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Here's a Beauty

  • 1.  Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-20-2017 21:07
    Made in 1903. London.

    Challen & Son famed piano from Abbey Road Beatles. 

    How can I tune this without deactivating the dampers? She paid me to ask you.


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    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
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  • 2.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-20-2017 22:20
    Papp's mutes

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    Larry Messerly, RPT
    Bringing Harmony to Homes
    www.lacrossepianotuning.com
    ljmesserly@gmail.com
    928-899-7292
    ------------------------------



  • 3.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-21-2017 00:47
    Larry,
    I currently do not own such a mute but do believe initially that was my solution to the problem if what colleagues have shown me is what you are mentioning. I will check the supply house catalougues for it as this is no longer a guessing game. 
    Much obliged...

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    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
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  • 4.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-23-2017 20:40
    Here is one I tuned in the Loire Valley, France using a Papps mute. It came out fine and was
    used in the wedding reception. 

    Bob Highfield

    Inline image 1





  • 5.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-20-2017 23:31
    Hate to disappoint but that is not the famous Challen from Abby Road. I can't believe it but Abby Road did actually auction off that piano in 2010, so it is out there someplace. Bonham, who did the auction, was estimating that it would bring in about $243,000. Don't know what it actually did sell for. I could be wrong but I doubt it's sitting in someones home.

    Here's the story, including a picture of the real Abby Road Challen upright. 

    http://www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/beatles-abbey-road-piano-to-be-auctioned-1.873690 

    And here is Paul actually playing it in the Abby Road studio 2.



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    Geoff Sykes, RPT
    Los Angeles CA
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  • 6.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-21-2017 00:57
    Geoff,

    So a Westerner never made a mistake building a piano?

    I was indeed told that with the caveat this particular piano was not that piano. It does in fact appear that this action has been rendered obselete in the picture. 

    Thank you as that I will attempt to convince the piano owner that the piano is an anachronism with the article and that the manufacturer in fact had spurned its own creation in later days of manufacturing.

    In another epistemology, however, some might claim this affirms the assertion by that very article, that it is a Challen. I drive a Chevy, but not from '57.

    It is frustrating as that she is very attached to it...

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    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
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  • 7.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-21-2017 01:33
    Benjamin --

    The Challen she has is beautiful, and I vote she should keep it, regardless of its heritage. Much too nice to have ever lived in a studio and suffered the kind of abuse the Abby Road piano did. Her Challen is history. The Abby Road Challen has a history.

    Abby Road had two famous uprights. The Challen and a Steinway that was, and still is, referred to as Mrs. Miller's piano. The Mrs. Miller piano had its hammers lacquered to being close to rock hard. Deliberately so. It was then "carefully" tuned to sound like a tack piano. Mrs. Miller used it exclusively on all her albums, and apparently she was very popular and made a lot of them. The Challen wound up having the same treatment. Apparently there was enough demand for that sound that they needed two pianos similarly re-engineered to satisfy the client needs. 

    A couple of years ago I was called upon to create a similar tuning, using a mandolin rail instead of killing the hammers, on a decent Kawai studio upright. The closest I could find to a description of the tuning used on Mrs. Miller's piano and the Challon was that it was "carefully" tuned. I wound up simply tuning the middle string to pitch then dropping one side of the trichord unisons by something like 3¢ and raising the other side by something like 5¢. The customer and I both thought it was close enough. Unfortunately I haven't seen it since so it's probably in his studio slowly sounding better and better all by itself.

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    Geoff Sykes, RPT
    Los Angeles CA
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  • 8.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-21-2017 02:33
    Geoff,

    The Cabinetry is beautiful. Some argue a piano is a musical instrument over it being a piece of furniture. The action design creates enough lag time and expense in maintaining it that its days as a musical instrument are over. She balked at the suggestion she purchase a new vertical, so the money is not there. The decline in the piano industry for ornate cabinetry has put the industry in a vice; you choose between the piano as a musical instrument, or furniture. But you can't have both. Nor is it modern form of expression to carve the cabinet of the piano. Minimalism dominates the visual art of creating many three dimensional objects today, from pianos to buildings to carriages. The relics littering the landscape in the United States people cling to, piano shaped objects, contribute to its decline in popularity for the US. But more so, musical understanding in general, as a discipline, not entertainment, suffers. Beyond the ivory towers, music illiteracy is rampant in this country. I am convinced pianos like this won't help. She might learn to sing karaoke, but not sing and play this piano.

    The sustain pedal response was interesting. It rested on your foot as you released it. The dampers collide with the string with a rapid release. Playing time lasts at the piano for a duration of time that relates to quality of sound and feel for me. I didn't play much.

