Piano Time hits the right notes with visitors and home town players

NW Melodies by Marcia Lippert
in place at Goodwill

Once again Piano Time was a big hit! The third year of this “street piano” adventure brought artists, musicians and community together for an interactive experience. Eleven artist-decorated pianos were placed around Shoreline, cared for by adjoining businesses and neighbors and enthusiastically played by thousands of Shoreline residents and visitors throughout the month of August.

Pianos were generously donated to the cause, artists were selected from a Call for Artists, a collaborative committee of City staff, musicians, artists, Prosser Piano staff and community set the plan in motion, and numerous local businesses enthusiastically agreed to participate to make this all-August project a success. In addition Piano Time was supported in part by Prosser Piano, GBC International Bank and a generous 4Culture Group Arts Award.

If you didn’t get to see all the pianos you can find images on the Public Art page of the City’s website. 

Sports and Tunes on Backyard Birds
By Susan Pope at Paramount Park

Each piano had a “note book” attached and collected comments from both pianists and performers – children, teens, adults, seniors, beginners to professionals. The comments were wildly enthusiastic with many wishing the pianos could remain in place indefinitely and definitely supported their return in 2015.

Piano Time 2014 celebrated with bookend concerts at Arts al Fresco on August 7 with three pianos in play, and the Michael Stegner and Friends trio in the City Hall courtyard concert on August 27. Along with noon and evening concerts in the parks, musical theater outdoors at City Hall, new Gallery and Sculpture Stroll exhibit openings, plus chalk art on the trail, this was definitely an art-filled summer to remember.

Piano Time 2014 Notebook Quotes:

• We’re so glad you do this every year!
• I love this piano idea. Thank you Shoreline!
• I love the fact you can just be walking by and see someone playing a piano on the street at any time of day/night! This is such an amazing idea!
• Love tangrams. Such cool art.
• What a great way to make our neighborhoods fun & vibrant! Thank you for doing this!
• Thank you to everyone who made public music possible!
• My friend is moving to college tomorrow and this is our last hurrah.
• I love that you provide a piano for those who are without.
• This piano is awesome. I don’t have a piano at home, or get to practice very often. Thanks a lot!
• What a great idea to bring the piano out, help influence kids to do something good.
• My 3-year-old loves this piano.
• These pianos are fantastic and I love seeing them all around Shoreline.
•  I look forward to seeing these pianos again sometime. Then I can share my pieces with the world and fill the parks with wonderful songs by Beethoven, Bach, Chopin and Mozart. Please keep doing this and thank you for giving others who don’t have an opportunity to play the chance to play.

Infinite Arrangements by Elise Koncsek
at Gateway Plaza

• Great to hear Mason play in the sunshine on a bike ride!!!
• Thank you for doing this art project. I look forward to this sunny month with pianos all year long.  I love not having to pack gear around. The pianos are just there already. Thank you for all the effort moving, setup, creation lots of work. I go find a new piano each day and do some morning music for all to hear. These pianos add beauty to the gray drab suburban landscape. I cover any pianos I see when it rains trying to help them last for years to come. Thank you.
• Love this idea! Had a woman sit on a bench and play her harmonica along with the piano! Art rules!
• Back to re-live our first date.
• To be honest I gave this up a long time ago. I wish I hadn’t done that. I wish I could play Canon in D major again, one more time.
• This is great. Maybe attach a beginner song book so visitors can play.
• We came all the way from San Ramon, CA to play this piano.
• Thanks Shoreline! From a composer
• Played two jazz standards. Love this idea!
• Came from Portland to Seattle for fun, but got a lot more than we hoped. Wonderful idea!
• We love this interactive art installation!
• We drove out from Buckley for these!
• Thank you for a moment of grace and pleasure in music.
• Yay! Happy to find this piano at my favorite grocery store. Stopping here on my route for a treat. It’s great to find it in the early morning so I could play part of the Impossible Dream that I remember (when no one is listening). Kinda shy player.
• It felt peaceful playing piano by the “ocean”.
• Whoever dolled up the piano did a great job. Thanks, Shoreline.
• We played and played. We loved it so much! We had so much fun!

