Submitted by Karen Cross Durham on Fri, 01/18/2008 - 7:10pm.
Chicago premiere!
NOTE BY NOTE: THE MAKING OF STEINWAY L1037
2007, Ben Niles, USA, 80 min., DigiBeta video.
“A slimy log dumped into frigid Alaskan waters emerges as the hand-selected Steinway for a world-class performance…the story of a family, a neighborhood and a machine with a heart.”--Ron Wilkinson, Monsters and Critics.com
“Niles and cinematographer Ben Wolf scrutinize each step as if it were RIFIFI’s climactic heist, offering moments of fixated strangeness and wonder.”--Jim Ridley, Village Voice
The unlikely subject of the building of a piano becomes a gripping and even soaring story of craftsmanship and artistry taken to an obsessive level of perfection that is oddly moving in this age of computer-generated everything. The filmmakers spend a year in Steinway’s Queens, New York, factory, following the wondrous process of creating the glossy, black, 9-foot-long concert-grand that will come alive under the hands of Hèléne Grimaud. Testimony to the unique personality of each handmade instrument is demonstrated with attitudes ranging from persnickety consternation to crazy joy when artists as diverse as Pierre Laurent Aimard, Harry Connick Jr., Lang Lang, and Hank Jones audition prospective pianos.
Reduced admission!
Chicago Sinfonietta subscribers, Chicago Symphony Orchestra subscribers, and WFMT-FM members admitted for $7 to any NOTE BY NOTE screening.
Special "guest" appearances! Steinway L1037, the actual piano that is seen being built in the film, will be on display in Theater 1 on Friday, January 18. Following the 7:45 pm Friday screening, six-year-old prodigy Emily Bear will give a performance. The Steinway L1037 will be on view in our gallery/café for the remainder of the run, January 19-24. Performances are scheduled to take place 25 minutes prior to each screening; artists TBA.
Friday, January 18-Thursday, January 24
Fri. at 6:00 pm and 7:45 pm;
Sat. at 3:00 pm, 4:45 pm, 6:30 pm, and 8:15 pm;
Sun. at 3:00 pm and 4:45 pm
Mon.-Thu. at 6:00 pm and 7:45 pm
Gene Siskel Film Center, 164 N. State St., Chicago, IL
Tickets: $9/general admission, $7/students, $5/Film Center members.
Information: 312-846-2800 or www.siskelfilmcenter.org.
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