To have reported the shouty self-appointed piano police to the actual police?

[PeppermintCrayon]

I am half-expecting to be told I'm being U for posting a thread of the "please validate this thing I already did!" variety...

Recently I was at St Pancras Station. There are several pianos for public use there. They're a bit knackered; one of them has a few keys that don't work.

Some kids were playing one of the pianos, about eight or nine maybe. They were having a fun trying to play different tunes. They were banging the keys quite hard. A man of maybe 55, 60, suddenly appeared and started yelling: "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING, YOU NEVER BANG A PIANO."

I went over and said I didn't think yelling at children was very nice and that these kids probably didn't have a piano at home and did he want to put them off music? He started huffing and puffing about how the pianos had to be tuned because of people messing about. I said perhaps he could have said: "Look, this is how you play a piano," and explained nicely instead of yelling. He then started yelling at me.

He then went back to sitting at a nearby cafe table glowering at anyone who went near the pianos, so I went and found a transport policeman and told him this man had been shouting at children for playing the piano and he went to have a word.

I don't think I was being U, but...

It comes down to respect. The children weren't showing any. But that seems to be perfectly acceptable these days. Poor precious flowers.

I'm obviously the only one who thought there was 8 or 9 children banging on the piano. I was wondering how there was room for them all.

Come off it, YoutheCat, this really isn't an issue of "respect". When children play with pianos, they do tend to do precisely what these children were doing - they try to play tunes and thump the keys a bit. That isn't because they don't respect them, it's because they don't know about them and are finding out about them. No-one puts these pianos in a station in order for people to stand around respecting them, they put them there to be used by all and any members of the public, including children. And maybe some of those children will find they enjoy experimenting with them and will go on to learn to play properly. Result.

Yes, chocolateyay. Those children bullying another child is directly comparable to some kids playing piano keys rather hard while trying to pick out a melody on a public piano.

This thread is MN bingo.

I can only imagine the sound of a tinny piano being belted by kids. In fact where i work there us a nursery on the floor below - and a piano - so i know exactly how it sounds. Sitting there, trying to have a cuppa in a station cafe after/before a shitty journey...

I'm sure the bright sparks who put the pianos there had a lovely image of someone tinkling away at the keys, soothing the agitated commuter.

It wouldn't bother me as I'm a bit deaf anyway.

To be honest, if you want a nice peaceful cup of tea, the concourse at St Pancras is probably one of the last places you would go to.

True. Stations are not exactly the sanctuary!

It comes down to respect. The children weren't showing any.

Yeah, little fuckers, trying to figure out how to make music and possibly getting overexcited about it. IT IS THE END OF DAYS.

Is yelling necessary to a telling off in your world, out of interest? Is it particularly effective?

Perhaps, just perhaps, if the purpose of the intervention was to get them to treat that and other instruments better in the future, explaining the problem might be more effective.

"But the thing I hate even more than kids banging on them are grown-ups sitting there tinkling out Beethoven for the adoring masses. Fuck off and get a good solid British inferiority complex like the rest of us."

I agree with the OP. Leaving aside for a moment the difficult technical question of how hard you need to bang a piano to damage it, and precisely how hard these kids were banging it - information, let's face it, none of us is ever going to know - the guy didn't need to shout at them. He could have asked them nicely.

Mind you, I think reporting him to the transport police was a bit OTT.

You are mostly v v odd posters. The children were trying to play tunes on the effing piano. trying to play tunes ie using piano to try and play music. There is nothing wrong or misbehaving about that.

Is this some kind of weird noise thing about children some of you have? or some weird protect the pianos at all costs? or some odd class related thing about who is allowed to play pianos? or some weird support forum for grumpy old men who give out to and shout at children?

Yanbu. They were playing on a piano. It's what it's there for.

Some guy shouted at them and possibly scared them. You wanted to protect the kids as there was no obvious adult around whom you could reasonably expect to intervene if it escalated beyond shouting.

I can only imagine the sound of a tinny piano being belted by kids. In fact where i work there us a nursery on the floor below - and a piano - so i know exactly how it sounds. Sitting there, trying to have a cuppa in a station cafe after/before a shitty journey...

Yeah, I agree on this - would be bloody irritating! (Memories of boarding school and elderly pianos in poorly-soundproofed practice rooms haunt me.)

But that's not what the bloke (or pages of MN) are saying the problem is. I wonder if that was the man's true problem - it was setting his teeth on edge and being really annoying. In that case a more measured 'hey, you kids, that's a bit loud and annoying, can you keep it down a bit?' might have been better...

No, they aren't my kids. He just shouted so aggressively that it was really OTT. I thought it was sad that he didn't just explain. He was shouting at them for something they maybe didn't even know was wrong. He was really quite aggressive and actually yes it is a police matter if people behave like that in public. He was practically spitting with rage and it was really excessive.

Some guy shouted at them and possibly scared them. You wanted to protect the kids as there was no obvious adult around whom you could reasonably expect to intervene if it escalated beyond shouting.

This. Exactly this.

Oh and I'm frankly baffled by the number of people who think the copper must have just been pretending to agree that this guy shouldn't hang around looking for people to yell at, or scream at children.

Ohhh...he was hanging around looking for people to yell at, and he actually screamed too?

In that case YANBU.

I wish you'd mentioned that in your OP...

To be fair, Worra, OP did say that he yelled.

Yes, and now it was a scream and the guy was actively hanging around looking for people to yell at, or scream at children.

The thread gets weirder and weirder but I suppose that's Mumsnet

Surely the pianos are there for people to have a go on? I assume by banging you mean pressing a bit hard? If so I don't see the problem. If you can only use them if you are grade 8 or above it should say so.

Personally I would rather see two enthusiastic 8 year olds trying to play something than some poser showing off.

No need to shout at kids and not appropriate. Would be different if they were carving their names on it. That would warrant shouting.

YABU. If the children's parent couldn't stop their bad behaviour, someone else had to step in to do it for them.

Why is it bad behaviour to be using pianos that have been put there for people to use? Children are people you know.

Would be different if they were carving their names on it

Some people on this thread would think that merely an endearing display of self-expression for their precious budding Turner Prize winners.

To people worrying about police involvement or thinking the police will side with said man. I worked in local police force, husband retired senior police officer. I don't think he will have been congratulated or arrested. PC will probably have just had a word to get his side and advised him to calm down a bit. No big deal.

FarFromAnyRoad, I doubt that. Not really the same thing is it?

" You do know banging a piano's keys hard doesn't break it? Might put it out of tune but those banged up old pianos are untunable anyway. I say this as a pianist (of sorts). Presuming that the kids were banging on the keys with their hands and not a sledgehammer the piano would be fine."

That's what I was thinking as well (also as a pianist of sorts). I mean, the OP was saying they were having fun trying to play tunes and being fairly heavy-handed (which I remember doing myself as a small child), not "vandalizing it" or "trying to break it" or "disrespecting public property". It's not like they were thumping away on a harpsichord or something that will actually go seriously out of tune very quickly if not played carefully. And I'd prefer to see small kids having fun trying to play the piano then doing a lot of other genuinely anti-social things.

Also seriously, the people talking about how you should NEVER treat a piano like that should see a friend of mine (who's a semi-professional pianist) playing at maximum volume. He's been described in reviews as "visceral". :)

Actually, now that I think of it, I do know someone who broke a piano by playing, but it was a friend of mine when she was a teenager and a reasonably practiced pianist - apparently, it's not always a good idea to lay into a bit of fortissimo Beethoven when you're having a massive teenage strop. Also apparently a string breaking on a piano makes an enormous bang.