Author Topic: Old pianos  (Read 40559 times)

Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #150 on: 14 December, 2019, 11:15:49 pm »
I could have made room!

https://www.robertspianos.com/ldetails.php?RP=2191208&make=Bosendorfer&model=Imperial

That's really frustrating! I have been to St. Andrews on choral courses twice in the past 18 months and never got the chance to play that piano. I only ever played one in Vienna. Part of our course was in the Younger Hall but the Bösendorfer was never on display.

I wonder how much it cost them to transport it from St. Andrews to London?
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It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #151 on: 16 December, 2019, 05:40:53 pm »
Here's my latest recording.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrhSs6d3-xA

TBH the editing is probably better than the playing...  ;)
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

Re: Old pianos
« Reply #152 on: 16 December, 2019, 05:58:18 pm »
Here's my latest recording.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrhSs6d3-xA

TBH the editing is probably better than the playing...  ;)

I enjoyed that.

Re: Old pianos
« Reply #153 on: 16 December, 2019, 10:50:06 pm »
Marvelous, I feel uplifted😊

Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #154 on: 16 December, 2019, 10:58:02 pm »
By the way, I'm reading the music from an A4 ipad and turning the pages using a Bluetooth pedal operated with my left foot.
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

Re: Old pianos
« Reply #155 on: 16 December, 2019, 11:24:10 pm »
Nicely done Wow, and fingers crossed for you CET.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk


Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #156 on: 16 December, 2019, 11:31:22 pm »
I wondered what the extra pedal on some grand pianos is for. Now I know.

No, that's not the one! That's the so-called "sostenuto" pedal. My piano only has the two, the sustaining pedal, which lifts all the dampers off for extra resonance, and the una corda (one string) or "soft" pedal. That shifts the entire keyboard and action slightly to the left so that a different bit of the hammer's felt hits the string. Technicians talk of "voicing the una corda" which means they stick tiny needles into the felt of the hammers so that bits of it are softer than others. I think it must be a very intricate and painstaking job. On an upright piano, rather than sticking needles into the felt, all the hammers are pushed closer to the strings so that it is possible to play with more delicacy. This means that it is possible to ensure that the hammer hits the string at a lower velocity, thus the sound is less.

The sostenuto pedal enables the pianist to hold down a chord and if the sostenuto pedal is then depressed, the dampers of just those notes will be held back even when the keys are released. This enables some notes to be held on whilst the fingers go and play a load of other notes elsewhere. I believe this innovation was introduced by Steinway in about 1910. I have rarely played a piano with a third pedal* and never had cause to use it. The only pedal you use regularly is the sustaining pedal. The pedals are normally made of brass and you can tell how much use the piano has had as the sustaining pedal will have been worn down by decades' worth of shoes pushing it up and down.

*When we were in Vienna last year, we visited a piano showroom in which a Feurich grand had a 4th pedal fitted. That does something a bit weird, and makes the piano sound as though it's in a rickety old cathedral.

The bluetooth pedal is something with a built-in battery which just sits on the floor to my left and I give it a shove with my left foot at the right time.

A year or so ago Jan and I attended a concert at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester in which the soloist Lars Vogt actually had an iPad inside his piano! He was using his left foot to turn the pages, although I was rather surprised that a virtuoso would not have memorised the piece. It was Beethoven's 4th concerto, so very much part of the standard repertoire.

Edit: here's a video demonstrating the harmonic pedal. Feurich is an old make of piano and the name has recently been reintroduced by Wendell & Lung.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7z6cYWjr3Q
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

hellymedic

  • Just do it!
Re: Old pianos
« Reply #157 on: 17 December, 2019, 12:38:40 am »
[Slightly OT]

What brand of page turner are you using? David says he has seen 'better' ones than the one he currently has.

I'm not sure any turner will give wonderful service on our VERY deep pile carpet without some sort of rigid backboard.


PaulF

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #159 on: 17 December, 2019, 09:26:52 am »
I found this video https://youtu.be/mHP332XDJlg

Looks like I can build one for less than £10

Re: Old pianos
« Reply #160 on: 17 December, 2019, 10:42:34 am »
I think the line about the 3rd pedal might have been intended as a joke?

My parents had a "boudoir grand" piano that had 3 pedals (my sister has it now). The middle pedal never worked all the time we had it - I assume either it couldn't be fixed or would have cost too much to fix; the piano was tuned regularly.

PaulF

  • "World's Scariest Barman"
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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #161 on: 17 December, 2019, 11:27:50 am »
The middle pedal on ours, according to my son, is a "practice pedal" that mutes the sound

Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #162 on: 17 December, 2019, 07:01:58 pm »
I think the line about the 3rd pedal might have been intended as a joke?

Well spotted. It was.

I realised that after I had posted my screed, and rr had responded. I couldn't even b arsed to post a facepalm.

Having said that,  i gained the impression from the Lars Vogt concert that one of hte other pedals had been wired up to operate the ipad.
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #163 on: 17 December, 2019, 10:25:19 pm »
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_pedals#Sostenuto_pedal

It seems that the sostenuto pedal was first introduced by the French in the first half of the 19th century. Albert Steinway perfected it in 1874 but it only caught on in the US. Albert was son of Heinrich Steinweg who began making pianos in Germany. Albert Steinway died only 3 years later at the age of 37.

