At 22:51 +0100 18/5/08, Allen Wright wrote: >What I was really asking was whether in 1980 or so there was >anyplace in the UK other than the Steinway London Restoration Centre >that would have been doing "official" Steinway rebuilds. I assume >probably not. I set up in 1975 and Steinway (Bob Glazebrook), "Blüthner's" (the Leverett brothers) and Harrods were the main London firms at the time. I have seen 1880s pianos done up by Steinways at the time and was not impressed. For one thing they always used the heavy modern standard Renner Steinway hammers and filled the keys with lead to get the statutary static down-weight, with the result that the piano was lucky to have any up-weight at all on a damp day. Someone told me once that Richter played everything with the soft pedal down. Is there any truth in that? Most of his recordings are so lousy and on such lousy pianos that I've never been sure. JD
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