This morning two men came to my house and, with something I can’t call anything but grace, delivered a piano. Watching Sean and his mate from Elstree Piano Removals moving quickly and smoothly – tilting and guiding and tipping and rotating a 75 year-old, iron-framed upright piano into our back room in about two minutes from knock-on-the-door to thanks-and-see-you-later was a rare treat.
They managed the piano’s stupendous mass like ballet dancers manage a big lift. To watch them you’d have thought the thing was a piano-shaped helium balloon (the weight-lifters’ belts were a bit of a giveaway, though). They seemed to have a perfect, fingertip understanding of the thing’s moment, steering it as if self-propelled through the obstacle course of our hallway without touching a thing and their communication was impeccable – they could give seminars or, I shouldn’t doubt, turn the whole thing into a successful West End show (not unlike Stomp). Truly amazing.
By the way, we got the piano (thanks Din and Helen) from Freecycle.org for precisely £0.