A PIANO IN THE PARLOR.

Byline: Bob Keefer The Register-Guard

When some men retire, they take up golf. Others see retirement as a time to go fishing. After University of Oregon geography professor Everett Smith retired from teaching three years ago, he bought himself a grand piano.

Smith, who started taking piano lessons when he was in the third grade, had never quite found enough time to devote to the instrument that was once the centerpiece of the American home. Now, he's playing all the time.

"I play old standards," he says. "Jazz piano is my favorite kind of instrumental music."

Once the focus of many American homes, the piano has been squeezed from that starring role by everything from television to computer games. Nevertheless, it remains a survivor among cultural icons.

In 1909, more than 360,000 pianos were made and sold in the United States. By 2002, that number had dropped - not counting electronic keyboards - to 84,000. (In roughly that same period, the U.S. population more than tripled, from 92 million in 1910 to 281 million in 2000.)

And yet, despite competition on all sides, the piano refuses to leave the American parlor. Total annual U.S. piano sales have generally declined since a post-war high in 1974 of about 250,000, but the total value of pianos sold has mostly increased. We are buying fewer but better instruments: Nearly twice as many grand pianos were sold in 2002 as in 1974.

One new piano buyer in Eugene is Maryl Barker. When she sold her business last year and retired, she bought herself a grand piano, an unusual step for someone who barely plays.

Barker, 50, had suffered a disastrous introduction to the instrument as a young girl. She put the idea of piano aside for most of her life, and now figured it was time to redeem her interest in music.

"I got up for my recital and couldn't remember a single note," Barker recalls. "I was probably 8 or 9. It wasn't real fun."

Barker bought the piano in part for its decorative value. "I was moving into a new home, and I thought, 'Gosh, a piano would look nice in here.' And it would be an incentive to get with the lessons."

The piano, a Kawai baby grand, is also an investment, she says. "It's probably the most expensive thing in the house. It's just fun. A friend was playing it the other night. He said it has a good feel and a nice sound."

In its early 20th century glory, the piano was everything from social centerpiece of the household to a laboratory for music instruction for the children. It provided evening entertainment for family members and guests and was a sign of affluence among the middle class.

So important was the piano in Oregon that in 1915, the Oregon State Music Teachers Association was founded, with 27 charter members, to accredit teachers and create a syllabus for music instruction - generally on the piano - for public schools. By 1927, the group - now called the Oregon Music Teachers Association - had 327 members.

For the past decade, the OMTA's membership has held steady at about 700, says Joan Gathercoal, a Corvallis piano teacher and the group's official historian.

Gathercoal, 71, remembers piano from its heyday. Her father was a jazz pianist and her mother played piano for their church. At night, she and her twin sister, Jean, would lie in bed and listen to their parents play music.

"Our family entertainment was singing and playing around the piano," she says.

"I remember Mother always saying, 'Now, John, if you could just play what's written.' And my father saying, 'Ruth, if you could just jazz it up a little bit!' '

The piano's popularity has endured because of the instrument's versatility, Gathercoal says.

"The piano is a complete instrument unto itself," she says. "It can play melody and harmony together. That is probably the most exciting thing about the piano and why it is used so much. It enables you to use the piano in classroom teaching. It also enables you to accompany other instruments, the voice and dancers."

Former Eugene mayor Ruth Bascom grew up with a piano in her home. She still has it - a Steinway upright her father bought from a friend who had lost his job during the Depression. She plays for fun, as she did at a recent Christmas party. "People that make a lot of noise and sing loudly, I can accompany them," she says.

Bascom taught each of her six children to play on the family piano starting when they were 6 years old. One son became a church organist.

"A piano in every house: That's the way it should be," she says firmly. "Of my six children, four have pianos at home. The other two are thinking they should."

Richard Clark, a retired professor from the University of Oregon School of Music, also grew up with a piano at the center of his home life.

"In my family's house, it seemed like one of the essential things we had to have was a piano. When my parents moved to Canada, their first big expense was a piano."

But Clark says the piano has slipped from the position it once held.

"It's diminishing. I just don't think people are as involved on the personal level with making music at home," he says. "At our home, we always had lots of music, especially around social events and holidays. We just don't do that anymore. We've just changed. These entertainment centers people have, you don't actively participate, you just watch. People's entertainment time is presented to them, instead of created."

Larry Clabby has no statistics to prove it, but he sees a swing back toward piano playing among the families whose children attend Eugene's O'Hara Catholic School, where he heads a remarkable piano program.

About 60 of O'Hara's roughly 400 students take weekly private piano lessons through the school, which has 15 pianos, including five grand pianos. Students can start piano instruction at O'Hara in second grade, and about a third of the school's second-graders are enrolled this year.

Clabby says that school provides an ideal atmosphere to introduce children to music.

"Nowadays, everybody is very, very busy," he says. "I'm talking about second-graders! They have such a busy schedule. Everybody is in sports, so to have lessons right here in school is an advantage.

"Also, it's a protected environment where the children seem to be very comfortable getting up and performing for their classmates and the whole student body."

Interest declined in the piano program for a while in the late 1980s, Clabby says, for a number of reasons, from digital keyboards and computer games to the disintegration of the traditional family.

Now, though, he sees families interested again in owning a real piano. And that, he says, is part of a greater swing back in society.

"It seems like there are people moving into Eugene with more structure in the home," he says. "It's a throwback. It's deja vu. It's beautiful families, very traditional families, with traditional values. And music is a part of that."

CAPTION(S):

Carle Stiltner, 11, is a fifth-grade O'Hara Catholic School student learning to play the piano from Larry Clabby. About 60 students take piano lessons through the school. Kevin Clark / The Register-Guard Retired University of Oregon professor Everett Smith recently bought a grand piano. Larry Clabby sees renewed interest in piano playing among families whose children attend O'Hara Catholic School. Above: Both the sound and shapes of a piano bring beauty to a room. Here, the leg of a Samick piano at Lawson's Keyboard Center offers elegant curves. Left: A parent put up paper piano keys in piano teacher Larry Clabby's classroom at O'Hara Catholic School. Kevin Clark / The Register-Guard Everett Smith bought a grand piano when he retired from teaching geography at the University of Oregon. Larry Clabby says he's seen a renewed interest in piano playing among families with students at O'Hara School. "I just don't think people are as involved on the personal level with making music at home. At our home, we always had lots of music, especially around social events and holidays. We just don't do that anymore. We've just changed." RICHARD CLARK RETIRED MUSIC PROFESSOR