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Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. Today I’m going to tell you about five misleading piano terms. You may have heard some of these terms and wondered what they mean. They may sound scary and you want to know more about them. Let’s dive right in!

The first term we are going to discuss is “Gray Market Pianos”.

When you hear this term, it sounds pretty foreboding, almost like it is something illegal! Truth be known, gray market is a term coined by Yamaha North America. Yamaha North America is the sole distributor of Yamaha pianos on our continent. Every new Yamaha piano that is sold in North America must go through this corporation. Yamaha North America is separate from Yamaha International.

Japanese culture doesn’t like used things so much. As a result, there’s a glut of gently used Yamaha pianos in Japan that nobody wants to buy. Enterprising business people refurbish the pianos and then redistribute them in the United States as used Yamaha pianos. Naturally, Yamaha North America is not too happy about this because it cuts into their market. They do everything they can to try to squash it.

What are some of the things they say about them? There is certainly some truth to their claims! Yamaha wasn’t really an export company until the 1970’s. When you are talking about really old Yamaha pianos, you might wonder if they were made to withstand a wide range of climates. At one point, they weren’t exporting pianos much at all. So, this could be an issue with extremely old Yamaha pianos.

Yamaha talks about the “climatization” of their pianos for the North American environment. Here in Orange County we are about ten miles from the beach. The beach is about ten degrees cooler and probably has about 20% higher humidity than what we have here. That is just ten miles away! Go an hour and a half inland and you could be in the hot desert or cool mountains. There are many climates right around us!

What about the whole North American climate? It is kind of funny to say that pianos are climatized for North America because the climates are so diverse. Any late model Yamaha, from the 1970s and beyond, are made to handle climates all around the world.

What is another problem with buying gray market Yamahas? If a technician is ordering parts for a Yamaha piano and they provide the serial number to Yamaha and it doesn’t match one they sold, they won’t sell the parts. Is that a big problem? Not necessarily. There could be other serial numbers that could be referenced in order to get the parts. Also, Yamaha is not the only parts manufacturer and their parts aren’t so unusual. So, there are parts available from Abel, Renner, and other companies that can be a good fit. You just need to be aware that this is what gray market is all about. Should you be concerned? Possibly, if it is an older Yamaha, but otherwise you should be in good shape.

Another similar parallel comes from Steinway. Steinway’s biggest competition you’d think would be Yamaha, Kawai, or Bösendorfer.

The biggest competition Steinway has is used Steinway.

Why? When you go to a Steinway store you see an $80,000 piano. When you look on the used market you see similar Steinways for half the price or even less. This is obviously a big concern for Steinway. They have coined a term called, “Steinwas” claiming that if you have a Steinway piano and one or more parts on the piano were not made by them, it’s no longer a Steinway piano. Is there truth to this? Yes and no. Sometimes it can be true. There is nothing more crushing than to see badly restored Steinway pianos tarnishing their good name. I applaud them for trying to keep that high standard! However, there are also stupendous rebuilders of Steinway pianos. Steinway does rebuild pianos but they can only do a limited number of rebuilds every year. For all those used Steinway that have been made for over a hundred years, there are really high-quality rebuilders out there. They may choose to use Steinway parts, and you might wonder why they would use any other parts in the restoration. To save a few bucks here and there? Not really. I can imagine there might be a few inexperienced rebuilders who think they can get away with using a cheaper part. But the extra labor it would take to make that part work can negate any savings by selecting the wrong part. The real reason why a rebuilder would use different parts is that Steinway is not a parts builder. In fact, the only parts they have on hand are for the pianos they are currently building.

On a side note, Steinway pianos manufactured in Germany have always utilized action parts manufactured by the German company Renner. Steinway recently bought Renner Corporation.

