[CAUT] New Upright Pianos

[stranges at oswego.edu]

You could *never* try my patience, Mr. Sambell. Your letter was riveting,
informative and from the heart. I love your posts! One can learn *so much*
from you. Keep 'em coming!

:)
A secret admirer




> Barbara, I would urge you on no account to recommend Sreinway 1098's; they
> are simply bad pianos. Back in 1970 the university I worked for underwent
> rapid expansion of their faculty of music and purchased a number of these,
> principally for the offices of non performance professors, such as
> musicologists, composers, and historians, whose demands for a piano were
> fairly low, and in fact were not necessarily pianists at all. Aside from
> poor tone and excessive false beats, and  generally mediocre workmanship
> the touch quality was slow and stodgy feeling. But far more serious was
> that EVERY ONE of them had the pinblock in the bass separate.Other
> technicians I knew had similar experiences Admittedly, I am sure that this
> design flaw has been corrected in more recent years. But the few I have
> seen since then have been less than impressive. One had action geometry
> problems which resulted in sticking keys, despite all the centers  and key
> bushings being free. I was able to correct this, but why did it get out of
> the factory like this in the first place?And I don't know if they still do
> this, but the fallboards were held in by screws from underneath the
> keybeds, which simply defies commonsense. I have seen the recent K's, and
> find them anything but impressive. They are not really reproductions of
> the old K's, which  were truly noble instruments (despte their quirky
> actions) so much as an interpretation of them. My feeling about Steinways
> is that their hearts are really not in it where uprights are concerned. I
> have attended many of their classes, and cannot recollect one mention of
> uprights. On one occasion I heard Franz Mohr say he hated them. I know of
> one horror story of a K which had sticking key problems, perhaps similar
> to the one I had worked on, but the dealer technicians had been unable to
> correct them. The whole situation escalated out of hand and ultimately
> resulted in the customer being without a piano and still owing the bank
> $8000. I feel both parties handled things badly of course. The customer is
> so angry he has circulated the whole story on the Internet, and says he
> will do anything he can to hurt Steinway. This is very sad. When it comes
> to choosing practise room pianos, I would very strongly consider Kawais. I
> have worked on some which were from ten to thirty years old, and found
> them in near mint condition. These had ABS actions, now superseded by
> carbon fibre which are even more reliable. I love wooden actions, but
> honesty compels me to acknowledge the superior durability and stability of
> the Kawai actions.Should the piano endure, it is obvious that this is
> where the future lies.If pure beauty of tone is more important, I would
> consider some of the fine German makers, especially Bluthner, Pfeiffer,
> Sauter, Seiler,  Ibach , Steingraber, Fuerich, Schimmel and others.I have
> not seen recent examples of Bechstein uprights, only grands, or Hamburg
> Steinway uprights so can have no opinion on them.-On the whole, I think
> that with few exceptions most pianomakers are not interested in developing
> the upright, which actually has more potential as a musical instrument
> than appears to be recognized. For instance, Edwin Good is quite properly
> critical of the somewhat inferior repetition of the upright action, but
> recognizs Del and Darrell Fandrich's designs and makes the observation
> that it remains to be seen if the Fandrich action will become generally
> accepted. But it goes much farther; we know that the only valid middle
> pedal is the sostenuto, yet there  are a minority of uprights with this
> despite a perfectly reliable design. Instead we have in general, three
> useless possibilities for the middle pedal, viz; the bass damper lift,
> duplicating the regular soft pedal, and the so-called 'practice rail'. The
> latter was likened by Tobias Matthay, a world renowned music educator, to
> a 'dog trying to bark with its head in a sack'. If it is used much, it
> wears through quickly, and if it doesn't, which is more often than not, it
> is worthless. I believe it to be a vestigial remnant of the supernumary
> pedal effects from the late 18th. Century Viennise pianos and has no
> legitimate place in a piano. If iit did, then it should be in grands too.
