Whatever happened to the old Herne Hill Piano?
Well it was homeless on October 1st. After the Piano Day Event it was wheeled past the shiny new one that had taken over its place and was locked away in storage at Herne Hill Station, safe but lonely.
It was then rescued for the third time in its history.
This time by Simon Nash who wheeled it (2 miles!) to his communal offices at Green Oil Ltd Brixton.
Attached is a picture of it in it’s new home, the Old Granary on Coldharbour Lane, home of Green Oil UK Ltd.
Below an extract from his letter to Herne Hill Forum.
Thank you so much for the piano.
It’s in an atrium with great acoustics, it gives it an ‘Ocean’ affect (you might have seen this affect on a Nord Stage 2!), it’s a concrete stairwell kind of thing.
It’s amazing what you’ve done, I actually met my piano teacher at that piano. Many fond memories!
Anyway, keep up the good work, and thankyou for making the world more beautiful.
I built a piano trolley for it from some old flight case wheels (I found a broken flight case some time ago), an old door and pieces of ply wood, largely reclaimed from local fly tipping!
The trolley worked so well, the piano seems to have largely stayed in tune the journey here! The train staff helped me get it onto the trolley, and I walked it back here on the road, about two miles! A decorator who’d just got off the train helped me along the road some of the way, and an artist coming out of the building helped with the last bit. I used a sheet of metal from an old water tank to get the piano over bumps, it worked well.
And now it will bring joy to lots of people, including myself.
My friend John runs a recording studio and we’re going to tune it together some time – he thinks a few notes are out of tune. We might even fix a couple of broken keys.
Anyway, attached is a pic for you. Do visit any time. It’s currently still on the trolley so you can play standing up, but I’ll build a bench some time.
God bless and keep making the world more colourful.
Kind regards,
Simon Nash
Director
Green Oil UK Ltd
Saving a Piano from the dump.
Our story in pictures.
Carrie in Clapham had a piano she no longer wanted – she answered our freecycle ad. We collected it took it to Clockwork Studios Loughborough Junction where Staffan Gnosspelius painted it beautifully. Then we brought it to its new home Clapham Junction Station.
Now travellers and station staff have more live music in their daily life – and get a chance to meet someone they may have not met before.
Henri Herbert boogie boogie maestro and street piano legend launched it for us Sat Oct 15th.
This is our documentary in a nutshell. The aim of the film is to inspire more stations, and neighourhoods to do the same. In the film we see the transformation these pianos make to city life and the lives of the people that play them.
We are raising funds to finish the film on an indiegogo crowdfunder.
Click here for indiegogo fund page
Take a peek at the perks – would you like your name/your friends name on the Clapham Piano £25 ?
Lets all have a great night at the Ritzy with DJ Wizard Jamie Renton £15
It would be exciting to have more pianos out there. Your support hugely appreciated!
Instrument of Change: Street Piano Crowdfunder
We’re currently raising money by crowdfunding on Indigogo to enable us to finish our documentary. We’ve worked so so (so!) hard on it, but we can’t finish it without this final boost of money!
If you are able to donate anything at all we would be hugely grateful. If we can polish off the doc it means that the amazing individuals that we’ve spent the last few months, some even years, with can have their voices heard – and not just that, but we hope the film will really pave the way for more street pianos to be introduced in the UK and around the world.
Click here for our campaign page. Thank you! xxx
Invite to launch of new Street Piano and our Crowdfunder.
Date: Sat 15th October
Time: 1.30
Place: Clapham Junction Station Upper Front entrance.
Seeing as the aim of the film is to inspire more street pianos we decided to put a new street piano on the map at the same time as launching the crowdfunder.
Come hear Henri Herbert – boogie woogie legend of the St Pancras live in the station at 1.30.
We are on the last lap with our film Instrument of Change Street Piano.
We have done 90 percent of the work. Almost there!
To finish it off we need raise some funds for dubbing, grading, archive and legal costs.
Come listen! Come play! Keep live music alive! The piano will be available to play after 2pm.
It would be fabulous to see you there!
Here is Henri’s legendary session at St Pancras – 12 million views – it kickstarted his solo career!
Herne Hill Piano Day
Last Saturday we were in Herne Hill celebrating (and filming!) the introduction of the brand new street piano, crowdfunded for earlier this year by the Herne Hill Forum (have a look at this article to refresh your memory if needed!). This meant we also said goodbye to the old piano!
We were lucky enough to have a stand for the afternoon. We saw familiar faces as well as lots of new ones to chat to about our film, and Maureen and Ken made a speech in the afternoon about the doc. They also officially announced the upcoming event at Clapham Junction where a new street piano will be introduced on 15th October – more details on this coming soon!!
The new piano, the campaign for which received around £10,000 in donations, was designed and painted by local graffiti artist Tizer.
Inspired by the Cheshire Cat from Alice and Wonderland, you can see more pictures on our instagram.
The piano is now in its permanent position in the underpass by Herne Hill station. Make sure you pay it a visit!
Celebrate Music for all on Sat Oct 1st
A bit of History …
Herne Hill Piano was installed in 2012 – here is a pic as it was then before all the extra graffiti colours. Here is Anthony a Herne Hill Piano legend. He played Mozart and taught himself to play classical music after first hearing it on video games.
He was a highlight for folk out for the night in the square. Often on Youtube – here is a popular sample – we hope he will come on October 1st!
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