Album Notes

The World’s Most Beautiful Barroom Piano once sat in a Redlight district in St. Louis, Missouri, a district long gone to make way for a new Interstate Highway. The piano was found in an old Magazine Exchange shop to be demolished by the “headache” ball. There it sat neglected in a dingy room, dark, dirty, shabby and no longer able to play. Paul Eakins rescued the piano and spent over 600 hours in completely restoring it until it once more played like new.
This beautiful piano with the tiger-striped oak case and the unique red and white keys of the keyboard is indeed one of a kind. In keeping with the setting and mood of the barroom, a carved, gilded bacchanalian face in relief adorns each side of the front panel. The ornate lower newel posts are decorated with gold, as are the wide carved bands around the lovely art glass. A decorative strip of inlaid wood borders the edge of the top lid. The coin slot is on the upper left hand corner.
This Barroom Piano once more brings enjoyment to fascinated people who hear the sprightly music that recalls memory of an era of Americana dear to the listeners in the 1920’s. These songs are reminiscent of the typical bars of that time; the friendly bartender, the brass rails, spittoons, sawdust, the clink of glasses and mugs sliding across the bar.