    One of these days I need to listen to that recording again. Paul made the piano work for his genre, which was not easy to do. Just playing and singing is hard for anybody.



    ------------------------------
    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
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  • 9.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-22-2017 01:23
    Hey, folks, it's 'Abbey' not 'Abby' - I know 'cos I've worked there on a project with the LPO - and was obliged to walk over that Zebra Crossing to get there.  Michael   UK





  • 10.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-22-2017 12:33
    You'll like this, then. The Abbey Road crossing Live Cam. With audio.

    https://www.abbeyroad.com/crossing 

    Can you spot the tourists?

    Thanks to all for the spelling corrections. I blame the built in spell checker for allowing them to pass. <-grin->

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    Geoff Sykes, RPT
    Los Angeles CA
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  • 11.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-22-2017 12:56
    Ok ok corrected. 
    All these piano dealers fueling dying local orchestras with so-called leased pianas for free. Why can't this happen for internationally known pop artists? Why not get on the ship that sails?

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    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
    ------------------------------



  • 12.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-22-2017 01:33
    This is similar to what I did at Abbey Road Studios for the recording of Porgy and Bess (LPO/Glyndebourne/Rattle) You can hear it on the CD or the DVD released at the time. It is near the opening - Jasbo Brown (Wayne Marshall) and the Catfish Row piano. I suggested to Simon that since the folks in Catfish Row couldn't afford to bury their dead, neither would they afford to have the piano tuned. He said 'OK - so long as it's at 440' BTW it's 'Mrs Mills' not 'Mrs. Miller'           Michael    UK





  • 13.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-21-2017 02:51
    I don't think I understand this thread. You haven't tuned an overdamper before?

    If it is as conventional as it looks, you can undo the nut in the middle and the little clips on the sides, lean the action forward, and remove the soft pedal muffler felt rail. Then you can put a muting strip into the middle register.

    By all means, use a Papps mute. It can reach through the strings and you can pluck them with it to find out where you are.

    Once you've tuned the center string of the muting strip area, and the bass and treble, lean the action forward again, take out the muting strip, replace the soft pedal muffler felt, and tune the side strings, using the Papps.

    Sometimes people have written note names near the tuning pins which also help you keep your place.

    Forgive me if you already knew all of this.

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    Susan Kline
    Philomath, Oregon
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  • 14.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-21-2017 05:14
    Susan,

    Please don't be offended if I don't know this. Have never been asked to work on one. Born in a Steinway bubble to a Steinway tech who worked Oberlin. If you don't know, ask.

    As for Challen & Son, I never heard of the piano or the story of Abbey Road and the alleged famous Challen. I say alleged because as I file the client in the dinosaur piano business program PT biz, which provides over 200 makes of pianos in a default list to enter the make of a client's piano with a click, not by typing, the Challen does not appear, and had to be typed in. Sorry the creator of PT biz should have heard of it.

    Couldn't call myself a Beatles fan. More interested in Paul's hero, Fats Domino, and the guys Fats imitated, Huey Smith, James Booker, Professor Longhair, Allen Toussaint; Harry Connick Jr. called James Booker his greatest influence. A lot of my education is on the playing side of things. Those are the guys who will teach you how to play. Not Paul. Not John.

    Don't understand? In another thread I claimed people don't know the stability of verticals because of using ETDs. Riles people up. 

    But all this information is priceless. Really. Glad I asked.

    ------------------------------
    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
    ------------------------------



  • 15.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Member
    Posted 04-21-2017 07:43
    Hi Ben,

    I like your list of piano influences. I once saw Mac Rebennac (Dr. John) play a solo gig at the piano that was amazing! His left hand work doing the syncopated New Orleans style major 10th walking lines - ah! James Booker and Professor Longhair are his main influences. He started as a guitar player, but was injured by a gunshot wound on his left hand, so he switched to piano. 

    That being said, I am also a Beatles nerd. Paul can definitely teach anyone a lot about piano composition. He was not a bad player, but his "chords are outrageous" as Bob Dylan once said. He had a "run" of piano-composed tunes from '66-'69 that would make any pop star jealous. For No One, Good Day Sunshine, Penny Lane, Martha My Dear, Your Mother Should Know, Hello Goodbye, Getting Better, Lovely Rita, Fixing A Hole... I cold go on. These are all before Let It Be, You Never Give Me Your Money, Long and Winding Road, etc.

    I once sent a note to the London PTG-like group asking if anyone had any info on who used to tune at Abbey Road, but never heard back.

    I generally try to stay away from tuning English uprights. 

