July 12th, 2014 by Meryl Danziger | Tags: exploration, musical discovery, Piano, sustaining pedal | No Comments »
My piano is little: 64 keys and only two pedals. Max noticed the pedals and asked me what they are for. I encourage kids to try and figure things out as though I weren’t there: Suppose you were stranded on a music island, just you, the instrument and some tropical fruit. What would you do? But Max’s nature – as well as his experience – is to oblige, so he just sat there looking willing but clueless, and a bit embarrassed. I let a couple of minutes tick silently by. I knew that in school, Max enjoys science. “Suppose you approach it scientifically?” I offered. “What if you try playing without pushing the pedal down, and then do the same thing using the pedal?” His eager smile said that was a terrific idea, but feeble little pokes and random pedaling revealed that he didn’t really get it. Maybe specific steps would help.
- “Play a note without holding the pedal down. Then let go of the note and listen.”
- “Play the same note while you hold the pedal down. Keep the pedal down, let go of the note and listen.”
Max dutifully executed my instructions. When he took his finger off of the pedaled note and heard the sound continue, his huge eyes widened and his mouth opened in genuine wonder. He whipped around to look right at me. “It’s a Survive Pedal!” he exclaimed. “It made the note survive!”
Later, when we were doing Max’s first black-key 
improvisation together, I mentioned that he could add the Survive Pedal if he wanted to and that it might sound nice. His serious response told me that for the foreseeable future, this is what we would be calling it. Come to think of it, maybe all of us can relate to a Survive Pedal …
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