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28 November 2001 Just went poking around the illustrious Eric Cheng's website for the umpteenth time, and ended up reading the cello section again for the first time in a while. I can't fathom what it's like to own a really good acoustic instrument. I'd be upset if one of my keyboards were stolen, of course, but that's a monetary issue; after I'd finished ranting about how mean human beings can be sometimes, I'd just hop on eBay or some online music store and get another one. It's all just electronics and plastic parts, really. But a cello -- or more personally in my case, a grand piano -- is something else entirely. A good acoustic instrument is made of its own kind of flesh and bone: no two play alike, having been created individually and with exquisite care. While I hesitate to invoke the cliché that they're actually living, breathing creatures, I have to say that I've felt the presence of something beyond mere wood and wire when I play them. Some hint that there's really a soul in there, speaking to me, figuring out whether I speak its language. I don't know how I'd deal with the theft or destruction of something like that. Interesting too that Eric had so many brushes with dealer snobbishness, what with folks telling him that they wanted to sell the instrument to a "real player" rather than a "hobby-cellist" like himself. I have sometimes felt like I don't deserve to be playing, say, a particular Steinway grand...it's like interviewing a celebrity I respect and stumbling over my questions as she smiles at me patiently, checking her gold watch. A lot of the piano's subtle beauty is way over my head, and certainly beyond my ability to bring out with my own ten fingers, as I'm all too often aware. So I'd be the first to admit to a dealer that I don't have the right to own a really good piano. (Eric's more healthy response was to shrug his shoulders in mild annoyance.) Oh well. It'll be years before I go shopping for a soulmate-piano anyway. - VT
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