The Weight of a Piano

by Chris Cander

Genres: Family Life; Literary Fiction; Women's Fiction

Synopsis

For fans of Ann Patchett's Bel Canto, Annie Proulx's Accordion Crimes, Amanda Coplin's The Orchardist
A tour-de-force about two women and the piano that inexorably ties their lives together through time and across continents, for better and for worse.
In 1962, in the Soviet Union, eight-year-old Katya is bequeathed what will become the love of her life: a Blüthner piano, built at the turn of the century in Germany, on which she discovers everything that she herself can do with music and what music, in turn, does for her. Yet after marrying, she emigrates with her young family from Russia to America, at her husband's frantic insistence, and her piano is lost in the shuffle.
In 2012, in Bakersfield, California, twenty-six-year-old Clara Lundy loses another boyfriend and again has to find a new apartment, which is complicated by the gift her father had given her for her twelfth birthday, shortly before he and her mother died in a fire that burned their house down: a Blüthner upright she has never learned to play. Orphaned, she was raised by her aunt and uncle, who in his car-repair shop trained her to become a first-rate mechanic, much to the surprise of her subsequent customers. But this work, her true mainstay in a scattered life, is put on hold when her hand gets broken while the piano's being moved--and in sudden frustration she chooses to sell it. And what becomes crucial is who the most interested party turns out to be...
In 1962, in the Soviet Union, eight-year-old Katya is bequeathed what will become the love of her life: a Blüthner piano. After marrying, she emigrates with her young family to America and her beloved piano is lost. In 2012, in Bakersfield, California, twenty-six-year-old Clara Lundy has to find a new apartment, which is complicated by the gift her father gave her for her twelfth birthday, shortly before he and her mother died in a fire: a Blüthner upright. Orphaned, she was raised by her aunt and uncle, who in his car-repair shop trained her to become a mechanic. But this work is put on hold when her hand gets broken while the piano's being moved - and in frustration she chooses to sell it. And what becomes crucial is who the most interested party turns out to be…
"Immense, intense and imaginative…Cander is a smart, deft storyteller [and] understands how something as beloved as a piano can actually be a burden." THE NEW YORK TIMES

Release date: January 22, 2019

Publisher: Vintage

Print pages: 336

Sample

Chapter One

Hidden in dense forests high in the Romanian mountains, where the winters were especially cold and long, were spruce trees that would be made into pianos: exquisite instruments famous for the warmth of their tone and beloved by the likes of Schumann and Liszt. One man alone knew how to choose them.

Once the leaves had fallen and snow blanketed the ground, Julius Blüthner made the trip from Leipzig by train and walked through the forest alone. Because of the elevation and the brutal cold, trees there grew very slowly. They stood straight and thick against the elements, their grain dense with rosin. Blüthner nodded to the young trees as he passed, occasion­ally brushing their bark in greeting. He sought the older ones, whose branches he couldn’t reach, whose diameters were so great he couldn’t see if a bear were standing behind the trunk. He knocked them with his walking stick, and pressed his ear against them as his intuition dictated, listening for the music hidden inside. He heard it more clearly than any other piano maker, better even than Ignaz Bösendorfer and Carl Bechstein and Henry Steinway. When he found what he was listening for, he marked the tree with a scrap of red wool, which stood out bright against the snow.

Then the lumberjacks he’d hired cut down the trees he’d chosen. Watching closely, Blüthner could tell which were the finest specimens by how they fell. Only those with a mini­mum of seven annular rings per centimeter, all evenly spaced, would be carried out of the forest on sleds, then shipped back to Germany. And the finest among these would become the soundboards that beat like hearts inside his famous pianos.

As protection against splitting, the logs were kept wet until they reached the sawmill. There they were quarter-sawn to unlock the purest tones, then sawn and planed into uniform planks. The wood chips went into the furnaces to heat the mill and power the steam engines. Because of knots and other imperfections revealed in the cutting, many of the precious tonewood planks also ended up in the furnaces. What was kept was nearly perfect: white in color; light and flexible; the faint traces of the rings densely spaced and running parallel across the faces of the soundboard planks. These raw boards were stored for at least two years, covered and uncovered until their humidity dwindled to about fourteen percent.

When it was ready, the wood was transported by horse cart to the enormous Blüthner factory in the western quarter of Leipzig and laid out on racks near the ceiling in hot rooms for many months. But even then it wasn’t ready to become an instrument. To ensure that the soundboard would someday conduct Blüthner’s peerless golden tone, the wood had to dry out for another few years in the open air.

