My piano room
Excitements always fill my chest as I walk through the glass folding doors with white wooden frames is my piano room. It is not big in size, just like the size of a garage that fits two cars. It is rectangular in shape surrounded by four walls that are light green with bumpy textures. The ceiling of my piano room is reachable if I make a casual leap. There are three windows in the piano room. Two of them tall and skinny on the chimney side of the wall and behind the piano is the big window taking out almost the entire wall space giving a view to my back yard. On a sunny day the windows allow the sunlight to brighten up the entire room splattering shadows of the dogwood's shaky branch and leaves on the wooden floor. Near the entrance is a dark grey sofa. It is somewhat modern and square looking with four short dark wooden legs and the front two legs anchoring the carpet in front of it. It is a mid-size sofa. Four guests could barely fit on it. This is the room which I fancy the most in the entire house. This is where most of my joys were found and numerous precious memories were stored.
The attention grabber is often times not the shiny black concert grand piano in front of the sofa, but the carpet under the sofa. The carpet has such a unique feel to its texture and look. It has countless little marshmallow-like cotton cylinders on it. They are so marshmallow-like that you could almost taste its sweetness and would want to take a bite out of it if it weren't on a carpet. On the carpet is a square shaped black wooden desk with four skinny square legs. A book as thick as a dictionary is always available for the guests on top of the table and in between two dark green scented candles, and it is full of different landscape photography taken by a Taiwanese photographer.
The fire place has a mantel made of piled up red bricks that climbs up the wall that forms the chimney which reaches all the way to the ceiling. The fire place is old and it makes the entire piano room smell like burnt wood especially during winter times when the fire place is often lit. The fire place reminds me of Christmas. Perhaps I've just seen way too many Hollywood Christmas films that whenever I look at the chimney I feel like playing "The Christmas song" by Mel Tormé for it appreciating all those warmth it had brought to this room.
The piano is the main theme of the room. It is to the far right corner placed at an angle with its back towards the sofa, and it adds a level of graceful atmosphere in this room. It is placed at the corner of the room even though it does not fit at all. I received this piano as a birthday gift on my seventeenth birthday. It is a concert grand piano with a black exterior so shiny that it is mirror like. The keys are made out of wood with snow white finish contrasting the black wooden keys in between them. The keys always appear so calm and graceful, even though they have gone through countless arpeggios and melodies.
I first saw this piano in a piano gallery in northeast Portland. In the piano gallery there were all brands of high end pianos, Steinway & sons, Böesendorfer, Mason and Hamlin. I played on every piano in the showroom like a four-year-old kid who just wants to touch everything he sees. They all sounded like expensive pianos. However, there was only one piano that I immediately felt a connection to after playing just a couple notes on it. It was the YAMAHA grand piano. The piano had a really unique echoic quality to its tone, making the pianist's playing brighter and clearer, and it is the kind of sound quality that I have always been looking for in a piano. Therefore after a radical debate with the seller about the piano's price we bought it.
My piano and I have gone through numerous memorable times together, either the good times playing all the Chopin and Mozart or the bad times playing the dull scales. Usually Chopin, Liszt and Rachmaninoff's solo and concerto pieces are layered over one another on the piano's music stand, just because I never bother to put them back onto the book shelf after playing them, and even though the shelf, which fits perfectly in the corner, is only two steps away from the piano. The piano lid is usually raised and kept at a thirty five degree angle, making the piano's sound brighter and crisper when played. It also allows people to see its golden sound board and strings that can create amazing sensations through simply vibrating the air with their unique frequencies.
Due to the fact that my mother and I both absolutely love arts, there are several paintings in the room. The biggest painting is on the wall behind the sofa, hung at the mid-wall height. The theme of the painting is gods from a Chinese folk tale. It was imported from China which my mom paid a celestial price for. It doesn't quite fit with the western interior design of the house, but it is one of those things that after a while you kind of just get used to looking at it. The other two that hang on each side of the chimney are contemporary oil paintings by this artist who only draw pianos.
The piano room has also been known as the lady bug's room. By the time spring arrives, lady bugs start showing up in the piano room. No one knows exactly where they come from and why they only appear in the piano room, but they have become some of my most loyal music fans. Whenever I am playing the piano, my dear fans are always here to back me up. They do not criticize my playing but simply appreciate the music which I find to be quite noble. However, every once in a little while there would be an exception where one of them would stand on the staff on the score reminding me that I missed the F sharp back there. To be honest sometimes it really makes me wonder why the lady bugs suck up to me so bad, maybe it's because they don't want me to call the bug exterminators on them.
Ever since I've moved into the dorms, all I have for practicing piano is in my small studio room and the Yamaha electric keyboard. The piano room back at my house seemed luxurious by comparison. Excitements of playing in my piano room always fill my chest whenever I am heading home once in a little while. When I start playing in my piano room after a long span of separation from it, the room would feel somewhat unfamiliar to me at first. However, the unfamiliar feeling goes away as I play a piece or two on the piano.
Warming up is important before playing. After sitting down on my adjustable piano chair, I usually warn my fingers up by playing Chopin's Etudes. When I feel like my fingers are ready, I move on to playing whatever piece I am trying to mastering currently. Before I start playing, I like to close my eye and imagine if I am playing on the stage of the Carnegie hall in front of a full house. Doing such usually makes my playing more precise, because I feel the responsibility of performing professionally for my imaginary audiences. And usually what happens after I'm finish playing the song is that I all the sudden realize that I've day dreamed again. Nevertheless, it is always fun while it last, even if it seems stupid afterward.
The Piano room brings me joy, is my favorite room in the house. It is here where I can toss all the worries and pressures aside and simply indulge in playing the music that I like. No matter if I am feeling angry like a new born volcano, under pressure like a deep sea submarine, or depressed like the U.S.'s economy, playing a piece on the piano always relieves me like a shot of morphine. The stress, anger and sadness are absorbed by the piano bits by bits every time my fingers contact the keys. The Piano room is my play room and my source of endorphins.