tools he needed on hand to completely touch up the instrument, so he unscrewed and removed the front panel of the piano and took it back to his shop for the weekend.

Almost immediately, the new household addition became a hit with the kids in the neighborhood. . .

Abby and Reba 

. . . and Reba's twin brother, Ruben.  We ended up getting the front panel back on the piano on Monday (Ray's definitely a prompt dude), and were happy to find the instrument looked as good as new.  So now we finally have a piece of Granny's love of music in our house (besides those two of her ukes, I guess), and this old Hough family heirloom can serve a new generation of young instrumentalists.

- Brian