It was with reverence, then, in 1905, that an assistant Kla­vierbaumeister selected a number of those carefully seasoned planks and glued them edge to edge to form a single board. He cut it to the proper shape and planed it to the proper thick­ness, flexible enough to vibrate but strong enough to push back against the pressure of more than two hundred strings. Once crafted, it was returned to those warmer rooms to dry further before thin ribs could be applied to its underside, per­pendicular to the grain lines. Then the soundboard took on a small amount of moisture, enough to allow its top to swell into a gentle curve, upon which the bass and treble bridges would sit, their downward pressure meeting the apex of the opposing curve as if around a great barrel. The Klavierbau­meister admired his work: the impeccably matched parallels of the grain, the precise curvature of the crown. This particular soundboard would provide the heart for the factory’s 66,825th piano.

The frame of the case was built by other craftsmen, its five back posts sturdy enough to bear the weight of the sound­board and the iron plate. The pinblock was cut and fitted. The agraffes were seated into the plate at a height that would determine the speaking length of the strings, which were then strung; tuning pins were hammered in, and the action set and fitted. Cold-pressed felt was layered thick onto the wooden hammers, thinning appropriately toward the delicate treble side. Dampers were installed next, along with the trapwork of pedals and levers, dowels and springs. The case was ebonized after the guts were in, requiring countless coats. The finishers’ arm muscles bulged above their rolled-up shirtsleeves.

Next the instrument, nearly complete, was tuned, the ten­sion of each of the 220 strings adjusted to the correct pitch. Then it was regulated, the touch and responsiveness of the action attended to until the motion of the fingers on the keys would be properly transferred to the hammers that struck the strings.

At last, after many years of effort by many expert hands, the piano was delivered to its final station for voicing. The Meister there lifted the linen blanket covering it and passed a hand over the shiny black top. Why should this piano be special? Each one was special, with its own soul and distinct personal­ity. This one was substantial but unassuming, mysterious but sincere. He let the linen drop onto the factory floor.

“What will you say to this world?” he asked the instrument.

He shaped the hammers one by one, listening to every string, shaving and minutely aerating the felt again and again. He was like a diagnostician, knocking the nerves below a patient’s kneecap, measuring the response. The piano called out each time in compliant reply. Hello, hello.

“Fertig,” he said when the work was done. He wiped the sweat off his forehead with his sleeve, pushed the wisps of white hair away from his face. Standing back from the piano, he regarded this complete and brand-new entity that would be—after being played in properly—capable of incredible feats. The first few years were unpredictable, but over time it would open up and gather into itself a unique history. For now it was a perfect instrument, characterized only by its potential.

The Meister fluffed his apron as he sat down on the barrel he’d borrowed for a seat and, flexing his fingers, considered which piece to christen the piano with. Schubert, his favorite composer. He would play the rondo of his penultimate sonata, the big A Major; the opening melody was pretty, with a feeling of hopefulness and joy that preceded its more pensive, agi­tated development. This would be the perfect inauguration of the glistening black Blüthner No. 66,825.

“Listen!” he called out, but nobody could hear him above the factory’s ambient noise. “Here she is born!”

And he pressed his finger down on C-sharp, the first note of the rondo, listening hard, and it rang out to meet him with the innocence and power of a child’s first cry. Finding it as pure as he’d hoped, he began to play the rest of the sonata. He would send off this shining new piano with as much optimism as he could gather, knowing it would no longer be as vestal once it was touched by its future owners’ desperately human hands.


Chapter Two

Clara Lundy kicked a step stool against the front tire of an old 1996 Chevrolet Blazer and leaned over the engine, tossing her dark blond ponytail over her shoulder. She unscrewed the cap of the relief fitting and put a shop towel over it to catch the gas that leaked out when she pressed the valve. When the lines were bled, she stuffed the towel into her back pocket and went to her toolbox to grab the 16mm and 19mm wrenches and the quick-disconnect tool. Then, with an athletic jump, she disappeared into the yellow-framed pit so she could work from underneath. She removed the bracket, released the snap-lock fitting, and pulled the rubber hose off the outlet side of the filter first to keep the fuel from dripping in her eyes. She’d learned that lesson long ago in her uncle’s garage and had never forgotten it.

“Hey, Clara?” Peter Kappas, one of the shop owners’ three sons, peered down at her. A halo of late afternoon sunlight out­lined his bulky silhouette. “That guy with the rack-and-pinion job’s back again. He says it’s still making noise.”

“Same noise or new?”

“Popping. Bolts, probably.”

“Can you do it? I’m not done with this filter.”

“I promised the Corvette would be done by five.”

Clara slipped the new filter into the bracket. “Okay, give me fifteen. I’ll get it up in the air and see what’s going on. But if it’s the mounting bolts, then you’ll have to do the alignment again. You got time?”

“For you?”

“Stop.”

He raised his arms. “Kidding. Yeah, I can do it.”