> Further, the regular soft pedal in an upright merely messes up the touch
> quality with an excess of lost motion. A Japanese company, Toyo
> successfully made uprights (called the Apollo piano) with una corda they
> termed the Slide Shift System. I have also seen this (rarely) on a few old
> German uprights. To achieve this , the dampers would need to be mounted
> separately from the rest of the action, which in turn would have to be
> fastened to the keyframe, which would be installed like that in a
> grand.This would also be a boon to us, as the dampers would be much more
> accessible for maintenance and repair.Other attempts to improve repetition
> have been made, in fact fairly successfully, variants of spring and loops
> for instance, and the old Mason and Hamlin screw stringers had a leaf
> spring riveted to the front of the jacks which engaged against a felt
> block on the inside of the catcher. And to prove I have lost my reason,
> dare I put in a word for the much maligned "birdcage'?I am not for a
> moment suggesting these should be revived, but the term is insulting. They
> were the true forerunners of the modern upright action and are entitled to
> some respect. The proper mane is 'overdamper actions'. In fact, they are
> simple and in the right climatic conditions, very reliable. The touch
> quality can be very clean; in my younger days many years ago, running
> round London  (UK) doing five tunings daily, I might tune four and then an
> 'underdamper'. This, with its three springs instead of one as in the
> overdampers would feel springy and rubbery in comparison. The Bluthner
> piano company clung to the overdamper design long after most makers had
> abandoned it, perhaps for these very reasons, and their uprights were
> magnificant by any criteria. It is not true that overdampers are more
> difficult to tune. One simply has to adopt suitable muting techniques.
> Their besetting problem is adapting to our climatic conditions and the
> fact that only the best built ones damped efficiently.But I woul like to
> own one of those Bluthners. Incidentally, they had hammer and wippen
> flanges made of brass with adjustble centerpin bushings. These were
> blatantly copied from the earlier Erard grands, but were beautifully
> machined. They looked like a wood flange, only thinner, and were slit up
> to the bushing hole. A tightening screw held the two parts together. I
> believe the hammer flanges on the large American square pianos were slit
> the same way. Well anyway, these are some of the possibilities which could
> do much for the upright, if the will existed to do so. Realistically, I am
> not hopeful, the money angle is undeniable. I could go on and on, but have
> tried everyone's patince enough,  I am sure.
>
> My best to all, Ted Sambell
> - Original Message -----
>   From: Paul Chick (Earthlink)
>   To: 'College and University Technicians'
>   Sent: Tuesday, February 13, 2007 9:58 PM
>   Subject: Re: [CAUT] New Upright Pianos
>
>
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>
>   Subject: Re: [CAUT] New Upright Pianos
>
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>   On Feb 10, 2007, at 9:30 AM, Barbara Richmond wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>   Greetings all:
>
>
>
>   While we're on the subject, a friend asked me to compare Yamaha U-3s
> with Steinway URs. Uh, I don't even know what a Steinway UR is, just
> that I usually try to avoid Steinway uprights in general (but maybe
> they've improved lately!).
>
>
>
>   I cut my teeth on Steinway 45s (or 1098s or whatever they are). Once you
> learn how to work with them, or at least accept them, they're much
> easier to appreciate. But avoiding them simply because you'd rather tune
> a Yamaha because it's easier isn't giving the Steinway much of a chance
> out of the starting gate. And don't expect it to be like tuning a Yamaha
> or a Kawai, or a Boston or a Walter, or a Baldwin, because any of those,
> it isn't. You have to accept the instrument for what it is and work with
> it. Yes. Steinway verticals can be aggravating to tune. Some, more so
> than others, and especially when they're new. But once you put that
> front board back on, take off your technician's hat and put on your
> musician's hat, it is a much different story. All that noise somehow
> turns into a reliable, very stable, and pretty decent sounding musical
> instrument.
