I'd like to chime in a welcome to Kevin as well. And I agree as far as it goes both about the pianos rebuilt (at least the one I've had the pleasure of viewing) and Ron O's comments as to the desirability of moving forward into new territory. Not that I mean in the same breath we need scoff at what has been done before us, or overly blame people for being people.... after all they will continue so in any case like it or not. That said... I hope very much to one day be able to import either a Nossaman or an Overs to these parts. As far as Australians self image is concerned.... grin... Try the Scandinavian version ! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jante_Law Cheers RicB Jim, I agree with your post. Simply continuing to build the same spec., as was derived a century ago, can't possibly yield state of the art. A passionate quest for incorporating the results of years of thinking and testing ideas is what moves the knowledge base forward. Ron N. is one of a small number who are working at further developing tone building. Thankfully, a few people in the USA seem to be paying attention to these endeavours in progress. Is this because US society seems to tolerate itself believing that it can achieve? Here in Australian our collective attitude seems to be that the only people capable of achieving anything are anyone else but Australians. We need to grow up as a nation and realise that we have pretty much the same bell-curve of intellectual capability as exists elsewhere on the planet. The Australian self-deprecating attitude that pervades here, like some terminal disease, doesn't seem to be doing us any favours. Ron O.
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