Sohmer

[Delwin D Fandrich]

Lynn,

I know very little of Sohmer's scale history. You'll have to go to the
historians for that information. I do concur on the old Sohmer upright -- I
remember rebuilding one of them that was quite a nice instrument.

It is possible that Sohmer built a 45" piano in the past and discontinued it
along the way for some reason. If they lost the original plate pattern in
the process they may not have been able to resurrect it. I just remember
that this was being presented to the dealer as an all-new piano. Of course,
that could have simply meant that it had a new decal or a new pecky pecan
finish if they followed the industry norms in such matters.

I can see why the piano I described, however, would have some serious
instability problems.  With a very short backscale through the tenor/treble
and a very long backscale through the bass, the tenor/treble would tend to
fluctuate quite a bit more than the bass section.

Del

---------------------------------


----- Original Message -----
From: "Lynn Rosenberg" <Lynn@eznet.net>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: October 19, 2000 4:37 PM
Subject: Re: Sohmer


>         I find you're comments very interesting.  The first Sohmers I ever
> saw were the 45 inch studio pianos.  I did see an old studio where the
break
> was csharp 29, and if my memory servs me correctly that piano was made in
> the 30's.  I've seen many old Sohmer uprights, that had excellent scale
> design, and were very stable pianos.  In regards to Us manufacturers, the
> Aeolian plant out of East Rochester, made at one time George Steck,
Fischer,
> Chickering, Knabe and Mason & Hamlin.  In they're 45 inch studio pianos,
all
> but the Mason & Hamlin, they didn't make a 45 inch piano, everything was
the
> same, scale, plate, case, might have been fancier, but the big difference
> was the name plate.  If you took off the name plate, which was held on by
> screws, changed the name, fore example replace Steck with Fischer, the
> pianos were the same.  they did that for years, different names but
basicly
> the same piano.  I get very suspicious when I see different makes of
pianos
> with the same scale breaks.  The Mason & Hamlin 50 as far as I'm
concerned,
> and I know this because I knew people who worked at Aeolian, was nothing
> more than a 1940s Steck.  Lynn Rosenberg
>