MICHAEL GETTEL

I was 9 when the moving truck delivered our first family piano to our home in Colorado. It was an upright, and it took up an entire wall in our living room. As my love for playing grew, a few years later my parents surprised me on my birthday with a very special gift a new Yamaha grand.

As if this were not enough of a surprise, my parents had the new piano placed in my room, which is where I discovered it when I came home from school that day. This required substantial furniture rearranging even the acquisition of a smaller bec. (I spent the first week, in fact, sleeping underneath my new instrument.) From that moment, I literally lived in my room. My parents and I shared a bedroom wall and, to their chagrin, I usually played fate into the night. Even after I left for college, I always looked forward to coming home and getting reacquainted with those special keys

That was a decade ego . Last spring, a moving truck arrived at my home in Seattle. While I was away teaching at school, a wellcared-for Yamaha grand was moved into my studio.

These keys know every note I've ever played my very heart and soul.
Welcome home . . .

KOSTIA

I was 4 years old when I received my first piano a 1937 Wolkenhauer upright. My parents had sent it as a gift from East Germany, where they lived and worked. My home was in Russia, with my grandmother in a tiny apartment in St. Petersburg. This piano was the center of life in our home. Even my pet rooster, Peter, used the lid as tris favorite perch, the place where he would listen as I played. This piano was not simply a piece of furniture. I feel it had a life of its own. To touch her ivory keys was to communicate with her. She was the source of the most profound heart-and-soul relationship I have ever had.

I am grateful to have studied under two of Russia's great master teachers, Vladimir Nielsen and Tamara Karetkina, who encouragea a sense of reverence for the relationship between pianist and piano. From them I learned that people with great technical skills may be able to play very fast or perform complex passages, but they may be only pushing keys to express their ego not to make music. To the musicien, the piano is more than a box with keys and wires; it is a part of music itself. When I play, the piano becomes part of me, and I become more than myself. It is a bridge to the dimension where music existe, and it takes time and talent to be in tune with the piano to be in tune with music. It is a mystery, I know, but it is a wonderful mystery, and my life as a musicien is devoted to understanding it more deeply.

IRA STEIN

The best way for me to express or relate my emotions is through the piano. It is my voice, a direct extension of my heart. The whole process began when I was 10, when I would practice my Bach or Haydn instead of skateboarding with friends.

Later I began to improvise, the truest form of self-expression. At such moments, my fingers touch clown on the keys and I no longer have to think. A dynamic link of the soul and hands occurs that may continue for hours. It pauses only for occasional breaks of silence, and it ends only when the feeling has been fully conveyed.

When I'm happy or peaceful, I can rejoice in the pure sensuel pleasure of the sounds and melodies that I can produce. And, when I'm sad or angry, improvising on the piano can be healing by the cathartic release of my emotions, and comforting by the sound of music that I have never before imagined, which rises up to my ears. Sometimes I'll play something that pleases me so much that I'll repeat it over and over again until I can't forget it. It grows into a form, and a song is born.

Although there are many relationships experienced during our lifetimes, I have found only one that remains consistent the one I share with my family. Members of my family are always nearby to share the joys and disappointments of each growing year.

The piano, I have come to realize, has also become a part of my family. I vividly remember receiving my first piano at the age of 5. It was as though my mother and father had just brought home a new brother or sister. At this time, little did I know that this instrument of creation was going to be the center of my life. Like members of my family, the piano has been a nurturing companion, a friend and an inspiration for creation. It has become a part of me forever.