There's a complicated lot of business in which Steinway sued Steinweg in the 1960s. Grotrian-Steinweg is an European make but as a result of the 1960s lawsuit, their pianos are known as Grotrians in the US. Steinways are also made in Hamburg, as well as New York.

Steinway is now owned by a hedge fund company, Paulsen & Co, Inc. The company has a very aggressive policy towards other piano makers in that they sponsor promising pianists and make them sign a contract that they won't pay anyone else's pianos. It's not 100% successful: Oscar Peterson famously played a Bösendorfer and asked his agent "Where can I get a box like this?" It then became his preferred brand of piano. Bosendorfer make grands and uprights, but produce only about 300 pianos a year. Steinway produce about 1000 grands and 250 uprights a year in each of their factories.
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

CrazyEnglishTriathlete

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #164 on: 18 December, 2019, 12:27:35 pm »
I wondered what the extra pedal on some grand pianos is for. Now I know.

The sostenuto pedal enables the pianist to hold down a chord and if the sostenuto pedal is then depressed, the dampers of just those notes will be held back even when the keys are released. This enables some notes to be held on whilst the fingers go and play a load of other notes elsewhere. I believe this innovation was introduced by Steinway in about 1910. I have rarely played a piano with a third pedal* and never had cause to use it. The only pedal you use regularly is the sustaining pedal. The pedals are normally made of brass and you can tell how much use the piano has had as the sustaining pedal will have been worn down by decades' worth of shoes pushing it up and down.

Prokofiev's Visions Fugitive #16 Dolente is only really playable with a sostenuto pedal.  (There is a sustained bass chord which is held long after the left and right hands are needed elsewhere).  This was composed somewhere between 1915 and 1917, so may have been the composer taking advantage of the new technology.   As it's a possible diploma piece I will be looking for a piano with one if possible.  My old Yamaha digital piano had one but not my current one.
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CrazyEnglishTriathlete

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #165 on: 23 December, 2019, 06:07:54 pm »
Slightly off topic, but it's my Grade 8 piano exam today, and assuming it goes well, that means a trip to Ben Wheeler in Little London to have a look at replacing my tired 18 year old Yamaha Digital.

Good Luck!
David's gone to the auction; I don't know what will transpire. We might have some surplus keyboard instruments. You know where we are!

David has successfully eliminated an extraneous sound from the Kemble upright with silent system.

Results in today.  75/100, which is the minimum required for a merit  :smug: and means there is now absolutely no excuse for a new piano  :facepalm:  The marks I gained by getting a lucky sightreading made up for not performing the Bartok very well.
Eddington Numbers 130 (imperial), 182 (metric) 574 (furlongs)  114 (nautical miles)

Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #166 on: 23 December, 2019, 09:03:56 pm »
Well done!

I would have thought that you have earned a new piano!
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

Re: Old pianos
« Reply #167 on: 23 December, 2019, 09:10:13 pm »
Well done!

I would have thought that you have earned a new piano!
That was what I thought. Your wife must have incredibly high standards! 

hellymedic

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #168 on: 23 December, 2019, 09:57:04 pm »
Well done!

CrazyEnglishTriathlete

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #169 on: 05 January, 2020, 06:23:32 pm »
Had a delightful hour and a quarter at Ben Wheeler Pianos, which is a large steel shed on an industrial park in the middle of nowhere in Little London, all to myself and have decided on a new Kawai 600 with the Aures system so that I can practice through headphones.  And my trusty old Yamaha Digital Piano is going to my first cousin once removed.
Eddington Numbers 130 (imperial), 182 (metric) 574 (furlongs)  114 (nautical miles)

hellymedic

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #170 on: 05 January, 2020, 06:43:53 pm »
Kawai are GOOD!

The grammar pedant mused at the difference a comma would make between  'my trusty old Yamaha Digital Piano is going to my first cousin once removed.' and 'my trusty old Yamaha Digital Piano is going to my first cousin, once removed.'


hellymedic

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #171 on: 06 January, 2020, 12:53:49 pm »
A Facebook friend has posted that their piano technician has removed a visitor from the Bluthner...

Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #172 on: 06 January, 2020, 06:07:18 pm »
I've played two or three Kawais and have been impressed. I think you tend to get a lot of good piano for your cash.
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

hellymedic

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #173 on: 06 January, 2020, 06:49:20 pm »
D has a Kawai grand in the lounge, bought 2nd hand at auction 3 years ago, but still partly wrapped in plastic and an electric piano in his shed, bought new.

They're nice...

Wowbagger

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Re: Old pianos
« Reply #174 on: 08 August, 2020, 10:57:00 pm »
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdjaILUFx-Y&pp=wgIECgIIAQ%3D%3D&feature=push-sd&attr_tag=QylumSVBbfec1MnQ%3A6

I just love the casework on that piano.

I first learned on a Bord piano, a Parisian make. It was, I thought, a fairly basic upright, but Marcus Roberts speaks fondly of them in that video.

They've done a most marvellous job on that piano. It really is a joy both visually and aurally. I can't see it on their stock list. I wonder if it has already been sold.
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.