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chrisw

Judging by what I am reading in other forums from piano teachers wishing to clean keys between pupils there is going to be a lot of work for tuner/technicians in replacing keytop surfaces.

chrisw

Hello Andrew, Welcome to this forum and good luck with your piano search. I returned to piano lessons at the age of forty years after having a gap of more than twenty five years. However I had been trying to teach myself for say five years before approaching my first adult teacher. The mistake that ...

chrisw

Copied from Barrie's reply to a similar question. You have to be careful with some of the commercial antiseptic wipes as they have alcohol and hydrogen peroxide which can damage the keys if used incorrectly Plastic can go soft ivory keys are porous and the alcohol can affect the glue underneath. CH ...

chrisw

Thank you Barrie. The CH wipes look like a good option for modern pianos, perhaps not for pianos with ivory keys. If we are able to resume piano groups before the release of a vaccine I might buy a large container of hand gel as well. In the meantime we are meeting using Zoom.

chrisw

As one might expect at this time decontamination refers to cleaning of keys so that the risk of transmitting the Covid virus by touch between a group of people playing the same piano is reduced as much as possible. I ask the question because when lockdown restrictions are partially lifted it might b...

chrisw

I buy my music at Promenade Music in Morecambe to give them the custom rather than anyone on line. There is a good music shop on line called Presto Classical located in Leamington Spa. I try to avoid Amazon.

chrisw

If Dawson's in Leeds does disappear there will be nowhere in the city centre that you can buy music apart from Hobgoblin which I guess won't have piano music. There remains a couple of places that you can buy a piano, one being Besbrode's but they are not in the shopping centre. When I was a teenage...

chrisw

That is a pity especially for the staff. The Manchester store is quite large but in recent years seems to have stocked mostly electronic instruments. It is many years since I ventured in and was put off by notices on the pianos saying please do not touch. Dawson's Manchester didn't stock much in the...

chrisw

I have the same model bought new in 1994. Enjoy your piano.

chrisw

My first thoughts were that this is a Kemble and the serial number suggests 1963.

chrisw

There is a 2010 Kemble 121 for sale at the Piano Gallery. Asking price about £4.2 k. I believe the silent system will affect the touch but you need to try the piano to see if you like it or not.

chrisw

Hello Barrie and Richard, I hope we can all get back to normal before not too long. It is getting time that I should be contacting my tuner technician. Some of the piano meetup groups are inviting people to join virtual meetings where video recordings are played instead of doing a live performance. ...

chrisw

Hello Richard, Somewhere on this website I think I have seen a history of Bentley Pianos but I can't find it this morning. When I was shopping for my very first piano in 1983 I remember going into a piano shop in my wife's home town and it seemed full of new Bentley pianos. I wasn't sure how long I ...

chrisw

Sorry but I have not heard of this make and can only recommend that you ask an experienced piano technician or tuner to assess the condition of the piano before you decide to buy it. If this is an old piano the make or brand means very little and its condition means everything. Warning signs (for me...

chrisw

The Besbrode piano shop website lists some Ibach serial numbers against date. It would suggest 81800 was built in 1920.

chrisw

I believe that Broadwood had already introduced overstrung pianos to their range prior to 1915 so would assume they continued to make straight strung models which could be made slightly smaller or at less cost.

chrisw

Broadwood are a very good British piano, some might argue they were the best. Yours looks to be in very good condition. According to the serial number which can be seen in the photograph it puts the date round about 1915.

chrisw

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/feb/11/virtuoso-mourns-beloved-150000-piano-smashed-by-movers I wonder what the risk is of dropping a heavy grand ? This is the second drop that I have heard about in the last decade or so. Would anybody care to estimate how many times per annum, anywhere aroun...

chrisw

Hello Barrie.
It appears the Kemble website will disappear on 1st February. Please see this web site.

http://kemble-pianos.com/en/

chrisw

I can't comment in detail on the Yamaha C110a upright. However Yamaha pianos have earned a good reputation for being robust and standing up to a great deal of use. It is important however that the person going to use it most likes the feel of the keys under their fingers and the sound the piano make...

chrisw

If there are any readers of the Piano World forum here, they may have seen a post saying that Yamaha will no longer be producing pianos bearing the Kemble name. Speaking as a Milton Keynes Kemble owner I am surprised how little this announcement is affecting me. I visited the Cavendish workshop agai...

chrisw

Happy Christmas to all the readers here.

chrisw

The Yamaha models you mention are keyboards and are really a different type of instrument to a piano. Keyboards are played differently to pianos. I do not own a keyboard but would imagine they are good for playing melodies accompanied by 'guitar' chords. They can be used as a starter instrument if y...

