I’m Robert Estrin from LivingPianos.com. Today’s question is, “Can playing the piano ease depression?” Disclaimer: I am not a doctor and the information in this article is anecdotal. I would not suggest playing the piano as yo
This is Robert Estrin from LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store with a great subject today: The fundamental importance of arm weight for producing a good tone on the piano. You might wonder what I’m talking about. Before I get into that, let’s discuss the piano as a unique musical instrument.
What was the first musical instrument ever?
The first musical instrument was obviously the human voice! Every other instrument imitates the human voice to one extent or another. Wind instruments, for example, have a clear connection with breath, flow of the phrase, natural progression from note to note, and the smoothness of the line. This is intrinsic not just to vocal performance, but also all wind instruments. String instruments have the bow to create the sense of line like the breath in singing.
What is the analog for the breath on the piano?
You might think, since phrases naturally ebb and flow like ocean waves, that you can simply calculate playing each note louder and louder towards the middle of the phrase, then gradually softer and softer towards the end of the phrase. However, if you try that, you’ll end up with a calculated performance. No surprise there! The secret of creating a smooth line at the piano is, gradually increasing and decreasing arm weight by transferring smoothly from note to note, growing toward the middle of the phrase, and diminishing toward the end of the phrase.
You can try it for yourself!
Play a phrase once while calculating each note getting progressively louder, then progressively softer. Then try playing the same phrase but using the continuous arm weight that ebbs and flows. You’ll find that no matter how much you try to craft the line based upon your musical inclinations, the first version will sound calculated. That is, after all, exactly what you are doing! When you play the phrase again, remember to use the concept of the breath by utilizing the natural weight of your arm. Instead of pushing down more, just support the weight of your arm with your fingers. Lean into it the keys even after initially playing them. Lean more toward the middle of the phrase and less toward the end. You’ll find that this creates a completely different sound. There is something engaging about imposing upon a phrase the idea of the breath and letting the notes flow naturally with that overarching concept. It creates a singing line that belies the reality of the percussive nature of the piano.
I’m interested in your impressions of how this works for you. If any of you have different ways of achieving the same sound, I’d love to hear from you! Once again, this is Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.
The fundamental importance of arm weight for producing a good tone on the piano. You might wonder what I’m talking about. Before I get into that, let’s discuss the piano as a unique musical instrument.
Hi, this is LivingPianos.com, and I’m Robert Estrin. Today’s question is, “Why is a slur impossible on the piano?” It seems like a ridiculous question because you know that you have slurs all over the place in your scores on the piano, and here I am telling you that slurs are impossible on the piano!
Well, as you probably know, the piano is an instrument of illusion. After all, you play a note and as soon as you play it, it’s dying away. So, every single note you play on the piano has a decrescendo to it, and yet you have music that’s written with crescendos. That’s a whole other issue, why crescendos are impossible on the piano, or are they? Obviously, if you play multiple notes, each successive note can form a crescendo. Correct. But what about a slur? Why is a slur impossible?
What does a slur mean?
Did you know that a slur on the human voice and many instruments have all the notes within the slur? In fact, it’s impossible to avoid it completely when singing. Try singing from one note to another note, and try to avoid getting the notes between. If you were to slow that down dramatically, you would hear all the notes sliding between the notes very quickly. I’m also a French horn player, and on the French horn, slurs also have all the notes between. If you listen to great string players, violinists and cellists for example, when they play slurs they won’t always have the notes between, but for expressiveness, depending upon the positions and which strings they choose, they will achieve a smooth slide between notes when slurring.
That’s impossible on the piano.
So what do we do as pianists? We fake slurs! We create the illusion of slurs by simply having the notes overlap slightly. In one case, you can play two notes and detach them. If you want to create a creamy, slurred effect between two notes, you would release the first note after you play the second note of the slur. You will hear a much smoother sound. If you want to avoid a slur, you can detach the notes. That’s how you achieve the effect of a slur on the piano. But you are not technically slurring on the piano. You’re just creating the illusion of a slur by judiciously overlapping the notes just enough so it doesn’t become ugly, particularly if you have a half step slur, you want to avoid dissonance. You can overlap the notes slightly in order to achieve a smooth connection from note to note.
Yes, slurs are impossible on the piano, but we try our darnedest to create the illusion of slurring by overlapping notes slightly. I hope this has been interesting for you, and I wonder how many of you realize what a slur actually means, and how to achieve the effect on the piano.
Thanks so much for joining me again. This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.comYour Online Piano Store. We’ll see you next time.
Hi, this is LivingPianos.com, and I’m Robert Estrin. Today’s question is, “Why is a slur impossible on the piano?” It seems like a ridiculous question because you know that you have slurs all over the place in your scores on t
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.
