Grand pianos take over Elgin Community College

Learning to play the piano is all in the family for the Filippi clan of Wayne.

The family's musical talents were displayed Saturday during the American Grands XIV festival at Elgin Community College's Blizzard Theater.

Gabriella Filippi and her two daughters, Natalie, 12, and Marisa, 10, as well as the eldest Filippi child, Lucas, 14, were part of the grand piano spectacular that brought more than 460 pianists from 46 local towns to play 12 grand pianos on the theater's stage.

"I wanted to perform with my children," Gabriella Filippi said. "It is a way for the family to stay connected and we are very musically oriented."

Gabriella Filippi and her daughters played together on "The Spinning Song," the theme for Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Phantom of the Opera," "The Calypso Rhumba" and W.C. Handy's "St Louis Blues."

The 460 performers - from adolescents to retirees - took turns playing the 12 Yamaha grand pianos loaned to the college from Cordogan's Pianoland. There were 460 musicians, 12 pianos, 1,056 keys and 4,600 fingers, said conductor Colin Holman.

The first of three performances on Saturday started with a rendition of The Star Spangled Banner, with 24 musicians tickling the ivories while the packed house of about 650 stood.

"It feels really good right after," said Caralyn Reid, 10, of West Dundee, who played on Nino Rota's love theme from "The Godfather" and "God Bless America." "It is fun, like you have achieved something really big."

Again, the finale delivered a spectacular performance of "The Stars and Stripes Forever." While two dozen pianists performed Sousa's iconic march, the remaining performers, some with American flags in hand, encircled the audience, which began to clap with the beat until the final bar before exploding into applause.