The Piano Shop On The Left Bank

Product Description

Ever since the piano was invented, people have longed to own one. By the nineteenth century the big, unwieldy instruments were everywhere: they shrank in the heat of the colonies, swayed on steamships & sang in the drawing room of every genteel home. Some of these old pianos have become treasured family heirlooms, some just firewood. But others have led a more itinerant life, occasionally finding their way to a secret, glass-roofed workshop in Paris where they are lovingly restored by a piano repairer with a passion for his job. When T. E. Carhart came upon Luc & his atelier, his life changed. As he explored the Eldorado of pianos in Luc's back room, absorbed Luc's wisdom on life & music & finally found the baby grand of his dreams, he rediscovered his deep love for this most magical of instruments. In this wonderfully atmospheric book, full of Parisian life, the story of a musical friendship & a mutual obsession is intertwined with reflections on how pianos work, their glorious history & the people who care for them, from the most amateur pianist to the tuners & craftsmen who make the mechanism sing.