Grand Obsession

AndyD

Piano tuner booked for next Friday, retired from London Steinway so fingers crossed.

Meanwhile our piano stool, (chewed by a teething dog years ago) got some TLC this week:

All four legs chewed in two places were filled and then stained

AndyD

You'd never notice now

Nina

@wtg ️
I still miss my Pleyel...

ShiroKuro

@AndyD wow! That’s an impressive repair job! Did you do it?

AndyD

Thanks, started with some trepidation but thought, well, surely it won't be worse
Hardest was getting the original shape when sanding the filler (two lots of filler, the chewing was so deep).
And I never have exactly the right colour stain... oak, redwood, dark tudor. Usually mix them, trial and error.

AndyD

Anyone know how to cure a rocking motion of an adjustable duet bench? Though it adjusts up and down fine, it has loosened somehow over the last 30 years. If you sit in the middle and press down left hand right hand it rocks.

Rontuner

Depends on the manufacturer, Jansen will sell kits to replace worn bushings. Flip it over and try to determine where the movement occurs. Sometimes it is just a matter of loose screws/nuts and bolts.

Big_Al

@AndyD
Very nice restoration work, Andy.

Big Al

wtg

@Big_Al said in Grand Obsession:

@AndyD
Very nice restoration work, Andy.

Big Al

Indeed.

And why is it that dogs go after piano benches? Our first golden chewed off the corner of the lid on the piano bench (it wasn't an adjustable style of bench). The fellow who did the repair didn't do nearly as a good a job as @AndyD did on his bench.

wtg

Stumbled upon this recent video titled "Valentina Lisitsa Meets Grotrian".

Valentina Lisitsa visit us at PianoWorks over the weekend and during a tour of our workshop, she encountered a Grotrian Charis model 208 Studio. We recently retired this piano from concert duty and the pedals were taken apart while we re-sprayed the matte ebony finish...hence the no pedal challenge.

She plays for about 7 minutes, and then talks about her reaction to the piano.

Link to video

AndyD

Really like this demo, and her comment "It doesn't feel like a toy piano".

Her technique is to be envied; yet, dare I say she often plays like she has a train to catch?

Piano*Dad

@Mary-Anna said in Grand Obsession:

I believe the video of Muffin and me was made at Plays88Keys' piano party. Jon was there and he's in the video. Do you recall, Jon?

She had a Steinway at the time, so you're probably right that it was a New York Steinway.

I agree. I was there with Anthony at that one, in Richmond.

wtg

@Piano-Dad said in Grand Obsession:

I agree. I was there with Anthony at that one, in Richmond.

And there are videos to prove it...

pique

@AndyD hey if i could play that fast, i'd do it too. I hope they sent this video to the grotrian factory--they'd be so gratified.