    Jeff

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    Jeff Farris
    Austin TX
    512-636-1914
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  • 16.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-21-2017 11:17
    Hi Jeff,

    The problem I had with the Beatles is that they gave up performing live music as the recording industry became larger than life. The Rolling Stones, who they are often compared with, on the other hand, never stopped touring. I conjecture the cessation of performing with the Beatles as much as inner conflicts led to its disbanding. Paul seemed to want to, he immediately created The Wings, wrote some good music with them also. The inability of Paul to read music is something of an enigma. I think it could have contributed to his ability to create a whole new thing in music. 

    I saw Mac a couple times. He was more lucid outside of New Orleans. Talked Dad into going. In New Orleans, I saw him at the famous Tipitina's,
    Tipitina's
    Tipitinas remove preview
    Tipitina's
    Tipitina's began as a neighborhood juke joint, established in 1977, by a group of young music fans (The Fabulous Fo'teen) to provide a place for Professor Longhair to perform in his final years. The venue, named for one of Longhair's most enigmatic recordings "Tipitina," has survived in an ever-changing musical climate.
    View this on Tipitinas >


    in the warehouse district of New Orleans. The Neville Brothers came out for encores. It kind of woke Mac up then, they actually played and sang better and stirred him up. I think New Orleans never abandoned Dixieland. When Bop changed jazz, New Orleans pianists created rock and roll piano. Rougher stuff, like Champion Jack Dupree. Boxer.

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    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
    ------------------------------



  • 17.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-21-2017 13:23
    The Beatles gave up touring because A) They woke up to the realization that they couldn't be heard above the screaming fans anyway, and B) Because the advances in studio technology, and their constant experimenting in the studio, allowed them to create music that just could not be performed live. the Stones, on the other hand, have always been a live phenomena. With the possible exception of Her Satanic Majesties Request, everything the Stones have ever written can easily be performed live. And besides, we go to a Stones concert to see Jagger dance and marvel that Richards is even still alive. Paul can't read music? Really?

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    Geoff Sykes, RPT
    Los Angeles CA
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  • 18.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-22-2017 01:56
    Paul writes music - so he must be able to read it. I tuned his poor old S&S 'A' at his home when he was writing 'Give my regards to Broad Street'.     Michael    UK





  • 19.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-22-2017 11:41
    Geoff,

    This is a clip from a documentary Paul did about 'es foray into orchestration in which he discusses his relative ignorance of formal notation, and how he composes for orchestra with a midi keyboard, not pen, paper, and staff

    PAUL MCCARTNEY SONGWRITING FOR STANDING STONE
    YouTube remove preview
    PAUL MCCARTNEY SONGWRITING FOR STANDING STONE
    documentary excerpt - speaking about the songwriting for his classical album 'standing stone'
    View this on YouTube >

    The whole thing is it for 50 bucks new on Amazon, prime 48

    https://www.amazon.com/Paul-McCartneys-Standing-Stone-McCartney/dp/6305614369

    I think on the whole thing he more directly affirms my assertion the music he wrote did not involve notation.

    Far as performing, I am skeptical screaming teenagers were the whole problem. That is a problem as a parent, not for a boy band. I have a hard time believing that was part of it even. They didn't have to, mainly, to make a living as a band. Also, the Beatles were a band that loved piano. Paul played guitar backwards. He couldn't do that so easily with piano. And pianos don't move.

    It is tough to see so many new pop artists abandon the piano for dancing. Bruno Mars. People who could play once like Lady Gaga. Her piano playing at Elton John's 70th? Atrocious. Get off the dance floor and start practicing piano girl. Mac worked with Anthony Kiedis. Couldn't get him to play keyboards. Who couldn't learn from Dr. John? 

    I like some concept studio creations. Brian Eno is the master of that at the keyboard. Allen Toussaint tried that with the recording "20 Space Themes," and it forced him out of the studio. But for the Beatles it was suicide for the band. I think moving keyboards may have been part of the problem.

    There is the blame Yoko theory for the breakup. How can you be a band and not perform?

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    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
    ------------------------------



  • 20.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-21-2017 20:26
    <<In another thread I claimed people don't know the stability of verticals because of using ETDs. Riles people up.>>

    <grin>

    I've been known to suggest that people are dulling their musical tuning discernment by spending so many hours on automatic looking at ETD's. Riled people up. A lot.

    As for the overdampers, I came by the knowledge naturally. First, I was taught by Ted Sambell, and of course when he was a young tuner in Britain during WWII and just afterwards, these "cottage pianos" were everywhere. He explained how helpful the Papps mute is for them. Then, I moved to Stockton, CA (yes, I really did that ................... I can hardly believe it now), and people were bringing over container-loads of birdcage pianos, many of which were past redemption, and flogging them for about $300. Well, they were pretty. Of course, I tried to redeem them anyway. Those which could be made to play were made to play. It was before we used CA glue on loose tuning pins, which would certainly have been helpful.

