WDET News
- Frank Pahl and his Toys
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Jun 13, 2008Arts and Culture - Link to Audio
The first thing you see as you walk into Frank Pahl's first floor work space is a dismantled piano. If you're not careful you'll walk right into it...it's so close to the door. On top of the piano are a bunch of odd-looking metal bells. Beyond that are a half-dozen old euphoniums hanging on the wall. Then there's this thing sticking out of from under a messy table.
This a ga-cella. And it's a guitar neck on a cello body...and it sounds like this.
(up ga-cella!)
The ga-cella is only the beginning.
This is called a little tike, these are chimes, this is a mongo, these are choral music boxes...
My name is Frank Pahl and I live in Wyandotte and Ann Arbor. I make my living writing music for theatre, film, and dance, and playing with several bands. Currently it's with scavenger quartet and little bang theory which is a band that plays music on toys.
The Little Bang Theory whistles and strums and thumps its way through songs that lilt whimsically from one off-kilter melody to the next. And it all happens on kids toys and instruments.
Anything that creates a sound is potentially musical...and so the delineation between sound and noise becomes considerably less important.
But Pahl says he's not trying to make a point by only using instruments made for kids. He just likes the sound of them.
It's not a gimmick or anything. It's just, timbre is timre. It's nice to be in a band that isn't interested in saying something. Just like it's nice to build machines that aren't really doing anything in particular.
And the machines he's talking about...I wish you could see right now...because they are just so cool! Basically what Pahl's done...and has been doing for years...is made these musical towers that play themselves. Across from the wall of euphoniums...and opposite a drum set are three columns of instruments.
There's are a few mini-ograns...some chimes...one of those little tyke xylophones with the multi-colored keys.
Pahl's taken a bunch of those wood hammers from an old piano...you know...those things that strike the metal chords. Then he attached them to some old rotisserie motors. Just think of rotating piano hammers that touch down on the organ keys instead of a rotating chicken.
(music tower plays on it's own for a few seconds)
Before it closed in 1957...Pahl's hometown of Wyandotte was home to Wyandotte Toys. One of the country's largest toy manufacturers. He used to love playing with the erecter sets and tinker toys made from the factory just down the road. His dad even worked there for a little while when he was younger. Then about 15 years ago...he started collecting the toys he loved as a kid. Then he started using them to make instruments and sound sculptures like this one.
The working class background of being in a suburb of Detroit all of your life makes you view things a little differently.
And that do it yourself aesthetic that's so familiar to people who grew up with parents working with their hands all day has really shaped the way Pahl makes music.
Down River you're not expected to make a living doing what you enjoy doing. You're expected to go work in a factory.
And that's where Pahl sees himself as different from a lot of the people and institutions he grew up around. He isn't interested in efficiency like the automakers are.
I just want to return to the fun of a machine that doesn't have a purpose or its only purpose is to play a toy piano in its clumsy little way.
(Up music)
My father made a huge leap a few years ago when he said, "Frank I just figured out that you're the only person that's doing what you want to do...and to me, that was almost a confirmation on his part. It was like, yes this is a good thing. He wouldn't go so far as to say it's a good thing but I kind of felt like, well I'm glad you figured it out. I figured it out a long time ago that I didn't want to work in a factory, even though I've done it, and I don't have anything against working in a factory, but given the option, no I'd far sooner do this.
Almost everyone in Michigan is...in some way is effected by the auto industry. And that's no different for Pahl. As the economy suffers so does his income.
I used to just wait to get that call so I could get like five commissions a year. I figured if I could get five commissions a year, then I could make a pretty lousy living, but could at least keep away from the day job.
Pahl has been experimenting with sound professionally 15 years. Even though he's lost some commissions...he's still able to make ends meet. Between CD sales, gallery installations...the remaining arts commissions...and sporadic teaching gigs...he's able to continue to tinker with sound.
I actually feel very lucky to be able to live the life that I do. The day that I'll change my mind about that will probably be the day that I need health insurance. I'm a healthy person and so far that hasn't hit me. It's kind of amazing that I always make ends meet and there's always a job around the corner but when you're pushing 50...all those ads I see on tv about selling this drug and that drug, and by the way if you're over such and such you better have a something check.
Pahl jokes about how ironic it is that as he gets older...his toy collection gets bigger.
Ironic isn't it.
For WDET... I'm Zak Rosen