After she tightened all the bolts and checked the lines, she went back up to prime the system. She turned the key to On, waited for the fuel pump to kick on and off, then switched the key to Off. She did that a few more times, and sitting there, she glimpsed herself in the rearview mirror and was startled to see that she looked older than her twenty-six years, like she’d aged a decade overnight. Her eyelids, in spite of the little bit of makeup she’d put on, were still vaguely puffy from her cry­ing jag the night before. Her mouth was set so hard that tiny lines radiated from her lips; she’d been clenching her teeth. When she relaxed her jaw, her pale cheeks seemed to sag and her mouth turned down at the corners. There was a smudge of grease across her forehead—probably from having pushed her bangs out of her eyes—that resembled her late father’s birthmark. She looked at herself, at his light brown eyes and pale eyelashes, their matching high cheekbones, and felt a gut punch at this unanticipated image of his face in the mirror. An old grief added to the new.

She turned the key all the way, and the Blazer’s engine fired up perfectly.

“Clara! Phone for you!” someone called above the noises in the shop: the hydraulic torque wrench and the air com­pressor, the glide and slam of toolkit drawers, the relentless clinking of metal, the ever-present laïko music coming from a grease-covered boom box in the corner, the shouts in Greek and English.

She wiped the stain from her forehead with the dirty towel as she walked over to the phone that hung on the wall. Peter’s brother Teddy stopped her with a hand on her forearm.

“It’s Ryan,” he said. “You might want to take it in the office.” Who knew what they’d been saying about her and Ryan. Peter’s mother, Anna, could read her face as though Clara were her own daughter and turn an opinion—I don’t think this Ryan is good for you—into a topic for general discussion. Clara usu­ally found herself offering supporting information without even meaning to, and the entire Kappas family soon knew all her personal business. She didn’t mind, though; they were the closest thing to a real family she’d had in a long time.

Clara nodded. The office was little more than a desk against the wall in the waiting area, between the water cooler and the coffeemaker. It was hardly private, but there weren’t any cus­tomers inside at the moment, and Anna, who was behind the counter writing an order for parts, winked at her and said, in her thick accent, “I’ll give you a minute.”

Clara sat down and tried not to look at the flashing caller-on-hold light on the phone. She gazed instead at the framed photos on the wall of the Sporades Islands: the family’s white­washed villa, the curved rock beach, the impossible turquoise water.

When she could avoid it no longer, she took a deep breath and picked up the line. “Hey,” she said.

“You’re not answering your cell.”

“I’m working.”

“Whatever, Clara. Listen, I’m taking off for a few days so you can pack up your stuff. I really want you to be out by the weekend, okay?”

“Wait, what? Seriously? I thought we were still talking about everything.”

“Clara, did you not hear me last night? I’m tired of waiting for you to make up your mind. You just don’t want what I do.”

“I never said I didn’t want the same thing, I just asked for time.” She turned her body toward the wall. “Ryan, please.”

“I know you needed time, and I’ve tried to give it to you. But I can’t keep putting your needs ahead of mine. I’m ready to move forward. I want a family. I’d like it to be with you, but if it can’t be . . . well, what choice do I have?”

“Look, I love you, Ryan, you know I do. But marriage is a big step. Why can’t we just be together? Why’s everything such a rush?”

“What is it about making this permanent that freaks you out so much? I know you love me. Why can’t you just say yes?”

Clara sighed. She could change this conversation, change her entire life, with just one word. But she couldn’t do it. “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

“Then we’re done. I need you out. I need to move on.”

“So you’re really going to kick me out? After two years you’re giving me, what, four days to move? How do you expect me to do that? And where am I supposed to get the money for it?”

“You know I wouldn’t leave you on the street. I found you an apartment in East Bakersfield. I already put down the first and last months’ rent. I figured this would make things easier.”

“Jesus, Ryan. Couldn’t we have talked about it first? East Bakersfield?”

He made a huffing sound. “Do you really care where you live? It seems like all you really care about is that damn garage.”

She balled the spiral phone cord into her fist, fighting the urge to cry again. Was she crying over losing him? Losing her home? Her own indecision?

“The lease and key are on the kitchen table,” he said. “When you’re out, you can drop your old key through the slot.”

Clara rested her forehead against the wall and exhaled. “So that’s it?”

“Yeah, that’s it.”

He paused, they both did, and she wondered if he’d say what he always did at the end of a phone call. You’re my girl—you know that, right? She couldn’t speak. She couldn’t let go. She leaned forward in anticipation, waiting, yearning, yet reluctant to give in.

“Good luck, Clara. I hope you figure out whatever it is you want, I really do. I’m just sorry it wasn’t me.” Then he hung up.

She held the phone against her ear, listening to her heart­beat until the busy signal began beeping. When she turned around, Peter was standing at the door.

“You okay?” he asked.

She didn’t answer right away. Maybe she hadn’t really loved Ryan after all, certainly not how he wanted her to. But she was used to being with him, to having someone to go home to, and life with him had been easy. “Will you help me move?” she asked Peter.

He pulled off his ball cap—Havoline, Protect What Matters—and raked his fingers through his thick black hair. “Of course,” he said, and put the cap back on. “You know I will.”