UPRIGHT GRAND PIANO – PARAMOUNT THEATRE
During one of the many TV talk shows I appeared on in about 1975 to raise the Paramount’s profile, a viewer called in to ask a question of me. She said, “Are you aware of the upright grand piano backstage”? I said that I had seen it. She said, “Have you looked on the sound board”. I said that I had not. I beat it back to the theatre, double quick, after the TV show to look at the sound board. It was then that I saw that Enrico Caruso had signed the sound board with a date in 1919. He was the most famous opera singer of that time in history.
Sometime after I left the Paramount, in May of 1985, this incredible upright grand disappeared from backstage. None of the administrations that followed me seemed to know anything about the piano, whatsoever. It is possible it ended up in an 18 wheeler truck with scenery from a touring play and stolen. Or, someone may have sold it to a collector without anyone at the Paramount knowing about the transfer of the instrument.
Very few people respect history. What happened in the past assumes an air of irrelevancy, cast adrift in the ether of time. Entire legacies of families, organizations and cultures vanish, never to be recovered. If any of those who read this story know anything about the whereabouts of this piano, please let me know!!!
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ENRICO CARUSO – OPERA SIGNER
