In late 2016 I was feeling the weight of my next career move. For twenty years I had wanted to build a business of my own, one that followed my interests and honored my family and our heritage. That Christmas I flew to Italy and met the Proel Group at the design studio of Dexibell, a young Italian piano brand, in the Marche, where I had studied since I was a teenager.
The view from the Hill of the Infinite in Recanati, in the Marche.
The odds weren't in our favor: an Italian piano almost nobody here knew, in a market led by long-established names. But the sound had a monastic dedication to it, uniquely Italian, and we believed. We came home with a plan: open Proel North America to carry it. A new company and an unknown brand, both at once.
When the first dealer put a Dexibell on their floor, I realized they weren't trusting Dexibell. They didn't know it yet. They were trusting relationships built over a lifetime in this industry. Proel was taking a chance too, on me. They had been building trust in their instruments, cables and accessories in Italy since 1991; I had spent twenty-five years building mine in North America. Each of us trusted the other to be the bridge. That trust traveled, from the dealers to us, and from us to a brand that hadn't earned it yet.
A gift like that comes with a responsibility, and the only way I know to honor it is to deliver. The piano arrives when we said it would. The call gets returned. The problem gets solved, even when it's expensive.
There were no guarantees then, and there still aren't. Everyone in the chain has their life in it, from the makers to the dealers who said yes first. At the end of that chain is a musician, trusting these instruments with their time.
Next year, Dexibell turns ten in America, and I find I'm still learning what that trust asks of me. Mostly, it asks me to keep showing up.