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
This is Robert Estrin with LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store with a viewer question. “Why don’t they make pianos like they used to?” So many of the magnificent, American pianos from years ago are just names stenciled on the front of Asian production pianos today. Names you don’t even hear about anymore like AB Chase, Knabe and Chickering were wonderful pianos years ago. There were well over a thousand companies producing pianos in the United States and dozens of companies were making stupendous pianos! You might wonder why they don’t make pianos like they used to.
Have you ever gone downtown and seen a beautiful old car and asked yourself, “Why don’t they make the ‘57 Chevy anymore? It’s such a cool car! I wish they would make Corvettes like they used to!” With cars, it’s pretty obvious. As technologies move on, mileage and safety standards have generally made cars better. But what about pianos?
Have pianos improved?
Not necessarily. However, they do make pianos the way they used to, just in very tiny numbers. Steinway and Mason and Hamlin are both manufacturing a limited number of pianos in the United States very much like they used to. However, Mason & Hamlin is utilizing newer technologies in their actions using synthetic materials in place of traditional wood parts. There are some new rigs and new robotics utilized in manufacturing, but for the most part, American pianos utilize Old World style of wet sand cast plate, hardwood rim, and a tremendous amount of handcrafting. Indeed, many of the great German and other European piano manufacturers from over a hundred years ago are still building pianos like they did centuries ago with the addition of some computer-aided design and manufacturing techniques for more exacting standards of production.
The vast majority of pianos today are made in Asia with a very different methodology from American and European pianos.
You might wonder why. Just look at the difference in the price of a Bechstein or a Steinway compared to a Kawai or a Samick. Asian companies produce pianos that are fully functional and quite good for a fraction of the cost of hand-crafted pianos by utilizing different technologies. Take a company like Pearl River. There aren’t too many companies like them!
Pearl River made over 140,000 pianos last year!
It’s a mind-boggling number. There is no way they could be producing pianos the same way Steinway does. Steinway made a little over a thousand pianos last year. It is just not a scalable manufacturing process.
In order to be able to produce a large number of pianos on a consistent level, it is necessary to be able to utilize newer technologies and newer materials in order to accomplish that. Is this a bad thing? Not necessarily. If you want that Old World style of piano building, they are available if you’ve got the bucks to pay for them. But, vast amounts of resources have been opened up to people who couldn’t afford those pianos. Some of the modernization and new techniques of making pianos in a way they didn’t have before opens up a whole segment of the market to pianos. In China, where they bought 450,000 new pianos last year, obviously those weren’t mostly hand-built instruments. It would be impossible!
That is why they don’t make pianos the way they used to. It opens up markets at different price points. Yet, those Old World style pianos are still available in very small numbers for very high prices. I hope this has been interesting for you. I’m Robert Estrin and this is LivingPianos.com.
This is Robert Estrin with LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store with a viewer question. “Why don’t they make pianos like they used to?” So many of the magnificent, American pianos from years ago are just names stenciled on the fron
Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store, with a really interesting question. What is the farthest a piano has ever been moved? Here at Living Pianos, we move pianos all the time. So, this question is very close to my heart.
Going across the country is around 3,000 miles from Maine to California. When you go overseas, of course, it is a much greater distance. We had the opportunity to sell a concert grand to the Royal Theater in London. That is almost five and a half thousand miles away! Interestingly, that move was a piece of cake until the last couple of miles. When you get to the inner city of London, it actually cost more for the last couple of miles than the entire rest of the move including crating the piano! This is their way of limiting traffic in the city.
How Far Have We Delivered Pianos?
We also have had opportunities to sell pianos to China. Shenzen is about 7,200 miles away. So, that is certainly far away. We’ve never moved a piano to Australia – at least not yet. If we have the opportunity, it will be over 8,100 miles away. Is that the farthest a piano can be moved? You’d think it would be since it is on the other side of the planet. Actually, no!
We’ve sold pianos to Singapore which is about 8,800 miles away.
That is the farthest we have moved pianos. But what is the theoretical limit a piano could be possibly be moved? Unless you are just taking a piano for a ride around and around the world, which could be endless, half-way around the world at the equator is the greatest distance at about 12,500 miles. So, that is the theoretical limit. Or is it? Did you know:
There is a piano on the International Space Station!
It is actually a digital keyboard. But, it is a piano nonetheless. For the sake of discussion, let’s talk about that. Once again, orbiting the Earth again and again could be many thousands of miles. But you would be just taking a piano for a ride and not actually moving it from point A to point B. The International Space Station is only about 300 miles away, straight up at the point at which it passes over you. So, the final answer is, if you are going halfway around the world at the equator, that would be the farthest you could move a piano which is 12,500 miles.
It’s interesting to wrap your head around what it takes to move pianos and how far they possibly can go. I hope this has been fun for you. Keep those questions coming in and you’ll see them in future articles and videos! Thanks again, Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.
Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store, with a really interesting question. What is the farthest a piano has ever been moved? Here at Living Pianos, we move pianos all the time. So, this question is very close to my heart. Go
