John Beale, Post-Gazette
	Nadine Theriault, left, uses a music stand secured in a bucket of cement. Practicing with her is Rodrigo Ojeda.

Student musicians of Carnegie Mellon University were fed up with the lack of support. Not from their faculty or administration, audiences or friends, but by their music stands.

The problem was they were simply hard to find in the many practice rooms of the College of Fine Arts building. Through the hustle and bustle of a vibrant school of music -- and perhaps through a little pilfering -- music stands were scarce, and certainly not there when you wanted one.

"People just moved them," said Angela Occhionero, a senior and clarinetist.

"It was a continuous irritation to the students," said Alan Fletcher, head of CMU's School of Music. "They would go to practice and someone had taken all their stands for a string quartet rehearsal down the hall."

Occhionero, 21, and her colleagues tired of searching for music stands, making due without them and lugging their own around. "I have dropped my stand down the stairs about 10 times over the years because I am carrying so much," she said.

Already a member of the School of Music's student government, she helped initiate a solution: Raise money to buy new stands -- and find a way to make them stick. A cabaret concert generated $1,000, which was matched by Fletcher, allowing them to buy 40 stands.

"Before we ordered the stands, we figured they would still get stolen," said Occhionero, even though they ordered easily identifiable blue and purple stands.

A native of Cleveland, she remembered that the Cleveland Institute of Music had a similar problem and chained its stands to pianos and stuck them in tubs of cement. "We realized that was too weird, and pianos get moved around anyway," she said.

Instead, they poured 45 pounds of cement in a bucket that sits above the feet of the pole.

"I think they are going to stick," Occhionero said. "They are moveable, but they are heavy."

With the help of CMU facilities management, Occhionero and several fellow students spent two days last month putting the stands together outside the campus fine arts building.

"It was pretty hysterical -- musical students trying to work with cement," she said. "People were asking us. 'When is this art gallery opening?' "

Fletcher praised the students' ingenuity and the effort. "They came up with the concept, made the design, raised money and executed it," he said.

So far, the stands have been a hit.

"When we first put them in, people said this is so funny," said Occhionero. "Now people thank us because they always have a stand to practice with."