The Dead and Dying Instruments

When we moved into our house more than twenty years ago, we decided to use our living room as a music room.  So we installed our small black spinet piano, Bill's electric organ, and my grandma's old pump organ in the living room and, for a while, that's all the furniture we had in there.  But, over the years, that room has served as a graveyard, of sorts, for dead and dying instruments.

Oh, we have plenty of fully functional instruments in the house--several working guitars, Victoria's flute, and the baby grand piano that eventually replaced the spinet.  But even that cherished baby grand was reclaimed and rescued from near-death, and was rebuilt and refinished by a master technician so our family's budding musicians could play it.

Bill's electric organ sits against the wall.  It's the one his Grandma Lucas bought so he could take lessons.  It's survived a couple of flooded basements, so some of the stops don't work quite right anymore.  But Bill is too sentimental to give it up.

Young children are the only ones who truly love to play the electric organ--especially the drums!







We bought our old pump organ from Grandma Vawser years ago.  She had bought it at an auction a few years earlier, so it really didn't have any sentimental value.  Grandma had upgraded to a new electric organ, and didn't have room for the old pump organ anymore.  We paid fifty dollars for the organ and stool, a token amount so the other grandchildren couldn't accuse her of playing favorites.  No one plays it now; one of the treadles is broken, making it a little hard to pump.  It can be fixed, though, and I suspect that Bill will get to it someday. 

My old guitar sits in a place of honor in the living room, gathering dust.  What else can you do with an instrument that doesn't make music any more?  I was devastated when it was declared disfunctional, so badly warped from changing climates that it could no longer be tuned.  It had served me well for thirty years. 

Then, there is the acoustic bass, hand-made for Bill by his friend, Mike, when they were both in high school.  It's beautifully made and intricately hand-painted, but I don't know how it sounds, because it has never been fully strung.  I think Bill has been a little intimidated at the thought of adding frets (those inlaid strands of metal that span the neck of every guitar, so you know where to put your fingers.)  I don't know, maybe adding strings at this late date would warp the neck so badly that it can't be played--or maybe not.  I'd like to try it and see.

My mom's old autoharp stood in the corner of the living room for several years.  I don't know where Mom found it--perhaps Dad bought it for her at an auction--but I know she used it to accompany her grade school students that year she taught in Endicott.  I think it is the same instrument my brother, Dan, first learned to play.  Now, he owns several top-notch autoharps, which he plays wonderfully well.  I guess I need to see if he will re-string it for me.  I know my preschoolers would love to see it and hear me play it.  Anyone can play an autoharp--it's easy.  But few play as well as Dan does.

Bill acquired our eight-string  mandolin sometime before I met him.  I can play it, a little, but the fingering for the chords is different than guitar fingering, so I've never worked too hard to perfect it.  It's missing a string or two now.  Perhaps one of our grandchildren will want to play it someday.

Then, there is Levi's little red guitar, missing its G string.  He used to play it a lot.  I've tuned it for him many times, just because I can't stand the sound of any untuned instrument, even a child's toy.  He still says he wants to take lessons, so we should probably pursue that, but maybe with a different guitar.

We have a few other instruments as well:  a full set of rhythm instruments that I sometimes use with children, a ukelele with a missing bridge, and a set of bongo drums that need new skins.  And I have several music boxes, too--do they count as instruments?

Music has always been a vital part of our family life.  I started singing lullabies to my children when they were tiny, just as my own mother sang to me; now I sing the same songs to my grandchildren.

We all play instruments of one kind or another.  But the question remains:  what do we do with those instruments that no longer function as they were intended?

I can see another whole-family summer project looming in our future:  let's repair some of those old instruments.  Let's make some music!


Sing joyfully to the Lord...Sing to him a new song; play skillfully and shout for joy.  Psalm 33: 1, 3