Play Me, I’m Yours
July 16, 2009 // Art + Life + Music



I was reading this article in The New York Times the other day called All Around London, an Invitation to Make Music, which talks about a program by Luke Jerram who takes pianos and puts them into busy, cultural areas across the world. The idea is that people will stop and play music for anyone who cares to listen, creating a (hopefully) pleasurable experience for not only the player, but the listeners as well. Luke calls this program, Play Me, I’m Your’s.

For some reason this article made me really emotional. I don’t know what it is, but there’s something really gets me about people being united by music. Music is a universal thing no matter what language you speak, we all understand. And there’s just something so random and wonderful about this project that makes me just want to grin from ear to ear.

For example, they did a version of this in São Paolo, where the article says that pianos are scarce. I guess people caught wind of the project and travelled for hours to get a chance to play on these public pianos. Just the thought of that makes me burst inside. How wonderful would it be to walking around and suddenly you see and hear a 9 year old boy playing Chopin? If this intrigues you, watch the video above. Just listening to it gives me chills.

Bobby

  1. [...] you Kitsune, for giving me wonderful pointers such as this [...]

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  2. That made the hairs on my neck stand on end. Impromptu sharing is wonderful. Thanks Bobby!

    Comment by eskimon — July 16, 2009 #

  3. I hear you on the emotion. It’s crazy isn’t it?

    Comment by rawbean — July 16, 2009 #

  4. ..and you have thus caused me to exercise my tear ducts.

    fantastic!

    Comment by saer — July 16, 2009 #

  5. I’m in London, there’s a piano outside the station of my commute and it really is nice to see someone playing with a group of people standing around enjoying it.

    Comment by katie — July 17, 2009 #

  6. that also gave me the chills. i totally agree with you in that music is universal.

    Comment by sara — July 17, 2009 #

  7. I work just across the road from that piano in the plaza, and I’m constantly amazed by the phenomenal talent that just sit down and begin to play.

    It’s beautiful.

    Comment by La — July 17, 2009 #

  8. this has to be one of the coolest ideas ever.

    -james

    Comment by james jay — July 17, 2009 #

  9. [...] Source: Kitsune Noir [...]

    Pingback by Play me, I’m yours… « Vibes and Tribes — July 17, 2009 #

  10. That’s an exciting project. I love that it encourages and nurtures a sense of community. For me anyway, it’s hard to find that.

    Comment by Stacey — July 17, 2009 #

  11. There was one of these outside my work in soho square – they’ve been removed now.

    When it first went up about 3 weeks ago, it was extraordinarily charming – the piano would sit alone for long periods, people were too shy to play it. Then someone who’d had a few lessons would throw down some chopsticks or some hall of the mountain king, badly played, years-lost muscle memory slowly kicking in.

    Flash-forward a couple of weeks, and there’s people bringing amps, accompanying instruments, singers etc., and the charm was kind of gone. I saw the same guy do a half-hour boogie-woogie set every single day.

    The amateurs were way cooler than the pros I guess, is what I’m saying.

    I wonder what happened to all the pianos?

    Comment by Rich — July 18, 2009 #

  12. Bobby, have you seen this?

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cI_0Hyn57Lk
    so beautiful

    Comment by Ariel — July 20, 2009 #

  13. Wow thanks for sharing this! I had to reblog this and keep the vibe going on this. Great story!

    Comment by H Flava — July 21, 2009 #

  14. Luke calls this program, Play Me, I’m Your’s.

    Yours! Yours! Yours!

    Comment by drinks-after-worker — August 2, 2009 #