Cul de Sac by Richard Thompson for April 16, 2022

my older brother has the piano from which he had practiced as a child after our mother had passed away

While Liszt and Scott are rightfully remembered for their musical compositions, their trebuchet-building skills are sadly forgotten by most of the world.

Two trains of thought and never the twain shall meet…

A piano trebuchet would be great

I believe Dill just likes the word, and enjoys saying it. Maybe if his brothers had instead called theirs a big catapult, he wouldn’t be trying to work “trebuchet” into random conversations.

I’ve never been sure if the piano was a constituent part of the trebuchet, or ammunition for it.

Puts new meaning to ‘Spring is in the air’…….

If you counter flood, it will get rid of the Franz Liszt.

I had to look up Raymond Scott. Apparently his music was used in Warner Bros cartoons. So a nice reference by Mr Thompson

That’s an awfully big trebuchet!

Music makes a big impact in the Cul-de-Sac Neighborhood… ☺

My grandmother taught piano. I was a tiny thing when I visited them where they lived, 4 or 5? On a lark she sat me down for a “lesson.” I promptly learned it, and then copied every tune she played, even simple ones with two hands. Astonishment and amazement ensued. I could do “a thing!” Even my parents were impressed and asked me to perform “my trick.” When my grandparents died just a few years later, Grandma bequeathed me her antique parlor grand Steinway so I could start real lessons. I was overwhelmed not because of the extravagant gift, I didn’t know from pianos, but because someone in the family thought to encourage me in something.

I took the lessons, I was good, there was quiet talk from my teacher about a potential career… Eventually the family dynamics worked their charm to make sure I was put back in my place. I quit the lessons, my mom won and the “cluttering up” piano was moved out of her house to my dad’s, where I would go to play it while everyone was at work so as not to disturb. Then I was off to college and marriage, and occasional mentions of when I might have my piano. There were always excuses why it wasn’t a good time, but I trusted it would eventually get to me, so I politely waited.

Then decades later it became the innocent sacrificial pawn in the cruelest end game my father ever played against me. I had to watch it being loaded into a moving van, given to a random graduate student who didn’t even want it. But he was deaf to mine, hers, and everyone’s tearful protestations. He had a point to make about me and that piano, the denouement of a decades long game I didn’t know I was playing. He spun around in all the noise and silenced the room, screaming at me: “YOU DON’T DESERVE THE PIANO!” Forty years of a timid beating lost heart finally shattered in my chest. But even in all this trauma and heartbreak, my heart holds on to that one bit of love that radiated from a grandmother I barely knew, someone who cared.

Speaking of the family trebuchet; I have seen a video of a BIG trebuchet throwing an old piano; it didn’t end well for the piano. He may have been referring to the Burning Man 2015 where they did throw a piano, or that Burning Man might have taken inspiration from this strip which is dated 2012….

Reminds me of an episode of Northern Exposure…..

In panel #2 she is being influenced by a Tom and Jerry cartoon. In the last panel she must be referring to Bugs Bunny in the cartoon “Rabbit Rhapsody”.

What does “trebuchet” have to do with pianos/pianists? I’ve been researching this all morning and can find only a definition for a medieval catapult. Anyone?

Had to look up Raymond Scott.

I’m undecided as to whether the piano will sound better in the hands of Alice or the trebuchet.

In my mind’s eye I see a spinet piano gliding gracefully through the air.

Piano on Fire Trebuchet Toss at Burning Man 2015

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6Rn8jBzsg9U

Did the Wedekind Brothers build a trebuchet from piano parts, or did they launch the piano from their trebuchet? This is not made clear in Dill’s laconic musings (easily read from panel to panel independently; makes his thinking clearer that way). Previous comments have shown either is possible.

Meanwhile, I am doubtless showing my age by saying I remember Raymond Scott from Your Hit Parade, which I first listened to on radio and then later watched on TV….

Ahh well do I remember the concert with Vladimir Horowitz playing Franz Liszt’s Concerto for Two Trebuchets.