    You can either remove the rail for the soft pedal with the muffler felt on it (it just lifts out of slots at the ends) and put in the muting strip, or you can mute each note in the temperament individually using the Papps mute -- doesn't hurt to have two if you want to do that. It's nearly a toss-up, but I found using the muting strip to be slightly less fuss.

    If individual notes refuse to damp, you can adjust them at the bottom of the birdcage wire. If lots and lots don't want to damp, work on getting the action slightly further back. I've been known to shim the slot for the little clips on the sides. A small distance can make a big difference in the damping.

    I think your dad came to Oberlin after I left. I was there from 1964-7. The conservatory was brand new. I was a lot closer to new than now, myself. Are all those practice room M's still there? Someone back then said there were more Steinways in one place at Oberlin than anywhere else on earth. This was long before the "all-Steinway school" thing got going.

    ------------------------------
    Susan Kline
    Philomath, Oregon
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  • 21.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-22-2017 16:21
    Susan,

    You are my guiding light. I thought Michael Gamble would be. Always check out attached files. But nevertheless some very interesting stories Michael, thank you. Glad he was mistaken, I knew nothing of the make, great history. Glad the conversation started.

    Dad arrived at Oberlin I think '78. The new buildings, called Bibbins, and Robertson, are impressive. The architect and the school made arrangements to build a sealed structure, with windows that did not open. It is frustrating what happened at the College Conservatory of Music in Cincinnati, being renowned for its architecural division @ DAPP. They should have an entire cirriculum on climate control, and if not, start one, applying it when building and redesigning their facilities. Didn't have the sense to build and remodel sealed buildings with a bunch of pianos in it, without fluctuating humidity, somehow. Huge drainage problems the whole time I was there, buckets and trash cans all over the place to catch the water. Kind of makes you question the operation from top to bottom. I think having a museum taught Oberlin College a lot about climate control and drainage.

    I am a building behind also since I left in the 90s. It has a Jazz building now, I don't even know what it is called. 

    I did a few courses to complete my degree at Oberlin, one being a composition course with Richard Hoffmann. A problem growing up in Oberlin at schools with the children of Faculty when considering attending Oberlin involves how the Professors get humanized in the process. I used to talk with his son, Paul, at the new gym, Phillips, all the time. In middle school his daughter was my swimming school teacher in the summer. An Obi was Dean here in Cinci during my unfortunate departure from CCM, and the humanization of authorities that went with that may have involved the irreverance it galvanized in me.

    Anyhow, one of Hoffmann's biggest concerns when I studied composition with him was what was being done to the shrubbery surrounding Bibbins and Robertson. It created as I recall about 30 feet between the building and the end of the shrubbery, and no doubt was difficult to maintain. It appeared the landscapers from B & G got tired of it. Hoffmann relayed to me how the architect hoped to create a floating effect as you moved past the building, as that the building would be moving at a different pace than the front of the shrubbery as you walked, biked, or drove. And it worked. But they hacked it to pieces, and with the base of the new building exposed, the effect is gone. I don't know if he ever convinced administrators to restore the shrubbery.     

    To my knowledge, to date, nothing is being disposed of, D, B, M, S, O, A, C, whatever other model. They got somebody in Michigan doing bellywork. That fleet of M's is there.

    The arts are so politically committed to the left. It helps Oberlin promote itself probably more than anything else. Milo's conflict with alumna Lena Dunham explains why the best undergraduate musicians will always end up at Oberlin, not Cincinnati. Cincinnati is too conservative.




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    Benjamin Sloane
    Cincinnati OH
    513-257-8480
    ------------------------------



  • 22.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-22-2017 23:24
    Hi, Benjamin

    I just went to Google and used the satellite view. We just called "Bibbins" the conservatory, and Robertson we called Robertson. Google misplaced the Warner Concert Hall name. I see there are other buildings there. Really sorry they trashed so many of the neat old buildings like Talcott (in my time) and Peters (just recently.)  It looks like Old Barrow is still there. Very gracious old building, was once the President's residence, but I got to spend two years in it when it was Russian House. We were envied for getting to live there.

    Minoru Yamasaki said, as an architectural principle, that every window should look onto a pleasing natural landscape, and he achieved it. Sorry they've not followed through with that. The north side of Robertson, the lot being kind of narrow and close to a street, was the hardest. There were lots of very bushy healthy lilac bushes there. At first, Robertson seemed so symmetric and uniform, with two halves and three stories, that I thought I would keep getting lost, but within a few weeks I could have been brought blindfolded to any place in it, and I would immediately have known where I was.

