Take the pictures, especially of the innards...how it works... David Ilvedson, RPT Pacifica, CA 94044 Original message From: Jim To: Received: 1/7/2009 8:48:02 PM Subject: Re: [pianotech] Changeable pitch action John, you are absolutely correct . . . I actually have one of these Heintzman & Co beasts in my living room, and the keys do indeed move a half octave in either direction., with the excess keys disappearing in to hollowed out cheek blocks. ( Not quite an octave, as there is no F#) The scale is overlapping strung as in a standard piano, but the plate is 6" wider in both directions, and also has the inadvertent result of a larger soundboard by about 4 sq ft. I saw two of these pianos in the late 80's in the Georgian Bay area of Ontario, and bought the third. It isn't straight strung, as Wim had suggested, but the keys are all straight, and the action has an extra set of components at the bottom, that compensates for the tenor and treble break. I don't know if this feature makes it more valuable, but certainly rare. I've only seen 3 in twenty five years of tuning, and as I mentioned, I bought the third one. If anyone is interested, I'll take some pics and post them on my website www.pianoguy.com cheers Jim Kinnear Collingwood, ON Canada ----- Original Message ----- From: John Ross To: pianotech at ptg.org Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 9:30 PM Subject: Re: [pianotech] Changeable pitch action Heintzman & Company, Toronto, Canada, made one. It transposed more than one note. I saw one in the 70's, but was not in the business, so didn't take much notice. It had extra keys, and the keybed moved sideways, into the cheekblocks. John Ross Windsor, Nova Scotia ----- Original Message ----- From: David Boyce To: pianotech at ptg.org Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 6:59 PM Subject: Re: [pianotech] Changeable pitch action Irving Berlin had a key-change piano: "Berlin was a self-taught pianist and one who reputedly restricted himself mainly to the black keys of the piano. Eventually he bought a special piano with a lever under the keyboard, enabling him to transpose his music mechanically" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irving_Berlin ) David. John M.Ross Windsor, Nova Scotia, Canada. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech_ptg.org/attachments/20090107/d33221e6/attachment-0001.html>
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC