February 12, 2007

A Designer Grand Piano (YouTube) Looks great; sounds tinny.

Here's a couple of Steinways by way of comparison.

  • Interesting. I'm no good at music, but it may not be fair to compare this way, what with youtube audio crapalyzing filter. There's a better quality video available here (click the right hand arrow until you get to the last page, then click on the "download" link). Perhaps even better would be to test the pianos side by side in the same room with the same music and pianist.
  • It looks like a killer whale. I like it.
  • That is indeed a pretty thing. The decal should read NCC 1701 instead of "NYT Line." I've never played a Fazioli, but they have a reputation as kind of the Ferrari of the piano world, producing extremely few instruments every year (c. 100) of the highest quality and accordingly high price tags. (So if it sounds tinny in real life, I'll eat my copy of Bilder einer Ausstellung, vinyl cover and all.) Their line includes the F308, a 10'2" beast with four pedals and a lid so heavy that it comprises three separate sections. They share a factory with a furniture plant, so custom cabinetry like this (ZOMG CASEMODX0RZ!) is nothing new.
  • What does the fourth pedal do, goetter? I thought Shamu too, spede. With a dash of Tupperware.
  • The fourth pedal goes to eleven brings the hammers closer to the strings so as to diminish volume without the una corda effect. (This is the same effect as done by the soft pedal on a vertical piano.)
  • Sauter also manufactures designer pianos, as does Schimmel.
  • I WANT! I WANT!
  • I was always rather fond of this Schimmel.
  • Oooh, that would be nice, goetter. Suddenly my old two-pedal spinnet feels very inadequate.
  • Poor me, whose money is all spent On a new four-pedal instrument. My old two-pedal spinnet Was not as useful, innit.
  • MonkeyFilter: Suddenly my old two-pedal spinnet feels very inadequate.
  • There's a nice collection of other work by the designer of the Schimmel Pegasus-piano at that blue-themed MoFi spin-off site.
  • Piano Practice The summer hums. The afternoon fatigues; she breathed her crisp white dress distractedly and put into it that sharply etched etude her impatience for a reality that could come: tomorrow, this evening--, that perhaps was there, was just kept hidden; and at the window, tall and having everything, she suddenly could feel the pampered park. With that she broke off; gazed outside, locked her hands together; wished for a long book-- and in a burst of anger shoved back the jasmine scent. She found it sickened her. --Rainer Maria Rilke, trans Edward Snow A piano is a piano is a piano. --Gertrude Steinway
  • But sometimes a guitar just needs one good stroke.
  • Ach! thinking o' clocks at a time like this?