The classic shape of a guitar with its sensuous curves, slender neck and delicate headstock is so beautifully human it resists any kind of alteration or improvement.
People have tried; early American rock and roller Bo Diddley came up with a rectangular box-shape guitar built especially for him by established maker Gretsch in the 1950s.
Bo’s cigar-box guitar became his signature instrument, but it never really inspired anyone else.
Others tried the Flying V, the starburst and pearl-dop as guitar shapes, but they just looked too flashy or plain weird.
Nothing can really replace the sensuous beauty of the classic guitar shape.
I could name a few other things that have resisted change – the motorcycle, the book and the Liberal party are other good examples of stubbornness, but I think we’ll stick with musical instruments.
Which brings me to the piano.
The basic idea of pressing keys with the fingers to produce a sound has been around since Ancient Greece.
After myriad experiments, the now standard 88 black and white keys spread out on a horizontal plane arrived about 250 years ago, and it hasn’t changed.
Anyone from Beethoven to Scott Joplin and my dog can get a sound out of a piano without too much effort.
Just play a series of notes and you’ve got a melody of some sort.
Hit two or more notes at the same time and you have a harmony.
Use two hands and you have a symphony. All this without blistered fingers or chapped lips.
I wish I’d learned to play the piano properly because all I can do is knock out three blind mice and a panel beater’s version of Let it Be.
My piano teacher smelled of fish and used to smack my hands with a ruler if I played a wrong note, which scarred my piano education a bit.
Nevertheless, as a child, I used to fall asleep at night listening to my father, Walt, play the Moonlight Sonata or Für Elise.
I could always tell what sort of day he had at work by how loud or quiet he played his piano.
My siblings all played the piano and sometimes, if Walt uncorked the sherry, we used to have sing-alongs and recitals instead of watching TV.
When I eventually settled down and had a family, I couldn’t imagine a home without a piano.
So we bought one from a deceased estate in Nathalia.
It was an old pianola built in New York in the honky-tonk jazz age of the 1920s when all that champagne quaffing and mad dancing was a thing.
So, it suited our place really well.
Unfortunately, it weighed a ton.
I’ve entirely erased the memory of how we managed to get it into our tiny north Shepparton lounge room — probably because the experience was so traumatic.
It stayed with us for 30 years and was a source of inspirational key-bashing and dancing for my kids and then my grandkids.
A few weeks ago, I realised the weight of the thing was tearing off the skirting boards and the ceiling cornices. She had to go.
I didn’t want to pay someone to just chuck her into the tip for me, so I put it on FB with the message: Free to good home — one mature New York-built honky-tonk piano. Perfect for mad parties and sing-alongs.
I didn’t expect much response because Spotify has taken over that stuff now.
So, I was amazed when this terrific bloke from Kialla arrived with a mini loader and strapped the old girl on to the back of his Ute and took her off to his shed where he repairs and sells old pianos.
We actually waved and took a photo as our old friend was driven up the street to her new home.
That’s the sort of attachment you make to things that never change.
NB: By the way, the ABC TV series The Piano, which airs every Sunday at 7.30pm, has some wonderful human stories about the role of the piano in ordinary people’s lives.
John Lewis is a former journalist at The News.
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