My name is Freedom Gobel, a 24 year old daughter and sister originally from Milwaukee, WI but currently studying law in Washington D.C. More importantly, though, I come from a family of artists, and consider music to be my primary passion. My grandmother taught me to play the piano when I was 3, and my father—a lawyer turned music instructor—continued those lessons at home with the piano I entered for a hopeful restoration. My mother is an actress, but has an undeniable singing voice that I was lucky enough to grow up hearing alongside my father’s accompaniment. My brother has made music his career, composing with artful precision for live theater productions, animations, and mostly for fun. Unable to haul a piano with me to law school, I fulfill my itch for creativity with music directing my school’s a cappella group and singing at the occasional coffee shop open-mic. The second I finish school, my dream is to live in a home big enough to house a beautiful piano—hopefully OUR piano, one day. All this is to say that music is inseparable from my family’s history and present culture, and I know the trend will continue for generations to come.
Our family’s beautiful 1913 Ivers & Pond upright piano was the first purchase my parents made together when they got married in 1992. At the time, it was standing tall at 79 years old, and today, it is 112. They maxxed out their credit cards to bring home what would be the piano their future kids learned to play on and will eventually inherit. As their most valuable possession, this piano was carefully moved to over a dozen new homes and to what feels like a dozen states. Its most recent trip hauled it from Milwaukee, WI to San Diego, CA, traveling over 2,000 miles to where it now lives. Unfortunately, due to its extensive travel history and over a century of use, the piano is in bad condition, and while our family saves to restore it, it sits in a storage unit down the road. Every day, my mother talks about our piano, wishing for it to return back to its cozy spot in our living room, where my father plays each morning while she drinks her first cup of coffee. As a symbol of their marriage, our family, and our unconditional love for music, it saddens us all to see it deteriorate. But unable to part ways and buy a new piano, we save and hope for the day we can restore it and bring it home. This piano is not a family heirloom yet, but it is an heirloom in the making.
