The unsuspected

I love Victor Borge. He’s a piano player that had a whole show as a comedy, only the main subject was always the piano. Here, I’ll share a video. You’ll see, it’s irresistible:

The page turner is his son, by the way. They were touring together and bringing good old fun to the masses.

Now, here’s the unexpected part: Victor Borge is also a world class piano concertist. He absolutely owns his skills on the keys. Which proves that you can be funny and a great musician. No, no, that doesn’t necessarily go together, trust me. You can get more videos of Mr Borge on YouTube, if you want. They’re all a joy. Like candy for the brain.

Let’s see another one. Lynyrd Skynyrd. Did I catch you by surprise? Well, that’s the point! This blog is titled “The unsuspected”, isn’t it?

This famous rock band had a piano player named Billy Powell. What might be surprising, and was certainly unexpected even for his band mates was that he was at the level of a piano concertist, which is the highest level possible on the keyboard, as far as technique is concerned. They discovered the guy was really skilled when they recorded  “Free Bird”. Who knew?

I’ll give you three other ones, quickly:

Chick Corea was an excellent drummer, who inspired Steve Gadd himself.

Prince was proficient with 17 instruments.

And Paul McCartney can play all the instruments in a rock band: Voice, Bass, Guitar, Piano and drums. Yes, even the drums. And he played the drums righty. If you watched the documentary “Get Back”, you can see what I’m talking about.