A piano rescued from a bombed-out concert hall is Gaza is restored, providing people with music and hope.
BBC News reporter Tim Whewell didn’t expect to find much. When he entered the formerly luxurious Nawras Theatre in Gaza, he “gasped at the scale of destruction.”
Nawras Theatre, not long ago restored to grandeur, was strewn with wiring and rubble, the twisted metal that provided the ceiling’s skeleton now dangling purposelessly above cushy, red-velvet seats laden with dust and dirt. War had rendered the hall useless.
In the midst of all this destruction stood a grand piano; this was what Whewell had come to see. He was reporting on the work of piano-restoration expert Claire Bertrand, who had come from France to put the piano back in working order. Whewell describes the project:
The restoration project was organised by Music Fund and financed by the conductor and piano virtuoso Daniel Barenboim, who gave a concert in Gaza four years ago. "Gaza is not only rockets and missiles and angry people," Barenboim tells me. "The fact that the grand piano will be there — and restored and playable — will give the Gazans the possibility, as soon as life permits it, to have some kind of cultural activities … They need to hear really good music."
For the restorer, Claire Bertrand, who volunteered to come to Gaza on her first foreign assignment, it was a big job.
Whewell explains that Bertrand’s restoration efforts required the replacement of all 230 strings, and all 88 hammers and felts.
Now restored, the piano has been moved to an adjacent music school, where it has already been used in recital by the students there. Khamis Abu Shaaban, the administrator of Gaza's music school, is pleased the piano is being used once again. "It hasn't been used because there were no musicians to play on it,” Abu Shabaan told Whewell. “But now we are going to teach a new whole generation."
Below is Whewell's video documentary about the project; you can also read Whewell’s complete story, view more photos and listen to Whewell’s radio documentary about the pianos of Gaza.
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