Creation - the Movie How piano playing affected Charles Darwin's theory of evolution(!)

His wife, Emma Darwin, studied piano with the celebrated composer Frédéric Chopin.

"Emma often played the piano for Charles, and in Charles' 1871 "The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex," Darwin spent several pages on the evolution of musical ability by means of sexual selection."

She was a gifted pianist and often played for the family and guests. The bassoon apparently belonged to Francis, and Charles made use of it in attempts to determine if plants could 'hear' the instrument.

Actually this is a fascinating read!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emma_Darwin
http://news.softpedia.com/news...y-Music-105956.shtml
http://creationthemovie.com/

Brian, I was just teasing you.

I very much look forward to seeing what you've found. I say you just go ahead and hog the thread!

Love your pictures, Brian!

Keep 'em coming!

This has to be a first - just carve out the back of the piano to make for some steering room for the bike! Hey, that therfore has to be an electronic keyboard sitting in the piano doesn't it? Otherwise how can you have a frame in the instrument with the back cut away like that!

Look at the lovely case on this 6ft Ronisch (c1890) It is a decorative figured walnut case on turned octagonal legs.

A special kind of deep-sided table, 6ft, Broadwood made these especially for the flower-vase, pot-plant and home-photo market...

Over on PTG this pic, the feeling being that the piano therein probably doesn't need tuning!

The Church of Piano
It looks like, as first impression, a vain spectacle of piano worship. It is an Olympic example of piano prayer!

ANTIQUE RUSSIAN IMPERIAL PIANO WITH 2 CHAIRS
Check here for some wonderful closeup photos:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ANTIQUE-RU...Z37975QQcmdZViewItem

It's an Organ but it is like a Piano on the Feet
Cameron Carpenter performs the Revolutionary
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvbEEhee3GU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQxyQktNFwc

Judy Garland at Sixteen
Backstory: http://www.nickelinthemachine.com/category/chelsea/

Tribute To Earl Wild

http://mrdproductions.com/video/flvplayer3.html

According to his official website, the great American virtuoso pianist, teacher, and raconteur, has died at 94.

http://www.earlwild.com/

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01...ts/music/24wild.html

"Earl Wild's 90th birthday concert, and a more elegant evening of patrician pianism I could hardly wish for.
Throughout the evening, I was struck again and again by Wild's still-generous virtuosity at 90, "

http://nightafternight.blogs.c...11/back_to_work.html

Interview: http://www.shumeiarts.org/article_wild.htm
Review: http://www.shumeiarts.org/latimes_earlwildreview.html






Born in 1915, Mr. Wild has been a legendary figure performing throughout the world for seven decades, and has the singular honor of having performed at the invitation of six Presidents of the United States. " In 1997, he received a GRAMMY award for his brilliant disc devoted entirely to virtuoso piano transcriptions entitled, "Earl Wild - The Romantic Master."


He wrote some wonderful Transcriptions

Earl Wild's cover for Rhapsody In Blue

Up on ebay

[IMG]http://i.ebayimg.com/16/!BkhEURQ!2k~$(KGrHqIOKkYEsmmRrF)sBL(2pEmVFg~~_3.JPG[/IMG]

One-of-a-kind Dining Table Artistic Piano

Lilylady, on my computer the picture does not show so after some searching I found this, there is more of the story and many other close up photos here:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Custom-Mad...?hash=item45f0b28e23

"This project investigated the ability to reduce waste through the reuse of a hard to recycle object, the upright piano. This piano was found described as “must go or will be forced to throw away.”

Custom one-of-a-kind dining table was made from and existing upright piano as a project to showcase the artistic value of reuse as opposed to disposal or recycling."