The Piano Shop on the Left Bank: The Hidden World of a Paris Atelier (Paperback)

by T.E. Carhart (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
An American journalist living in Paris stumbles across a small piano atelier in a street near to his apartment. Initially he is just curious at the strange eccentricity of the shop and its inhabitants, but he is soon overtaken by his long buried interest in the instrument and the desire to own a piano once more. With the help of Luc, the shop's owner, the process of finding a piano that is 'just right for him' begins. This Luc assures him is not something to be rushed. A piano is finally found and duly purchased. He then begins to re-develop his playing skills, dormant since adolescence. This brings him into contact with many local characters, including piano movers, tuners, tutors and back room musicians of all kinds for whom music is also an all-consuming passion. Based on his real-life experiences this is more a book about pianos than Paris. Carhart leaves us in no doubt of his passion for the instrument and it is the depth of this passion that carries the book. Whether or not you share his love of the piano and his extreme delight in playing and listening to the music it makes, you will be infected by the excitement and pleasure with which he imbues this simple tale of Paris, friendship and a life-long love of music. (Kirkus UK) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Description
Ever since the piano was invented, people have longed to own one. In the nineteenth century, an age without recorded music or television, this craze reached its apex. Pianos were everywhere: they swelled and shrank in the heat of the colonies, they were in every genteel home, in restaurants, on steamships, in the remote bars of the American west. Some of these pianos have become treasured family heirlooms, some have ended up as firewood. Others have led a more intinerant life, washing up in all sorts of strange places. Occasionally, these wandering pianos find their way to a secret, glass-roofed workshop in Paris where they are lovingly restored and sent off again by a French piano repairer with a passion for his job. When Thad Carhart discovered Luc and his hidden cache of pianos in the dusty repair shop on his street in Paris, his life changed. Having been constantly on the move between America and France, he had never owned his own piano. As he explored the Eldorado of second-hand uprights, grands, harpsichords and player pianos in Luc's atelier, talked to him about how they work and their history, and finally found the baby grand of his dreams, he rediscovered his deep love for this most magical of instruments.

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (June 1, 2001)
• ISBN-10: 0099288230
• ISBN-13: 978-0099288237
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #674,639 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars finely written, a delight for every francophile, June 11, 2009

By	parisNewt - See all my reviews

Everyone interested in France will enjoy this bit of intellectual entertainment, though piano experts and tuners will tear their hair over the small innacuracies and over-romanticization of the trade. Nonetheless, the author has captured a unique (and dying) way of life, in an endearing depiction of Paris' ateliers and artisans. Bravo!