March 23, 2006

Mark DeLozier plays at the Emporium on the piano he restored and brought with him from Cleveland. The piano — and his playing — have found a welcome home there.

By Diane Chiddister

It was raining and grey at lunchtime on Monday, and inside The Emporium people sat silently eating lunch or reading the paper. Perhaps no one noticed exactly when the quiet, pony-tailed man walked to the piano and sat down to play, but they soon sensed that something had changed.

Outside the weather was still gloomy, but inside, as Mark DeLozier played “On the Street Where You Live” and “When I Fall in Love,” things felt brighter somehow.

Emporium regulars say that DeLozier has that effect on people when he plays the piano.

“He starts to play and we all start feeling happy,” said Flo Lorenz. “Everything changes.”

That’s what happened on a recent Saturday morning when DeLozier sat down to play “Try to Remember,” Lorenz said. Pretty soon, as customers chatted and children played, a couple of women began harmonizing with DeLozier’s tune, and then a group gathered around the piano to sing. The music made things feel homey, Lorenz said.

“It was a magical time,” she said.

It’s no accident that DeLozier tends to play in an unassuming manner, without calling attention to himself. He doesn’t want the spotlight, he said in a recent interview. Rather, he wants what happened that Saturday morning — to add beauty to people’s lives and to bring them together.

“I wouldn’t want to be on stage, exposed, with everyone listening,” he said. “When people are talking, that’s fine.”

For many years, DeLozier played for contra dances in the Cleveland area, and he lived his entire life in Ashland until moving to Yellow Springs last June. DeLozier loved playing for the dances because, as with his playing at The Emporium, his music added to people’s good times and helped build community, he said.

When he moved to Yellow Springs, DeLozier needed a place for his piano, an old Brinkerhoff that he picked up years ago and refurbished. He asked The Emporium’s new owner, Kurt Miyazaki, if he could keep his piano at the cafe, and Miyazaki responded enthusiastically. So for the past few months, since he moved the piano, DeLozier has stopped in almost every day to play for a while.

Miyazaki said he is thrilled to have a piano at The Emporium, which others are also welcome to play, and especially thrilled to have the presence of DeLozier.

He has been trying to make The Emporium a welcoming place, Miyazaki said, and DeLozier’s music “is the missing piece. I’ve always thought there are special moments here, with people talking and eating, a communal space, like a kitchen. To have the music too makes me smile — it’s such a soothing sound.”

Last week some of The Emporium’s regulars said they are impressed with DeLozier’s repertoire of jazz standards, show tunes, classics and old-timey music.

“He knows all the old songs,” said Leon Holster. “He spans the decades.”

DeLozier likes taking requests, Holster said, and will experiment with songs he doesn’t know. But always, he makes it clear to customers that he doesn’t expect, nor does he want, their full attention. Rather, he wants to blend in.

“He has changed the nature of lunchtime here,” said Roger Cranos. “He plays softly in the background and doesn’t interrupt. He just makes everyone feel better.”

DeLozier said that playing the piano just comes naturally to him, and as long as he can remember he’s been able to play something once he hears it. As a child, he said, he thought everyone else could do so as well. Only in high school, when he would play the piano in the music room and the band director expressed amazement, did DeLozier realize that perhaps he had an unusual talent.

He has turned his love for music into his livelihood, and his main work is tuning pianos. Mainly, as with playing, he has taught himself how to tune, he said, although he later took a correspondence course that confirmed what he already knew. The best part about tuning pianos is anticipating what they will sound like when he’s finished, he said.

When he’s not playing the piano at The Emporium or on a tuning job, DeLozier might be found doing odd jobs in construction or, when the weather warms up, out in the garden in the Vale with his partner, Raven Murie.

He still owns land and a home outside Ashland, where he lived for 18 years without electricity and running water, he said. He finds it hard to think of giving up his previous home, but he’s feeling more and more a part of the Yellow Springs community.

Certainly, when he plays the piano, DeLozier makes wherever he is feel a little like home.

Contact: dchiddister@ysnews.com