[ti:‘Magic’ Gloves Let Famous Brazilian Pianist Play Again] [by:www.51voa.com] [00:00.00]更多听力请访问51VOA.COM [00:00.04]Shortly before Christmas last year, Brazilian piano player Joao Carlos Martins [00:06.28]invited his friends to a bar near his home in Sao Paolo. [00:12.04]He wanted to show them the best gift he had received in many years: a new pair of gloves. [00:20.76]They are not just any gloves, however. [00:25.12]The specially made bionic devices are letting the 79-year-old [00:30.72]play with both hands for the first time in more than 20 years. [00:42.76]The artist is considered one of the greatest players of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. [00:50.64]Martins retired last March. [00:53.96]By then, he had undergone 24 medical procedures to try to reduce pain [01:01.44]caused by a progressive disease and from a series of accidents. [01:07.88]His limitations had forced him to work mostly as a musical conductor since the early 2000s. [01:16.52]But in the final days of 2019, friends returned to his home. [01:22.76]They listened to him once again bring his favorite classical music back to life on his piano. [01:39.96]Before the gloves, which were especially developed for him, [01:44.36]Martins could only play songs slowly with his thumbs and, sometimes, his pointer fingers. [01:52.44]He told the Associated Press,"After I lost my tools, my hands, [01:58.84]and couldn't play the piano, it was if there was a corpse inside my chest." [02:06.12]Martins' health problems date back to 1965. [02:12.04]He became known for coming back from every struggle he faced. [02:17.12]For example, he suffered nerve damage in his arm from a soccer injury. [02:24.40]While he was on tour, a robber hit him over the head with a metal pipe in Bulgaria. [02:32.12]But even his close friends believed that the latest surgery, on his left hand, [02:38.40]would mark the end of his days as a pianist. [02:43.44]However, one designer believed Martins' retirement had come too early. [02:49.92]That designer, Ubirata Bizarro Costa, created special bionic gloves for Martins' hands. [02:58.76]The gloves help move his fingers up after they press on the piano keys. [03:06.28]Costa said he created early models based on images of Martins' hands. [03:13.12]But he said those models were "far from ideal." [03:18.64]He then decided to tell Martins about his efforts. [03:24.20]Costa and Martins then spent several months testing different models. [03:30.52]The perfect match came in December, and cost only $125 to build. [03:39.60]These days, Martins never takes off his new gloves -- even when he goes to sleep. [03:47.52]He said, "I might not recover the speed of the past. [03:51.52]I don't know what result I will get. [03:54.56]I'm starting over as though I were an 8-year-old learning." [04:01.04]Martins said he has received more than 100 devices in the last 50 years [04:07.64]as possible solutions to his hand problems. [04:11.96]None worked well or long enough. [04:16.24]"But these gloves do," he said. [04:20.00]The new gloves have given Martins a new goal. [04:25.08]He hopes to play the piano at New York's Carnegie Hall in October. [04:31.40]He is already set to conduct a concert celebrating the 60th anniversary of his first appearance there. [04:41.20]I'm Jonathan Evans. 更多听力请访问51VOA.COM