Imagine a Steinway M from the 1920s that needs a new set of hammers. An inexperienced rebuilder might just order the set from Steinway thinking it has to be right. However, the specifications of Steinway pianos vary over the years. It may or may not be the exact right weight and geometry for a specific piano from the past that you are trying to rebuild. The good news is that there are many companies that make very fine parts. Renner and Abel (to mention just two companies) make great hammers. There are a number of companies that make great piano parts.

The critical thing is using the right part for a specific piano.

Sometimes you go into a store and you wonder about a piano and the salesperson might tout a piano with an “all-spruce soundboard”. You probably think that spruce is great. In reality, “all-spruce” is a clever way of not indicating to you that the soundboard is not a solid spruce soundboard, which is the preferred board for high-quality pianos.

What is important is to have a “Solid Spruce Soundboard”.

A soundboard may be, “all-spruce” but utilizing laminated wood which is simply plywood. What is wrong with that? First, let’s talk about the benefits of laminated soundboards. A laminated board is much, much more durable just like plywood is less likely to crack than solid wood. Why is that? Because the grains are put layer upon layer crossing each other with cement between. It is almost impossible for a crack to go through because each layer of wood is positioned at 90-degree angles to one another.

A laminated soundboard is stronger than a solid spruce soundboard.

The bad news is that laminated soundboards lack the rich tone of high quality, solid spruce soundboards. The vibrations are not as rich and complex. You’re better off with a solid board unless you live in a harsh climate. If you hear the term, “all-spruce”, you now understand the implications.

Another term you’ve probably seen is the “Going Out of Business Piano Sale”.

Many of these are legitimate. When you consider that in 2005 there were over 1,200 piano stores in the United States, and today there are only around 150, you can see that many stores have actually gone out of business. However, this is the way it generally works. A store can’t keep running with depleting inventory and have enough money to cover operating expenses. When they get down to two pianos, how could that possibly work? It can’t. Usually, a going out of business sale entails partnering with another store that feeds additional inventory so their store can function as they sell out their inventory. There is a lot of hype that goes into these sales and sometimes they are very successful with tremendous amounts of promotion. It is not necessarily a bad place to buy a piano. But you should be aware that the sale may not be as desperate a situation as it appears to be. Worse yet, sometimes you see people taking advantage of these situations. A store might do a going out of business sale for months or even years! Sometimes they will even change names and do it all again. I’ve seen it happen and it gives a bad name to the whole piano industry.

Lastly, and related to this, are the famous college piano sales.

You’ll see these all the time. You might wonder how they have so many used pianos to sell. You might remember a similar sale just last year. Here’s how it works. College piano sales are a partnership among a manufacturer, a store, a distributor, and a finance company. They go to a school and offer to put several free pianos in the school for a year in exchange for a sale the following year that is promoted to the entire mailing list of the college or university. It can make for a very potent event.

The vast majority of the pianos at college sales do not usually belong to the college.

This is actually a good thing! If you’ve ever seen what school pianos look like, they are usually thrashed! Because they get used so much, the cases get beaten up and the pianos can be worn out. Indeed, the pianos at college sales have been there for just a year, usually kept in studios, not in practice rooms. These are the college pianos that are sold at these events. That just might be a handful of pianos. Yet, you have a whole school full of dozens of pianos that come from a store who is trying to capitalize on the event by selling a wide range of inventory to the staff, students, and alumni of the school. Is it a good place to buy a piano? Possibly. If you know exactly what you want and you don’t want to go through the negotiation process, it is a fine fit. However, it is definitely not the place to go if you want to try out pianos and have any kind of relaxed way of exploring different instruments for yourself. It is a high pressure, quick, know what you want, here is the price, and buy it situation. While it is not completely deceptive, you should understand what it is. It is mostly a good situation since you are not buying abused college pianos.

Those are five things that are not what they appear to be. I hope this has been helpful for you. If any of you are piano shopping or have piano questions, LivingPianos.com is always here as a resource for you. Thank you so much for joining me, Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.