Backyard Birds
By Susan Pope

• A very nice lady taught me “doe a dear” and she is going to teach me lessons! Can you believe it! I cannot believe what a piano can do to a person! Thank you ever so much!
• I am 41 and enjoy this piano every time I come to the park The piano is so sweet and pretty that must be played with love. Thanks for bringing it here so we can share it.
• Thank you so much, we enjoyed this late-night musical performance opportunity.
• Love this piano. The backyard birds are beautiful. We have found 5 so far. Such fun  - like a treasure hunt. Enjoy playing outside.
• Thank you for making our vacation special.
• Thank you for providing this piano. My daughter absolutely loved it. Best thing ever.
• The birds on this piano make me wanna fly.
• Thanks so much for sharing this piano. It makes for a long line of happy kids and endless music, a great addition to a sunny day.
• We love this project. Keep up the great community work!
• I love the birds and flowers. The tone of the piano is amazingly good considering it lives outside. I have played piano for 68 years and am glad to see people still enjoy it.
• I want the piano here forever!!!
• My daughter loved playing the piano! I think lessons will be in her future! Thanks for inspiring a young musician. Piano is absolutely gorgeous!
• I like the imaginative decoupage effects! I’ll come back to play this one.

Fancy Footwork by Kelly Lyles
The Park at Town Center

• I’ve really enjoyed the pianos around the area. At first I didn’t play at the library park too often because of the seven or eight missing keys, but it was great at the end of the month to have the keys fixed. But anyway, I hope this program continues for many more years. I love playing these pianos and listening to the different styles of music that comes with each musical passerby. So again, thank you Shoreline.
• Loved being here – very healing for some old fears and made new happy memories in their place. Wonderful 55th birthday gift.
• I’ve been playing piano since I was 3 years old. It’s brought me around the US, to Germany with Macklemore and even earned a Grammy nomination with Macklemore from playing “Same Love” on The Heist. It’s amazing what music can do for people and where it can bring you. I encourage people to follow their joy in music and let it inspire, heal and uplift you!! Josh Rawlings 
• Music is, at the best of times, an expression of heartfelt emotion to be used as an extension of oneself. At the worst of times it is a plague – nothing more and nothing less. Perhaps actions such as these will allow us to cleanse from ourselves the impurity of insincere music. I truly hope so. Good luck, music lovers.
• Had so much fun playing a duet with Mom.
• Possibly my favorite piano ever!! I played 2 jazz standards. Four missing keys made it tough.
• Thank you so much for Piano Time. I was so excited Sky gets to host this beautiful flower piano this year! The action on the keys feels really nice. I am cashier at Sky and also a pianist on the side. Love to play the music that makes people happy!
• Yea! Mom and I enjoyed finding and playing on all the colorful pianos last year—so happy to see them again! Thank you!
• So happy to see the piano on display! So good to take part in this fun event.

Wonderland by Heather Carr

• This is a great idea! I hope that if they are not already in Seattle they can get them too.
• I played these jazz standards for a flowery piano: Days of Wine and Roses, Poinciana, Red Roses for a Blue Lady
• Thank you 1000 times plus. This is amazing!
• What a wonderful idea—becoming a tradition, perhaps Goldberg variations are beyond me, but casual chord changes sound good on … does this piano have a name? Alice?
• Beautiful tonal quality!...I wish they had something like this in San Diego, California!... visiting family here!
• I’m jealous of everyone for playing so well. I Just tapped some keys, remembering old tunes. (6 days later) Back again! I’ll play a little more, try to get better. It’s cooler out here than in my house!
• This piano is beautiful and it’s sunny out and August in Seattle, right here writing in this silly piano book, right now is perfect.
• My granddaughter loves to sit down and play her nice pieces before entering the store. Nice thing!
• We just love the pianos! Thank you Shoreline for such a fun and interactive art project! We always meet the nicest and most interesting people at the pianos. Kudos to you!
• We drove up from Bonney Lake WA. What a wonderful way to bring such creative minds together for something that looks and sounds so great!