The Story of The Elephant's Pianist

This is proof that music really can soothe wild animals.

Transcript Oct 26, 2018

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[Music]

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if I could only play one piece of music

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I get this with the chance of a lifetime

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to play a piece of music to another

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thing what should it be

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[Music]

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[Music]

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when we got permission to take the piano

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12 ships well eight years ago I was

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quietly quite surprised because it's a

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little bit of neutral and so when we

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were about to go I thought well if I

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could only play one piece of music I get

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this a chance of a lifetime to play a

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piece of music - and I thought what

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should it be

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it was actually quite difficult because

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you know you're gonna be there with this

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huge elephant on you you want to play

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something to him that he might like or

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she might like so I decided on this that

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there's the middle movements of the beta

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with pathetique sand us because

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Beethoven is a a powerful composer his

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music is strong but it's also sweet and

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lyrical so maybe there is

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[Music]

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[Music]

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there was a blind elephant behind the

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piano by coincidence

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why does Florida and I couldn't really

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see I was behind the piano playing and

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people behind me was it otherwise play

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they know on me if you're listening to

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music how do people know you listen we

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don't really necessarily do anything

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different with our body with maybe just

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thinking maybe more still but the

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elephant flora was having his breakfast

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and elephants need to eat along we tend

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to body weight every day so soon as they

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get the juicy grass the Eternity and the

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flower was eating the grass the grass

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suddenly stopped eating so had all the

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Barna glass protruding from the sides of

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his mouth just mostly completely still

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every single time tell this truth tell

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it in his mouth and that the tip of the

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Trump would tremble and then you would

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stop playing it release it

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any hope is from near you or they would

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go back that that normal position you'd

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play music again straight away

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he would do it and then there was one

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elephant that nobody would go near

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called ROM size bull elephant and it was

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kept away from people because he was so

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dangerous and even though other Mohawks

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couldn't go close to him only his mohawk

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ago closely and when I said what could I

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play to Robson kill you

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I try okay but the Mohawks were really

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nervous and they put the piano and he

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reacted straightaway to the music in a

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way that I didn't expect came very very

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close to the piano he was breathing on

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me and he let me live so I ended up by

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playing piano a lot to this elephant and

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every single time and he started to do

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the same thing he would I would go his

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trunk and then to his mouth and the Moho

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said they'd never seen this elephant

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this way before I even played to cha cha

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now a big bull elephant the other day

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and that word again was an experience

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because people were said no no this is

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the alpha male this room really really

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calm I said I really would like to try

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but I have to make sure that he's not

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chained up

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not an agenda is going to be free there

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so they got tumor hoops who I said I

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took the P out to the mountains early

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morning and charged Ibaka he's a huge

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elephant with big tusks and nobody can

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go near started to play he didn't go

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away he didn't knock over the piano he

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didn't attack me

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he put his trunk over the top of the

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piano as I was playing it just sniffing

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around my face like this I thought wow

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this is so strange I I'm getting the

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reaction most positive reaction from the

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dangerous bull elephants

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[Music]

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the strange thing is we can't talk to

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them they can't talk back to us

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but it's so strange and I can't explain

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it

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that some pieces of classical music are

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songs without words and that if you can

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if you want to talk and say something

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about love to another animal you can do

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it through music

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you don't have to do it through words

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with a dog you do it by touching the

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head you know even a scratch or the dog

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but we're never physically you can't

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really do the back though the skin is

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very very thick and elegant

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we like me

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no way but through music it's still the

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thing that we can do to express our love

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for another animal and and if if the

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animal is feeling that you're saying

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[Music]

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we take it we can do that through music

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[Music]

English (auto-generated)