Return of the Piano Men

Oct. 18, 2006

Noel Leaman has spent much of his life behind the keys of a piano. “My dad’s a piano teacher and I got started through him as a young child,” he recalls.
His lessons at an early age were augmented by working in a recording studio across the street from a piano bar. Through the years, his fingers have traveled countless miles across the 88 black & whites of a piano keyboard.
Now 40, Leaman heads up the Cool 2 Duel Dueling Pianos show which debuted at Streeters in Traverse City in mid October and runs through New Year’s Eve. A mix of comedy, singalongs and keyboard virtuosity, the show is a crowd-pleaser
that aims to get the audience caught up in the act.
“We have mock baby grands facing off against each other and there are eight or 10 guys who come through on a regular basis for the duels,” says Leaman, who is based out of Saginaw.
“We put request books on the tables and people ask for anything from country to rock, Motown, or whatever,” he adds. “We also roast people; we get them up and dance around or sing off-color songs. And we have a lot of singalongs with the audience.”
The bottom line is having fun with rollicking, pub-style entertainment and costumes. Leaman started his company 10 years ago and has toured widely with the act, with this being their second time around at Streeters. The dueling piano format is popular around the world at venues ranging from Las Vegas to Japan.
Typically, Leaman says his players can handle 90 percent of the requests thrown at them. “The toughest situations we have is when there’s a room full of people and there something else going on, like gambling or a big game on TV,” he says. “We do best if there’s a dinner crowd and we’re the show.”
Such is the case at Streeters, which offers a variety of dining choices in the lounge area outside of the Ground Zero club which has been set up as a piano bar. The show is currently underway, offered every Friday and Saturday evening.