Hi Ron. Of course, I agree 100 % with all what you said. I must apologize once again because I didn't get right the post or Terry. This appears to happen often to poor me (ask RicB, he is used to it). Certainly, an untouched antique and a perfectly playing piano reflecting the original design are two different things, and indeed there is a strange, irrational behaviour amongst the antique pianos customers, wanting an untouched original instrument in perfect playing condition. On this topic, I also would like to hear Anne's opinion. I know Pierre Gevaert is constantly struggling with his heads in the Brussels museum, who constantly say : make it work, but don't change anything (in an attempt to please and the pianist and the historian). But this is the land of the most curious things, as I often hear that no copy nor severely restored antique sounds like some happy few glorious untouched antiques. What is the part of predisposed mind in this ? Now, regarding strings, what is better : the original stuff (known to be at that time very carefully selected) or modern stuff at best only approaching only some of the physical features of the original ? In my opinion, the original stuff, if not breaking, will speak more for the original design. Modern stuff anyway needs rescaling to function properly, and will alter much the tonal characteristics of the instrument (maybe in the good direction, but not in the original one). About the hammers, my opinion will differ : the original hammers are most of the time worn to the molding, or at least, they don't have the resilience characteristics anymore that they once had. So even if modern felt is not what ancient was, it will better speak for the original design than original worn hammers do, methink. Yet, some old hammers still do well, and create strong emotions, even if they certainly are not the original emotions. About soundboard, yet another story. In princip, I would agree that a new board made to copy the original would be closer to the original design in sound and performance, again nonobstant the fact that we don't have the same wood anymore, nor cared for in the same extreme ways they did once. But then, my opinion is that aging is a positive parameter in some happy soundboards, who truly gain personnality with time, and good vibrations. So for me, a new soundboar would get the clock back to 0 h 0 minute, that is : not the best advocate of the instrument. But that was probably the same situation back then. Nothing is simple. Curiously enough, once again, all other parts in the piano are less subject to religious extremisms, at least among customers. Maybe the french polish, which a new one hardly can compare to the original if well preserved. Best regards. Stéphane Collin. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ron Nossaman" <rnossaman at cox.net> To: "Pianotech List" <pianotech at ptg.org> Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2006 10:05 PM Subject: Re: Collard & Collard Patent Repeater Action, London Stéphane Collin wrote: > Terry, > > I really don't mean to be sarcastic here, but you show the limits of your > interest in pieces that witness the glorious tradition of our craft. > Fortunately, there still are people wanting to exchange the profit thing > against the historic trip. Apparently, also in the USA (nice to observe > that). > > With all due respect. > > Stéphane Collin. Stéphane, This attitude always puzzles me, as it universally ignores something I consider to be of fundamental importance. When this was a state of the art design, it was new. The strings, leather, felt, and whatever else it is composed of were fresh and functioning at their highest level. To adequately reproduce the performance this instrument was capable of when it was built, the better to show all due reverence to the history of our craft, we owe it to the builders to evaluate their work as nearly like they did it as we can, not from the shabby remains of a 150 year old carcass that they themselves would not likely have wasted their time patching up. Historically, this piano has never existed until right now. It was something considerably different when it was new and accurately representing it's builder 150 years ago. So which is more important to paying historical homage to ancient pianoid artifacts, The best performance the design and materials of the time permits, or the accumulated dust? If we're interested in the art and craft of the builder, let's make the piano capable of reflecting that by gutting it and replacing everything necessary with new materials of as similar quality and performance characteristics as we can manage. If we want to pretend the piano still works and sounds like it did when it was built, and that replacement of anything would diminish it in any way, then we have a display artifact that we shouldn't do anything at all to. Careful reproductions can then be built to explore the performance potential without destroying the original. In patching up a 150 year old piano to "play" again, we're serving neither the historical legacy or our craft, nor the performance needs of the pianist. What we're doing is creating a disposable toy out of something that is irreplaceable, or outright junk, while pretending to be concerned about both conserving a heritage that is no longer alive in the piano in question, and the needs of a pianist. That's my take, such as it is. Ron N
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