reeds like a duck

Thank you, Alex, for the honor of your invitation to post directly to this blog from the outset. I'm unfamiliar with blogging, but I hope that my existing patterns of blather will suffice for the nonce. In time I may come to know better. Meanwhile, a query: Is the ObWP a feature of this incarnation of Wordplay?

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I wish I still found it funny to "flush out" a subject. Alas, the expression is ubiquitous at my new workplace. It means both "flesh out" and "flush out" -- a sad loss of clarity and finesse. The dry bones shudder. At this point I want to flush the phrase completely out of the vocabulary of anyone who is neither hunting nor irrigating (medically or otherwise).

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On a more cheerful topic, however, I prefer to pull out only three or four stops at a time. I started playing on my father's harmonium (which he has still) before I could reach the pedals. It looks a good bit like this one, though with the stops arranged differently and less fancywork on top.

I sat on his lap, which danced as he pumped the pedals, mashing merrily on the keys with a fine disregard for the harmony for which the instrument is named. I learned early, probably even before I could talk, that one must NEVER try to play with all the stops pushed in. Later I learned why: with all the stops in, the pumped air has nowhere to go, and most likely will rip the bellows.

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Indeed, one must be careful to pull out stops corresponding with the complete range of notes one intends to play. Some stops govern only one section of the keyboard. Thus my preference for pulling out three stops (top, middle, and bottom of the keyboard) or four (I never could resist the Vox Humana stop). However, pulling out all the stops turns playing the harmonium into a hefty workout, since utilizing ALL the reeds at once -- particularly if one is playing a lot of full, rich chords comprised of many notes each, and using the knee-levers to swell the volume a lot -- takes a good deal of air from the bellows.

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Thus, in a way, playing a loud and full-bodied piece on the harmonium resembles the well-known image of a duck: balanced and smooth* above, while paddling -- er, pedaling -- like hell underneath.

[* smooth : Staccato is not an option on this instrument.]