Please, No Flowers

Wrong.

I admit I'm a Piano Nazi. When I taught 34 piano students per week, I kept a tasteful folded card on the piano with the reminder, "Fingers only on keys, please!" That means fingers only go on the keys and nowhere else, and the keys only have fingers touching them, nothing else.

In other words, do not smear fingerprints all over the rest of the piano or scratch the finish, much less lean on the fallboard (which contains the word "fall" for a reason). Further, nothing is to be placed on the keys that is not a digit of a hand -- no elbows, noses, pencils, feet, etc.

I was looking through some stock images today and noticed the prevalence of flowers on piano keys. This has been around for decades, and it doesn't seem to be going away. I get the visual contrast of the soft and hard, color against black and white, and just the "Oh look, it's a flower on a keyboard," which might have been my reaction in 1980.

A Google image search will yield flowers of all colors, types, and states of decay. You can find yellow daisies, black carnations, and lots with old petals covering the keys. If you like roses on your keyboards, you're in lots of luck. (There are also plenty of images out there with other things on piano keys -- other instruments, animals, even spots of what's supposed to be blood.)

Speaking of blood, another image that's popular on posters are worn-out pointe shoes. When I look at that, I don't think "ahh," I think "ouch!" It's a romantic image, but after enough experience, it's just a reminder of pain.

Just as pointe shoes are for dancing, piano keys are for making music. I haven't met a pianist -- or anyone else, for that matter -- who tosses bouquets onto their piano keys, have you?

Well, I do have one confession about tossing things onto piano keys. I might as well tell you.

As an undergraduate student at Connecticut College, I spent most of my time in the dance studio. On the ballet days (as opposed to modern days), I took the advanced classes and accompanied the less advanced ones at the piano. The schedule was a sandwich -- take a class, play a class, take a class -- and it went from mid-morning to mid-afternoon. No break for lunch.

There was a cafeteria right downstairs. Unfortunately, unlike the schedule, lunch was not a sandwich, but a chef's salad, hold the meat. I would place this salad beside the piano as I played, and take bites when the instructor went into a long explanation of something, which was frequent. I could usually tell when he was winding down and got my fingers ready on the keys to await his call for the usual ballet preparation: "ONE!" (arms forward), "TWO!" (arms to the side). (Musically: chord, chord.)

On one occasion, I was munching away on my salad when suddenly, before I knew it was coming, I heard, "ONE!" I literally jumped, and spilled my salad all over the keys. I dutifully played -- chord, chord. Then I played an entire gavotte while tomatoes and hard-boiled egg halves bounced on the keys, dancing about with lettuce and bits of cheese, all slippery with oily dressing...

When the exercise was over, I quickly wiped the mess off with a paper towel, hoping no one would see. Fortunately, the piano keys faced a wall, rather than being in sight of the students, but I felt the eyes of some staff people...

People with skeletons in their closets are often the worst reformers.

Fingers only on keys, please!

And put the flowers in a vase!!!