Best Buys in the Used piano Market

[Kendall Ross Bean]

Thomas~
 
This is an excellent question. I was also surprised there wasn't more
response.
 
Besides the Morris Steinert "copies" (not quite!) of Steinways (including
the Steinert, Hume, Jewett, and Steinertone brands), there are a number of
other brands that also reflect that heavy-duty, full-featured,
Steinway/Mason & Hamlin quality construction ethic that was prevalent among
independent piano manufacturers/builders back in the vintage/"golden" era of
piano building here in the U.S.(approximately 1890-1940). One of the pianos
I personally own is a Steinert Model E, a 7' grand, from around 1918; it is
a superior instrument, very similar to a Steinway Model B. No corners cut on
this Steinert!
 
The list of pianos below is not all-inclusive of the all better quality
grands, but it is a list of those I have have more or less direct experience
with.
 
Conover is an excellent example of sort of a "Mason and Hamlin" copy
(although as one technician remarked, sometimes it's difficult to ascertain
who was copying whom.)
 
Some other brands where I have been really impressed by the construction and
design of some of their grands are:
 
Baldwin (early grands made before about 1930, before Baldwin, like most
other manufacturers, focused more on how to build the pianos quickly and cut
costs; this applies to the other pianos below as well)
Bush and Lane
Bush and Gerts
Cable (Cable actually controlled Mason & Hamlin for a time, wisely kept
their hands off, but incorporated M&H features in Conover and Cable pianos)
Cable-Conover
A.B. Chase (Some of these, also, were similar to Mason and Hamlins in
construction/design)
Chickering (Hit and miss, but if nothing else, a very labor-intensive piano,
-ask any rebuilder. Chickering was a great innovator. Always trying
something new.)
Conover (already mentioned)
Conway (a Kimball affiliate)
Decker Bros.
Decker & Sons.
Jacob Doll
Ellington
Emerson
Everett
Estey
J&C Fischer
Jesse French
Ivers and Pond
Hardman
Hallet & Davis
Henry F. Miller
Hazelton
Haines
Haddorff
Kurtzmann
Krakauer
Kimball (no I'm not kidding, they really did make some nice grands early on,
also Concert Grands)
Knabe (Made some really nice larger grands, and Concert Grands earlier in
the 1900's)
Kranich and Bach
Lester (yes, before their "Betsy Ross spinet" eclipsed everything else, they
made some serious grands. A friend of mine had a 7 footer that was really
something.)
Lindeman
Ludwig
McPhail
Marshall & Wendall
Mathushek
Smith & Barnes
Strohber
Geo. Steck
Stieff
Vose & Sons
Weber
Wissner (also similar in many ways to Mason & Hamlin)
Wurlitzer (yes, I know, hard to believe, but they also made 7' and 9' grands
that were fairly serious. Many of these have "cast iron pinblocks" though.
(Sort of their version of a Mason-Hamlin screwstringer - yet another way to
eliminate the wood pinblock.) See my earlier posts for a description of
these, under the Wurlitzer Cast-Iron Pinblock thread in CAUT, September
2008, starting with
https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/caut.php/2008-September/027720.html)
 
Most of the really high quality grands made by these companies are, of
course, at least Mason & Hamlin "A" size, or over (5'8" or over) and are
usually characterized by massive thick bent/laminated rims and cupola style
plates, duplex scales, vertically laminated and capped bridges (but not
always) and many came equipped with high quality German actions made by
Schwander, Langer, or Renner, or else one of the high quality U.S. (German)
action makers like Wessell, Nickel & Gross, Strauch Bros., or
Staib-Abendschein. You will see things like individual or individually
adjustable aliquot bars on Baldwin and Steinert, and Cable, if I remember
correctly, as well as many others. Anyone who has restrung one of these
pianos knows how much extra time it takes to restring a piano with
individually adjustable aliquots; when cost and time cutting became
paramount, these were one of the first "extras" to go.
 
Sometimes where the piano was built can give another clue to the quality of
construction. Major piano rebuilding centers were New York, Boston, and
Chicago. The really high quality pianos often came from the first two;
manufacturers around the Chicago area were more into volume, but because of
that also were able to have a "side line" of higher quality instruments
(Cable, Conover, and Kimball come to mind.)
 
There are many other piano makers who, at one time or another, tried their
hand at creating serious (around 6 ft or over) grands. Most of the
established pianomakers had patterns at the Kelly or Wickham foundries at
one time for a Concert Grand (9') plate. Many of these makers subsequently
made their niche in smaller pianos, but the more serious instruments they
made can still be discovered, under the most unlikely of names (such as
Kimball or Wurlitzer). Because of this fact, and that the name often cannot
be relied upon to tell you which pianos were quality or not, I usually end
up looking more at design, workmanship and construction rather than brand.
And I have been surprised, often, when I link those observations to the name
on the fallboard.
 
Usually makers tended to consider their larger grands (around 6' and over)
to be their more serious pianos, so usually you find the higher quality
design and construction and the high quality actions in the larger grands.
Smaller grands (under 5'8") were usually deemed to be for the less serious,
and so lesser quality and workmanship in both design and construction was
usually allocated to the smaller grands (but not always. There were also
some excellent small grands made).
 
Some excellent references/resources on some of the high quality brands are: 
(You can usually get these books from the piano supply houses like Schaff)
 
1926 Presto Buyers Guide
 
Dolge, Pianos and their Makers
 
Roell, The Piano in America 1890-1940
 
Greenfield, A History of Midwestern Piano Manufacturing
 
Hope this helps~
 
Sincerely~
 
Kendall Ross Bean
 
PianoFinders
www.pianofinders.com <http://www.pianofinders.com/> 
e-mail: kenbean at pianofinders.com
 
Connecting Pianos and People
 
  
  _____  

From: Thomas Martin [mailto:flibberti.gibbet at yahoo.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, October 22, 2008 10:38 AM
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Subject: Best Buys in the Used piano Market



Hello All,
    
I gleamed on this before but, there didn't seem to be much interest so I
thought I'd persevere and make one more effort for input.
Recently there has been a discussion about Conover pianos being comparable
to Mason and Hamlins of similar size.  What about other brands?  Any input
into other brands with similar designs to pianos with names recognized as
high end that often go for maybe half the price because of the name on the
fallboard and embossed in the plate?
 
 
Thomas Martin

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20081022/2bc85441/attachment.html