949-244-3729
info@LivingPianos.com

5 Misleading Piano Terms

Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. Today I’m going to tell you about five misleading piano terms. You may have heard some of these terms and wondered what they mean. They may sound scary and you want to know more about them. Let’s

Hi, I’m Robert Estrin. This is LivingPianos.com. The question today is, “How Long Does it Take to Rebuild a Piano?”

There’s a very wide range of time, and there are many aspects to this question. Let’s say you have a piano you want to have rebuilt. Perhaps you have a Steinway, you want to have restored and you decide to send it to Steinway to rebuild. You’re probably going to wait over a year to get your piano back. It can take that long! Now, does that mean they’re taking the entire year to rebuild it? Well, yes and no. They might do parts of different pianos simultaneously. However:

It takes at least months to rebuild a piano.

Now, the other aspect of this question is, what does it mean to rebuild a piano? There are different parts of a piano that can be rebuilt. For example, are you replacing the sound board or repairing the old one? Are you creating a new key set, or are you staying with the original keys? There are different parts of a piano that can be utilized in rebuilding in most instances. Unless you have a piano that’s a complete disaster, you’re going to utilize a lot of the existing parts, so it can take different amounts of time depending upon how much work is required.

Let’s say, for example, you have an unusual piano from the late 1800s with a pre-modern action and it’s an art-case with beautiful scroll work, and some of the scroll work is missing. Perhaps other parts of the piano are destroyed as well, such as the music rack or one of the legs. It could take a very long time to match the woods, to hand-carve the beautiful intricate parts to make the piano match the way it was originally manufactured.

It could take longer than a year.

But I would say that any kind of even the most basic rebuilding that keeps the original action and replaces only some action parts, replaces strings, perhaps pin block, refinish the case, re-guild the plate, has got to take an absolute minimum of two to three months, if that’s all they’re working on. It is a big job. Not only that, you don’t want to rush through it because a piano needs to settle in, and a great part of the work of rebuilding a piano comes after the rebuilding in adjusting everything to play on a high level. On top of that, it’s important to make sure everything is stable.

If a piano has just been rebuilt and hasn’t had fine work performed, it will sound horrendous!

It takes tremendous refinement to get a rebuilt piano to play on a high level. It’s best to let the piano sit, play it, and have technicians work on it, and, of course, even over the next year or two, a rebuilt piano, just like a brand-new piano, is not going to be really settled in and stable for at least a year or two. You must play the piano and have it serviced on a very regular basis until it becomes stable.

So it’s all part of the process. I hope this has been helpful for you. If you have a piano you’re thinking of rebuilding and you want any advice, you’re welcome to contact us here at info@livingpianos.com. Thanks again. I’m Robert Estrin. We’ll see you next time.

949-244-3729

How Long Does it Take to Rebuild a Piano?

Hi, I’m Robert Estrin. This is LivingPianos.com. The question today is, “How Long Does it Take to Rebuild a Piano?” There’s a very wide range of time, and there are many aspects to this question. Let’s say you have a pia

So What Are the Best Piano Brands?

The country of origin is often the best indicator of the quality of pianos. Since piano production began in Germany and the United States, these represent the very best piano brands.

The United States only has 3 manufacturers left although there used to be hundreds of piano companies building in America. Today we have only:

Steinway

is Steinway the best piano brand

 

 

Steinway makes about 2500 pianos a year

 

 

 

Mason & Hamlin

is mason and hamlin one of the best piano brands

 

 

Mason & Hamlin builds only 250 pianos per year

 

 

 

 

 

Charles Walter

Charles Walter, one of the top piano brands in the united states

 

 

Charles Walter is a relative newcomer which builds only about 65 pianos each year.

