Street piano

The Street Piano was a piano on the pavement on Sharrow Vale Road in Sheffield, UK. It was originally left outside temporarily because the owner could not get it up the steps into his new house. As a social experiment the owner and a friend then attached a sign inviting passers by to play the piano for free. This offer was taken up by a great many people and the piano became a part of the local community. It has so far survived for over a year, including being stolen and subsequently replaced by a newer model (having 4/5 separate volunteers willing to provide a new one).

It became the center of a local campaign once the council decided it constituted an abandoned item, and the campaign to save it spread quickly to local news outlets, and several articles on Indymedia. As of July 2006 a spokesman said in an interview for the National BBC Radio 4 that the piano was no longer under threat of removal.

'Play Me, I'm Yours' In 2007 artist Luke Jerram installed 15 streetpianos across Birmingham,UK for the public to play. In just 3 weeks 140,000 people across the city played, listened and connected with one another.

Jerram said "Questioning the rules and ownership of public space 'Play Me I'm yours' is a provocation, inviting the public to engage with, activate and take ownership of their urban environment."

Since this time, 13 pianos have been installed in Sao Paulo and 30 across Sydney for the Sydney Festival 2009. [1] was set up for the public to upload and share their films, photos and stories of the pianos being played.

From Jerram's website.... "Located in parks, public squares on ferries and even in a tattoo parlour many of the pianos are being decorated by local artists and children. The pianos act as sculptural, musical, blank canvas's that become a reflection of the communities they are embedded into. Who will play them and how long they remain is up to each community."

In June - July 2009 30 "Play Me, I'm Yours" painted pianos by Luke Jerram were installed across London "like a creative blank canvas" for members of the public to play during Sing London and the City of London Festival. The official website: [2] --Eugenie Absalom (talk) 16:54, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Pianocrasher and Street Pianos 09 [3]

Luke Jerram's "Play Me I'm Yours" street piano initiative comes as a reaction of a creative individual to the general rule, prohibiting anyone to play music in public places without special arrangement - no matter how skilful you are at playing piano or how popular your music is with the audience. Any musician would have been stopped immediately by security outside the City of London and Sing London festival.

Camden based artist and professional musician Oleg Lapidus, aka the Pianocrasher [4] proved the point more than once by playing music unexpectedly in public areas and being stopped by security.

In 2008 he turned society's unacceptance of impromtu music performaces into a provocative creative trend, called Acoustic Graffiti Arts: video recordings of his own music performances and his visual art works, based on music stopped by security.

Both projects: street pianos and acoustic graffiti arts share the same artistic vision - they encourage general public to create freely and to use public space as their playground.

Oleg Lapidus, the Pianocrasher tickling the ivories of "Play Me I'm Yours" in the British Library Courtyard, June 2009 video: [5]

--Eugenie Absalom (talk) 23:32, 7 July 2009 (UTC)