    The windows were all sealed, but the main building had a lot of trouble the first year. Water somehow got through the white chipped rock on the surfaces, and rusted the rebar inside, which made rust streaks. I remember being in classes while people on scaffolding were chipping away at the rust -- tip tip, tip. I hope that the black fairly shallow pond between "Bibbins" and Warner is still there. We used to have a lot of fun with that pond. Someone put a snapping turtle into it once. B&G were not amused. And then one day -- I forget the exact dimension of the thing, maybe 19 feet on the long side? -- someone put a 17 foot sailboat into it, with guy wires on each end to hold it upright.

    Those practice rooms, especially the little ones, acoustically, were dry as the Sahara. I would sometimes get into the choir rehearsal room and practice there just to get some sound. We would get in to practice Sunday morning (borrowed key), and also during vacations. It was supposed to be very, very bad, but we did it the whole time I was there. The only day in Thanksgiving vacation when we didn't get in (mostly cellists) was Thanksgiving Day itself, when we were invited to dinner as a class -- and that was the night someone broke in and did some vandalism. So perhaps a little slackness in the key rules was actually protective.

    They may have kept the building sealed, unlike Cincinnati, but they were turned off the heat over Christmas vacation. I had left my cello in its locker to spare it the danger of hauling it on buses to Colorado. I came back and it had a nasty crack in it. In a building with so many instruments, they had a nerve, turning off the heat for so long in an Ohio winter.

    The biggest irony about my time in Oberlin was when, as a freshman, I discovered that there was a one credit class for piano majors, where they learned about pianos and worked on partial rebuilds of one of those M's -- the classes took on one after another. I thought that was FASCINATING!!! I wondered whether they'd let a cello major take the class. Never asked --- I need to PRACTICE! <palm to forehead moment.>

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    Susan Kline
    Philomath, Oregon
    ------------------------------



  • 23.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-22-2017 01:47
    Susan - forgive me! I thought this was a Challen Grand being discussed. Turns out now that it's an old 'over-damper' action. So Papps wedges are the way to go. These fit between the damper lifting wires, the hammer shanks and the strings. As you say, first release the action, pull it forward to get at and remove the Celeste rail. Return the action and (again as you said) feel for the strings with the tip of the Papps - they can't help but sound when you do this, so you know where you are. Tune the whole piano - one tricord at a time - until finished, then tilt the action forward again to replace the Celeste. How many times I've done this I simply couldn't calculate - but I never did like 'Over-Dampers'.     Michael   UK





  • 24.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-22-2017 02:08
    Hi, Michael

    You're far more experienced with them than I am, but it sounds like our procedures are the same. I tuned them mainly in the 1980's because so many were being imported from Britain back then. A lot of tuners refused to work on them. I don't know if it was because they didn't know how to deal with them, or if they just didn't want to bother. Getting them reasonably in tune (often at a somewhat low pitch, though, for the more battered ones) and more or less working seemed to me to be useful for the owners, some of whom liked the old Victorian sound. Certainly the cases look beautiful. It's probably been ten years since I've seen one here in Oregon.

    ------------------------------
    Susan Kline
    Philomath, Oregon
    ------------------------------



  • 25.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Posted 04-21-2017 03:51
    I use two rubber wedges with a wire handle. Many people use felt wedges in grands. There should be no need to 'de-activate' the damper system. I had a small Challen Concert model (8'2") Big, Black and built like a tank with built-in wooden leg bracing bars just above the castor level. Sold it to University and bought myself an S&S model 'A' Hamburg 1914. I know the BBC used Challens during the War and when they changed over to S&S afterwards the basements of the Beeb were full of Challens. Maybe that's where Abbey Road Studios got that one from. On page 122 of my copy of Bob Pierce Piano Atlas there is a photo of an enormous Challen Grand with a placard beneath it saying 'The Largest Grand Piano in the World'. I don't know the edition of my Pierce Atlas but the last S&S entry is a 'projected' number of 390,000 for 1965.  You should see the list of Bob Pierce's friends! Includes Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Artur Rubenstein, Liberace &c.&c.     Michael   UK





  • 26.  RE: Here's a Beauty

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-22-2017 02:05
    One of those giant Challen concert grands came into the shop I apprenticed in, JB Piano in San Rafael CA owned at that time by Leonard Jared (late 1970s). The piano was either 10 or 10 1/2 feet long! I was told that there were only maybe two made, and this one had toured the US with Paderewski in the early 20th century, loaded onto a railroad car.