 

 

 

 

 

The best European pianos come primarily from Germany:

Bechstein

Bechstein is one of the best piano brands in the world

Bluthner

Bluthner pianos are one of the best brands

Bosendorfer (from Austria)

Bosendorfer is one of the best piano brands in Europe, they are based in Austria

Fazioli (from Italy)

Fazioli from Italy is one of the best piano brands in the world

The Eastern European pianos are not as refined but offer excellent value:

Petrof/Weinbach

(The same company produces both pianos.)
petrof and weinbach are among the best piano brands

Estonia

estonia is one of the best piano brands in europe

Japan makes the best Asian production pianos. There are 2 companies which are the largest and second largest manufacturers of pianos in the world:

Yamaha

Yamaha is one of the best asian production brand pianos

Kawai

kawai is one of the best piano brands in Asia

Both companies have factories throughout Asia (not just in Japan) and the best pianos they build are made in Japan. They offer everything from budget instruments to hand-made pianos rivaling the best German and American pianos.

Korea has been making pianos for quite some time. While not as refined as the Japanese pianos, they continually improve. There are 2 Korean piano manufactures both of which have factories in other countries:

Samick

samick is a great piano brand, is it one of the best?

Young Chang

young chang is one of the best asian piano brands

Samick sells pianos under many different brand names including Kohler and Campbell, Knabe, Sohmer, Pramberger, Remington and many more. These are referred to as “stencil pianos” since the original manufacturer is either out of business or it is a made up name. Young Chang sells pianos under the Weber name.

Best Piano Brands YouTube Video

Best Piano Brands

What Are the Best Piano Brands?

The country of origin is often the best indicator of the quality of pianos. Since piano production began in Germany and the United States, these represent the very best, pianos.

1. Steinway is the best piano in the world:
There are a handful of piano companies which make pianos equal in quality to Steinway. (For example: Bösendorfer, Bechstein, Fazioli, Blüthner and Mason & Hamlin are all top notch pianos with rich histories.) In fact, if you look in the latest supplement to “The Piano Book”, by Larry Fine, New York made Steinway pianos are rated in the 3rd rank of pianos according to manufacturing quality. So why is Steinway recognized as the undisputed leader? In a word: marketing. Just as Microsoft dominates computer software because of aggressive licensing arrangements, John Steinway helped propel Steinway & Sons to its market dominance through exclusive artist contracts and favorable institutional arrangements.

2. Steinway pianos that have Teflon bushings in the action should always be avoided:
There are some pianos from the period that Steinway was owned by CBS in which Teflon was used in place of the felt bushings in the action. Some of these pianos exhibit problems. However, the issues are not nearly as severe as the problems of Steinways from decades earlier suffering from verdigris (a condition of gumming up of action parts as a result of having them dipped in paraffin oil when manufactured). One of the biggest problems with Teflon action parts is that few technicians know how to deal with them properly. Usually they can work fine unless there is a major change in climate.

3. Steinway upright pianos aren’t very good:
Here Steinway is getting a bum rap! While one could argue that Mason & Hamlin upright pianos and some of the extinct American companies from years ago produced superior upright pianos, Steinway uprights are by no means sub-par pianos. The fact that they don’t measure up to their grand pianos is the nature of uprights compared to grands.

4. Boston and Essex pianos are as close as you can get to a Steinway in a lower price range:
This is a beautiful myth created by Steinway to sell more than the 2,500 or so pianos that Steinway produces. These stencil brands are rebadged Kawais made in Japan, and Pearl Rivers made in China. No company ever OEM’s higher quality instruments to competitors! And the buyer must pay a premium since 2 companies have to make money on the sale. You are better off buying a Kawai or Pearl River directly from the manufacturer. Or better yet, search out a high quality, used American piano other than Steinway since the Steinway name has a price premium attached to it.

5. New York Steinways can’t compare to Hamburg produced Steinways:
Just as there is a mystique to the Steinway name, there is romance to the Hamburg Steinway name. Perhaps there is more consistency from era to era in the German manufactured Steinways. However, a great Steinway is a great Steinway and there are phenomenal instruments from both factories.

TOP 5 Steinway Piano Myths.

There are a handful of piano companies which make pianos equal in quality to Steinway. Find out 5 common Myths associated with the iconic piano company.