Some of you may be familiar with the choking priest story in Piano Girl. The chapter, called “Playback 1979,” recounts one of my gigs at the piano bar of the Redwood Motor Inn on Banksville Road in Pittsburgh, Pa. Now doesn’t thinking about that place make you want to run out and order a plate of buffalo wings and a blue cocktail? Cheers.

In “Playback 1979”, hardly a literary work of genius, but kind of funny anyway, I am being harassed by the room manager to play softer, softer, softer, to the point where I’m playing with one finger and not even playing a song. Those of you in the cocktail lounge piano business know the drill. 

For those of you not familiar with the book, here’s a brief synopsis of that chapter: While I’m playing, a group of priests show up for the Friday night happy hour. Happy, happy, happy. I play "Amazing Grace," my one religious number, and two people get up to dance. The F&B guy yells at me for being too loud. One of the priests, a guy named Father Louie, orders the crab cakes and starts to choke. He makes horrible noises and then collapses. The room manager tells me to play louder louder louder so the guests don’t notice the choking priest. The choking priest is like, dead on the floor, and I’m banging out “I Feel the Earth Move Under My Feet.” Not one of my finer musical moments, but I was 20 years old at the time, and lacking finesse.

Okay, that’s the drift of that chapter. Now we get to the life imitating life part. Last week, I was invited perform at a literature festival here in Germany, presenting my Piano Girl reading/concert program in a nice theater in Siegburg, a beautiful little city in between Cologne and Bonn. The event was sold out.

 

When I do a Piano Girl perfomance for a German audience, I present the program in English and German, working with an actress named Peggy O, who reads specific sections of the text that have been translated into German. This is lots of fun for me, because while she’s reading, I get to play, providing a piano score for each of the chapters. 

So. There we were in the middle of the choking priest/Redwood chapter, with Peggy reading while I plodded through 'Amazing Grace" (part of the musical landscape of this chapter) when a rumple rumple noise came from the audience. I also noticed that Peggy was not getting the laughs she usually gets while reading this section.

She had just finished reading the lines he’s choking, he’s choking, he’s choking. Heart attack, heart attack, heart attack! Someone call a doctor!, when she stopped cold, peered into the audience, and said:

“I have to stop. There’s a big rumple rumple out there. Is everything okay?” 

This question was followed by a gasp, then the sound of one of our esteemed audience members falling onto the floor. Rumple, rumple, indeed.

An anonymous voice from the audience called out: “We need a doctor!”

Peggy said: “Really?”

I was just starting the vamp to “I Feel the Earth Move.”

The house lights came up and the house manager hustled to the site of the incident. I realized it was my show and I was in charge, so I did what any self-respecting musician would have done under similar circumstances. I took a break. My husband met me in the wings and sent me back onstage to inform the audience that we would be taking a short intermission while the unfortunate woman was transported out of the theater and to the hospital, which was conveniently located next to the theater.

I’m no stranger to weird events, but even I am astounded by the timing of this particular medical emergency, right in the middle of the choking priest story. It’s almost like the woman got the idea from listening to us. 

“We need a doctor!”

“No we need a doctor!”

“No we need a doctor!”

After a ten minute break, I returned to the stage, explained that for obvious reasons we wouldn’t be continuing the choking priest story, and played a transitional piano solo to lead us into the next chapter, “Here Comes That Bride.” The audience was resilient and generous with their praise and applause. Evening over.

On the way out the door, a friend asked if the fallen woman had purchased a CD during intermission.

“Why?” I asked. “You think that’s what made her sick?” I’m a little sensitive about these things. I have had several people tell me their relatives have passed away while listening to my recordings. 

“No,” he said. “Just thought she might want something to listen to while she’s in the hospital.”

The unfortunate woman, I am told, survived. And so did I. 

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