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River City Cinema
PO Box 1004
Bangor, ME 04401

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Emily Burnham wrote this article about Harry Weiss that appeared in the April 25, 2008 issue of the BANGOR DAILY NEWS.

Playing for the Pictures

Most mornings, Harry Weiss sits down in front of his piano and tickles the ivories for a few hours. The sun warms the living room as it shines through the window that overlooks the Penobscot River. He doesn’t play too loud, so as not to disturb his fellow residents in the Bangor building in which he and his wife, Sylvia, make their home. If Sylvia wants to take a nap, he puts on his headphones. His piano is electric, though in the past he had a grand piano that took up an entire room.
He might play Prokofiev or Bach. Perhaps a Russian folk tune. Or, as in the case of the past week, he might be practicing an old art form that very few pianists still do today. For the past 34 years, Weiss, who turned 91 last month, has accompanied silent films with his piano — from Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton to darker classics like Fritz Lang’s "Metropolis" and "Pandora’s Box," starring Louise Brooks.

This Saturday, the nonagenarian will do just that for the first time since moving to Bangor last summer, when he accompanies Sergei Eisenstein’s 1925 Russian classic "The Battleship Potemkin." The screening is offered by River City Cinema at 7:30 p.m. at the Bangor Opera House.
"He found out about us, and he called us looking to play again," said Kathy Tenga-Gonzalez, artistic director for River City Cinema. "It turned out that we knew some of the same people at the Cinema Arts Center on Long Island, where I grew up. We got to talking about movies, and then decided to try this out. He’s pretty amazing."

Weiss, a New York City native, got his start playing for the pictures while in college at City University of New York, where he was a member of the film society on campus. He has always been a movie buff.

"The Film and Sprocket Society got hold of a print of a D.W. Griffith movie called ‘Intolerance.’ That was after ‘Birth of a Nation,’ which was so controversial," recalled Weiss. "They said, ‘We have to have someone play for it.’ And someone else said ‘How about Weiss?’ I said, ‘OK, I’ll give it a shot.’"
Before college, Weiss worked in the music business. At 16, he started playing the Borscht Belt circuit in New York’s Catskills Mountains, playing piano in jazz trios and quartets and rubbing shoulders with the likes of Sid Caesar and Benny Goodman. He met Sylvia soon after, though not at a nightclub.
"I met Sylvia in a library in the Bronx. I was composing something — I can hear the music in my head — and I saw her there and said ‘That’s it.’" he said. "I used to whistle [Falla’s] the ‘Ritual Fire Dance’ outside her window. We’ve been together almost 72 years, married for 68."

When World War II broke out, Weiss served in Hawaii for three years, doing intelligence work on the Japanese. When he returned, he knew he wanted out of the music biz. The pay was shoddy and unreliable, and he had a family to raise. So he started working in audio engineering and built a career in recording for radio and television, as well as writing arrangements for commercials.
The silent film accompaniment was something he returned to at a later age. Since the 1970s, it has been one of Weiss’ creative outlets. Initially, he played at the Cinema Arts Center in New Hyde Park on Long Island, where he and Sylvia lived for a number of years. It was there that he perfected his skill, which is almost entirely improvised.

"I never play music people recognize. I want them to follow the story, not the music. It all serves the story that’s being told onscreen. And if the scene changes, you’ve got to cut the music," said Weiss. "Sure, sometimes I’ll play something if the scene calls for it — I’ll play ‘Auld Lang Syne’ during a scene from Charlie Chaplin’s ‘The Gold Rush’ because it says they’re singing it. But otherwise, no."
When the couple moved to Del Ray Beach, Fla., he took the movie gig along with him. He has now performed regularly for more than 30 years, and he has learned plenty of tricks along the way.
"If I play something I don’t want to play, I’ll repeat the phrase but change a tiny something about it, like I meant to do it," said Weiss. "There are plenty of tricks. As Lee Erwin [a movie accompanist] said, ‘Thank God for diminished chords.’"
Comedies are fun, but Weiss really loves to accompany dramatic films. He plays to the audience, too — a crowd of older folks merits a more straightforward performance, while kids in their 20s are cause for something a little funnier.
"I never play the same thing twice," said Weiss. "I have a few themes that I use for certain films, but it’s always changing. Always evolving."

It’s the immediacy and the one-time-only nature of his craft that he really loves. Every time he plays, he’s making something different, which will never be re-created. That’s why he has never recorded any of the scores he has made up.

"There’s nothing like a live performance — it makes it imminent. You can’t record it, because it’s totally in the moment," he explained. "I call it, ‘music of momentary significance.’ Without the film, out of context, it doesn’t make sense. And once it’s over, it can never happen again. At best, it feels like the music is coming straight out of the screen."
Harry and Sylvia moved to Bangor last summer to be closer to their children and grandchildren. Their son Paul lives in Bar Harbor, where he runs the Whole Health Center, a long-standing holistic health and healing center.

"I am just so moved by the creative energy that comes through him," said the younger Weiss about his father. "I always took for granted how involved in every aspect of music he was. When I was growing up, people would come by the house and ask him to play for them, or they were looking for arrangements. It’s only recently that I can fully appreciate his music. At 91, he’s still so creative, and has the initiative to do things like this. I hope when I’m his age I am able to put out that energy."
Arthritis has slowed him down a bit — when he’s not playing piano, he wears a brace on his hand to keep his thumb immobile — but he still plays every day. He recently has started a singing group with some of his fellow residents in the facility they live in, playing jazz standards and Rodgers and Hammerstein tunes. A lifetime of music doesn’t stop because of a little stiffness in the joints.
"We’re old. We know it. But I’ll keep playing. You have to stay active," said Weiss. "I do it for the fun of it. It’s always a challenge."

©2008 Bangor Daily News, used with permission.

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