chrisw

Firstly, all the best for your retirement. Taking up piano seems a good idea to me, but then I'm biased. Seriously it can bring a great deal of joy but it can also be hard work and a certain amount of commitment is needed. An acoustic baby grand if bought new will cost at least £8000. If you buy a s...

chrisw

According to a list of Broadwood serial numbers which can be found on line a cottage upright with that number would have been produced between 1875 and 1880.

chrisw

Explain your situation to local piano dealers, hopefully they will be able to advise you based on the stock of pianos they keep. There is a well established dealership in Sleaford called White and Sentance and also one in Lincoln.

chrisw

You could telephone Yorkshire Pianos and ask for contact details of the company they use, or if you browse the Yorkshire piano website, I think they mention the moving company on one of their pages (it may be the Cavendish piano page).

chrisw

Any used item, particularly digital pianos, are only worth what you are prepared to pay. Assuming you are thinking of a private sale, at two years old I might think to myself that I wouldn't pay more than 50% of the new price because if it was more than that I would buy new and get a guarantee. To t...

chrisw

https://www.worldpianonews.com/historic ... _pianoland

This link may be of interest to two of the moderators here.

chrisw

Barrie, Longer pianos obviously have longer bass strings so they can achieve the lower notes with less mass per unit length of string and they give a better tone. At the other end of the piano where the strings can be very short, is anything done in larger grands to enable longer strings to be used ...

chrisw

In the first three pieces I thought the Fazioli had the nicest tone. The treble was mellow and clear and the bass sustained wonderfully. But this was the longest piano so you might expect the bass to sustain and the pianist may have lingered longer on the final chords. So I was getting worried that ...

chrisw

Perhaps you could send your question by email to Reidys in Blackburn or Bonners of Eastbourne.

chrisw

It is my pleasure, I only hope I get it right some of the time.

chrisw

If I look at page 1 of NYM on Google Images it appears to me that they are written in either Cminor or Csharp minor. Usually the last chord of a piece is written in the home key.

chrisw

Hello Rach Let me start with a disclaimer! I have not studied theory apart from browsing a couple of ABRSM books so please take the following suggestions with a pinch of salt. I have had a quick look using Google Images of the first page of 'The Boys of Summer'. The very first image is written with ...

chrisw

Hello Rach20191 and welcome to this forum. I wouldn't worry about making long posts, although you may have to sometimes accept long responses ! I have been playing fairly seriously for about 30 years, although have only really made substantial advances in the last ten years and then alas with little...

chrisw

Given the circumstance, my advice would be to get it tuned, voiced and toned and then try to get used to playing it. When I changed my tuner about six or seven years ago she toned all the hammers and it really didn't cost that much. It probably needs doing again ! If the Fazer produces too much soun...

chrisw

Beardywierdy, have you seen this video ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wX0tUHduh94&t=218s

chrisw

Barrie, I have a slightly different view when comparing digitals to acoustics, although I take your point that a digital is likely to be stronger in the bass than a shortish acoustic. I am mostly interested in the nuances of sound you can draw from an acoustic using hand and finger technique that I ...

chrisw

Barrie's article here https://www.a440.co.uk/piano-voicing.html may be of interest. Please do not be discouraged from persevering with your acoustic. In time you can draw out some very expressive sounds. I do agree that digitals do have some advantages over acoustics and having one of each would be ...

chrisw

Information available on the web leads me to believe that Fazers are well designed pianos. I also made a transition from a very early electronic piano to acoustic many years ago and it did take quite awhile before I became used to the heavier action and the different sound. It is possible that tonin...

chrisw

You could try...
http://www.pianoauctions.co.uk/catalogue.php

chrisw

I am assuming the sonata was written in 1801 (this might not be totally accurate). Therefore 59 years before the piano (i.e about 60). My mistake was to say we are approaching the 200th anniversary, without thinking about it too much , and not the 220th anniversary.

chrisw

Thanks for giving us a very impressive account of the restoration on your website. To say that have made a first class job doesn't seem to do it justice. The other interesting point (at least to me) is that we are now approaching the two hundredth anniversary of Beethoven's "Moonlight" sonata, a pie...

chrisw

I would start by visiting local music shops and trying out what Casio/Kawai/Roland/Yamaha have to offer.

chrisw

What will be the first piece of music you will study on this piano ?

chrisw

Congratulations. What a lovely photograph.

chrisw

Both are good makes but it is only their condition that matters and not the name. I would be asking for details of the work done during restoration and enquiring if there is a guarantee period. I would be considering whether or not I needed an independent tuner to inspect both pianos and advise me a...

chrisw

Thanks for the info Barrie.

chrisw

If you lift the sagging rail at the treble end with your finger does it just fall back when it is released. If so and the bass end isn't moving because it is held by the spring, where is the rail pivoting or is it just twisting/bending ? If the rail is twisting/bending it doesn't have sufficient cro...

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