[CAUT] All-Steinway; was CAUT endorsement

[David Love]

David Love, www.davidlovepianos.com

-----Original Message-----
From: tannertuner <tannertuner at bellsouth.net>
Date: Mon, 17 May 2010 18:54:42 
To: <caut at ptg.org>
Subject: Re: [CAUT] All-Steinway; was CAUT endorsement

--- On Mon, 5/17/10, Paul T Williams <pwilliams4 at unlnotes.unl.edu> wrote:


From: Paul T Williams <pwilliams4 at unlnotes.unl.edu>

Why were the grands from the '20's so much better than the ones from the '70's and 80's? 
 
Were they? Who's living that can tell us? Surely we can identify the problems with the pianos from the 70s and 80s, but we have a very different set of problems found in the pianos from the 20s. They're all different. My personal impression is that the current pianos are the best all around product Steinway has produced, but I didn't live in the 20's to know what those were like when they were new.
 
I was no more impressed with either of the Horowitz pianos (one was 1941, recently rebuilt by Franz Mohr, the other was 70s, I think) or the Clyburn piano that we hosted than either of the two 1993 Ds we had at USC. I service maybe 3 more Ds newer than the 93s. I like them fine but also recognize their problems. Love the few newer Bs and smaller grands I service. Just don't see that many Ds.
 
I service several Steinways that were rebuilt with non-Steinway parts, and I can tell the difference. Not bad. Just different. One is a 1925 art-case, model L, completely rebuilt, obviously with at least non-Steinway hammers. It's just different. Sounds more like a Kawai. Not that that's bad. But it doesn't sound like a Steinway to me.
 
I used all-Steinway parts on the couple I redid at USC. I liked them, personally. I also inherited actions rebuilt pre-1993 with non-matching Steinway parts (Hamburg wips and pre-93 shanks with unlacquered hammers) that were a disaster. I was finally getting a chance to start to straighten out that mess when I left, and I'd started ordering parts for rebuilding other pianos - all-Steinway. But there was far too much overall work to do to spend much time on rebuilding. This summer I get to do an early 1930s B action with all-Steinway at a church. I've proposed NYI parts, but I'm going to do a weigh-off to see which will work better. It had new pre-84 shanks and hammers ca 30 years ago if my guess is close but has original wips. It's since been restrung. They've gotten complaints about regulation and voicing, with good reason. Hammers are shot. I could use the current shanks with new hammers and wips, but that would be keeping 30 year old
 knuckles in a piano with all new everything else. I want to see what the NYI parts feel like. We'll see how it turns out.
 
Jeff


 
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