The Marathon Musician
On January 11, 2023 by ElyseDo you remember last year’s epic story about our friend James Waterbury, the champion piano torturer? It turns out there’s a spinoff starring one of his chief adversaries, Charles Wright:

After practicing on a piano for twenty-seven consecutive hours, a Michigan near-Paderewski was removed to a sanatorium, and will probably die. What happened to the poor, defenseless neighbors is not stated.
– The Washington Herald, April 28, 1909
At least death by piano playing is more respectable than death from misadventure through mussel eating. Fortunately, the wanna-be Paderewski didn’t die. As you probably don’t remember, less than two months later:

J. M. Waterbury of New York is no longer the champion long time piano player of the world. He lost that title. . . the other day to Charles Wright, a Battle Creek musician, who played for twenty-seven hours and forty-five minutes without cessation in a Battle Creek theater.
. . . after which, he was promptly returned to the sanatorium:
When Wright passed the record held by Waterbury by one minute he was removed from the piano, placed in an automobile and hurried to a sanitarium, where he arrived completely exhausted.
– The Oakes Times, June 10, 1909

Just like with his rival James Waterbury, not everyone cheered him on:
It must have been a great thing to have played the piano incessantly for twenty-seven hours and forty-five minutes, something that this young man’s descendants will mention with pride, provided he ever gets out of the sanatorium.
There may be, it is true, some worldly minded prosaic people who will aver that Mr. Wright might better have been occupied laying a street car track, or repairing plumbing, or selling dry goods.
There are even some to aver that to play the piano continuously for nearly twenty-eight hours is not a championship performance, but a crime.
– The Evening Star, May 2, 1909
I hope Charles’ descendants do indeed still speak of his heroic feats of piano pounding. His record, however, didn’t stand the test of time: As of this writing, the world record for marathon piano playing is 130 hours.
If earplugs aren’t enough to withstand that level of torture, there’s a way to prevent such egregious crimes altogether:


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Welcome to Second Glance History! This blog seeks to uncover the people and the stories forgotten by history and give them another read through a modern lens. Join me every week as we examine the differences that divide and the common threads that connect the then to the now.
He was just trying to prove the person wrong who said piano was not his forte.
…And that person was clearly already in the Guinness Book of World Records for Best/Worst Pun!
Are you saying his pun fell a bit … flat?
😂 What a “sharp” observation!