>
>
>
>   And I'm sorry, what David Porritt wrote, quoting Ron N, is just
> completely off base. The people who own 1098s love them. It doesn't
> matter why. They just do. And those people tend to find Yamaha verticals
> leave much to be desired. I especially don't get the big hoopla over the
> U3. It is very creamy. In fact, all cream. No coffee. No tea. No
> peaches. No cookies. Just... ...plain... ...cream.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>   The argument against the Yamahas (given by the Steinway dealer) is the
> Steinways will last a lot longer. These pianos would be used in a
> university, but I'm not sure if they are for practice rooms or studios.
> Anyway, I think it's hard to beat Yamaha in consistency and I wonder
> (and what I would be concerned about is) what the condition the Steinway
> hammers are in regarding lacquering--and then there are those center pin
> bushings...
>
>
>
>
>
>   I can't in good conscience responsibly agree with much of anything that
> has been said on this thread. When I look at the P2s and P202s in my
> client base and compare them to the 1098/45s from the same time and even
> years older, there is no way I could ever come to a sober conclusion
> that the Steinway doesn't hold up better over time than the Yamaha. The
> same would have to be said for G1's, G2s, G3s, and C3's versus Steinway
> S, M and L, even with teflon. Sure, the atoms will all still be there
> years from now on both pianos, but give me a practice room beaten 40
> year old 1098 over a P2 that's been used a couple hours a week in a
> church any day.
>
>
>
>   Folks, we're talking about mass produced pianos built for the lower
> priced market by a company accustomed to its customers throwing pianos
> away after 25 or 30 years, versus artist grade instruments built with
> superior materials, and built to be rebuilt again and again by a company
> that has been building pianos for world class artists since 1854.
>
>
>
>   Steinway marketing myth my behind. I don't see people lining up to pay 5
> times the original selling price for 35-40 (or 80 to 100) year old
> Yamaha pianos and then investing more money to get us to rebuild them.
> And I definitely don't see how that can be blamed on Steinway's
> marketing department. Yamaha's main market niche is for disposable
> pianos, and they are priced accordingly.
>
>
>
>   I have nothing against the Yamaha product or the company. But we're not
> talking about apples and apples here. If we were talking about Yamaha's
> artist series instruments, you might have a good debate. But Yamaha has
> shot itself in the foot for not marketing them more diligently. Or
> perhaps it can't sell them. For Yamaha to make a piano in Steinway's
> quality range, they have to charge 30%-40% more. Unless, of course,
> you're looking at a used one.
>
>
>
>   You've actually got to hand it to Steinway. The Steinway factory is
> located in one of the most expensive cities in the world, with one of
> the highest costs of living anywhere. And despite labor unions, and
> difficult hazardous materials restrictions, they manage to build a world
> class piano which sells for a lower cost than any of the Asians can do
> it. And it has survived the American economy for over 150 years. That is
> no easy feat considering it survived a civil war, two world wars and a
> dozen or more year long economic depression that wiped out almost every
> American piano manufacturer. I'm tired of hearing them berated the way
> they are.
>
>
>
>   Our customers like Steinway. Performing artists like Steinway. Our
> university faculties prefer Steinway. Steinway doesn't have to loan
> their pianos for free for a year to get universities to use them, and
> they don't have to pay artists for endorsements. This is not Steinway
> marketing.
>
>
>
>   I really don't see how anyone could come to any different conclusion,
> unless that someone truly can't appreciate the difference. Then, I
> suppose, it doesn't matter.
>
>
>
>   Jeff Tanner, RPT
>
>   University of South Carolina
>
>
>
>   Thanks for your comments, Jeff.  I tune and tech for a local dealer that
> carries Steinway, a line of nice Japanese pianos, and a price point
> Chinese product.  2%-the Steinway inventory-creates as much attention as
> the 98%.  The attention is not the advertising, prep work, etc.  It is
> the awe of the consumer walking into the store and up to a world class
> instrument whose name does not include “piano.”   Just say “Steinway” to
> anyone in music.  They know it’s a piano.
>
>
>
>   Paul C
>
>
>