{"id":34458,"date":"2018-05-10T01:30:00","date_gmt":"2018-05-10T08:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/northwest\/downtown-port-angeles-piano-getting-a-makeover\/"},"modified":"2018-05-10T01:30:00","modified_gmt":"2018-05-10T08:30:00","slug":"downtown-port-angeles-piano-getting-a-makeover","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/northwest\/downtown-port-angeles-piano-getting-a-makeover\/","title":{"rendered":"Downtown Port Angeles piano getting a makeover"},"content":{"rendered":"
PORT ANGELES — The piano that filled the downtown streets of Port Angeles with music last summer is getting a makeover before it returns.<\/p>\n
A work party at the Conrad Dyer Memorial Fountain in downtown Port Angeles pulled the piano apart on Saturday, sanding it and prepping it to be painted this week — and possibly back out on the streets by this weekend.<\/p>\n
Downtown business owner Mike French, a City Council member, said he began putting the piano out last summer.<\/p>\n
His inspiration was a young trumpet player who busked at the fountain, he said.<\/p>\n
“It was a young musician who was trying to better himself and become better at his craft while entertaining people in the process,” French said.<\/p>\n
French, who plays piano and has never had a portable instrument, wanted pianists to be able to do the same thing, he said.<\/p>\n
After checking with city officials and neighbors, French added better wheels to a piano, which was donated by United Methodist Church, and began leaving it at the fountain on sunny days.<\/p>\n
French said he was delighted to see how well the community reacted to having the piano downtown last summer.<\/p>\n
“We’re a super musical community, so to me this made total sense,” he said. “And to see the joy it brought to a lot of people solidified what I thought was a great idea.”<\/p>\n
After the piano had been out for awhile, people suggested that it should be painted, French said. That’s when, at the suggestion of others, French asked Natalie Martin of Sequim to paint the piano before it hits the streets again this summer.<\/p>\n