Temporal Silence

Today I met a man who restores old pianos -- and I mean old. He led us down into his basement workshop where he was restoring several pieces including an 1818 Alpheus Babcock (Boston) piano and a 1791 Broadwood (London) piano.

I was fascinated by the numerous keyboards and mechanisms in various states of assembly, but what intrigued me most was where he got the ivory for the keys, as ivory importation has been banned here since the early 1970s. So I asked. He told me that as long as the ivory was imported before the ban and is documented with affidavits of origin, you can still get your hands on ivory for things like piano keys.

This man keeps an official letter in the glove box of his car in case he's ever pulled over by the police while he has elephant tusks in the back seat. I never would've guessed that the job of piano restorer had an element of risk!