Piano Moving

Moving a piano is a pain. I’ve moved a lot of pianos myself, and I’ve paid people to move pianos for me and here are some tips I have on the subject.piano_moving

1. It’s usually worth it to hire professionals

It is spendy, but I think hiring professionals will be be faster and cheaper (if you count your time) compared to doing it yourself. If you’re moving within the Portland area, most movers are going to charge $150-$250 (depending on location, situation and number of stairs involved).

Here are some numbers for when I moved a piano last:

  1. Rent a U-Haul Truck – $100
  2. 2 hours to pick up and return a piano dolly from a friend
  3. 3 hours of my time and 2 hours of a friend’s time moving the piano
  4. $5 for donuts to thank helpers

Valuing time at $20 per hour, that comes to $245 and a lot of pain (imagine two 150lb guys pushing a full-size upright out of a basement and up a frozen hill on a sheet of plywood)! I could have paid movers $150 and they would have done it faster, safer and and I wouldn’t have had to spend my Saturday morning working on it! If you make a mistake and the piano lands on your leg or arm, you pay the doctor bill and 8 weeks of productivity!

 

2. If you’re going to do it yourself, do your research and prepare well.

Know your piano. Measure it and compare those measurements with the space you will be moving into or through. Know approximately how much it weighs and how many people you will need to lift it. Two strong men can handily lift a spinet or small console, but you’re moving anything bigger, or moving it far without a good dolly, you will want four men.

If you have steps to move it up or down, have a plan for getting through them. Don’t rely on the piano’s wheels to roll it. Most piano wheels are very small and not made for rolling more than a few feet at a time. Use a dolly whenever possible. It is much easier on the piano and on the movers. A run-of-the-mill furniture dolly will work for many uprights, but try to get something bigger with larger rubber wheels if possible. The small wheels on furniture dollies don’t go over doorways very well, and are not very easy to turn accurately. Securely cover and protect your piano. You can very easily damage your piano and the repair bill for a couple dings or scratches can easily be higher than what you might have paid professionals to move your instrument. Cover the piano with thick blankets if you can, leaving gaps to reach important handles and handholds.

Don’t use a pickup. Lifting a piano into the bed of a pickup without a ramp is not only very difficult, but unsafe. If not tied down very securely, the piano can tip out of the bed which is not good for the car or piano!

pianopickup

3. Don’t move a grand yourself.

Grand pianos are even harder to move since you have to take the legs and pedal lyre off and turn the piano on its side to move safely. Grand pianos should be wrapped in blankets or shrink wrapped for protection and strapped tightly so the lid doesn’t open while moving. If you have to navigate any stairs with a grand, a “piano skid board” is a necessity. I strongly recommend you hire professionals to move a grand piano, but if you want to do it yourself, here is a video that shows how to break down and move a baby grand piano.

 

grandpianomoving

 

Here is a list of the professional movers in the Portland area in order of my recommendation:

  1. West Coast Piano Moving  –  I have worked with them several times and they do great work. West Coast does the moving for Portland Piano Company
  2. A to Z Moving  – A to Z Moving works closely with Classic Pianos in SE Portland and I have had good moving experiences with them as well.
  3. Big Al’s Specialty Movers  –  These guys are big! And friendly! I haven’t worked with them, but I’ve only heard good things about them
  4. Michelle’s Pianos  –  In addition to selling pianos (Michelle’s is currently the Steinway dealer in Portland), Michelle’s also moves piano in the Portland area.

Grotrian Pianos

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Germany has a long tradition of producing high quality products and its pianos are no exception! Germany is home to several high quality piano manufacturers, including Steinway (Hamburg), Bluthner, Bosendorfer (Austria), Bechstein, Schimmel and Grotrian, or Grotrian-Steinweg, to use their German name.

Grotrian pianos have been produced in Braunschweig (Brunswick) Germany since 1856 when Friedrich Grotrian became partner with Heinrich Steinweg (who immigrated to the US as Henry Steinway!). As Henry Steinway began to focus on the American market in New York, the Grotrian family bought out his interest in the Grotrian-Steinweg factory in the 1860’s. The company prospered in the early 20th century producing a peak of 3000 pianos in 1927. The company survived the Great Depression, learned to make aircraft during WWII, repaired the bombed factory and has continued making some of the finest pianos on the market. Grotrian currently produces around 500 upright and 100 grand pianos of various sizes annually.
grotrian-steinweg

factory

Grotrian-Steinweg won several awards at world fairs and exhibitions and was the preferred instrument of great pianists including Clara Schumman, Paderewski, and Eugen d’Albert.
There has been tension between Steinway and Grotrian-Steinweg over the use of “Steinweg” for years and in 1977 the company dropped Steinweg from their name for all pianos sold in America (they still used Grotrian-Steinweg in all European pianos).

But enough history! Grotrian makes a wonderful piano! You should play one!

Grotrian uprights quickly replaced Schimmels (also German) as my favorite upright. Their sound is massive and the action is so responsive it feels like I’m playing a grand. Both their sound and touch is my favorite in any upright I’ve ever played.

Grotrian 57cm Classic Model

Grotrian 57cm Classic Model

Grotrian produces several different sizes of uprights ranging from the more affordable 52cm Freidrich model to the 66cm Concertina model which will costs you a bit over $30,000. And it would be worth every penny!

Grotrian produces several sizes of grands, ranging from the 5’4″ Chambre to the 1,200lb, 9′ “Concert Royal” grand. Their tone is very clear and “German” in quality. The range of dynamic is supurb, and while more aggressive than the Austrian Bosendorfer, the Grotrian is still a mellower piano than the Steinway. The pianos come from the factory precisely prepared and with very little work needed before they are put on the showroom floor.

The Grotrian Concert Grand

The Grotrian Concert Grand

While expensive, they are still a good deal cheaper than Bosendorfer and Steinway pianos in the same class. So if you’re looking for a wonderful, first tier piano, Grotrian is probably the least expensive way to go.

I’ve been able to work on several Grotrians, including a couple odd uprights from the 1950’s, a 9′ concert grand from the 70’s or 80’s and many new uprights and grands at Portland Piano Company.

The 1950's style Grotrian-Steinweg Console

The 1950’s style Grotrian-Steinweg Console

I recently got to tune a newly acquired Grotrian grand at Reed College in preparation for one of Paul Roberts’ master classes in February. Reed college has a new performing arts building and one of their concert spaces now features this 7′ Grotrian, sporting the durable “institutional finish.” It sounds wonderful in its space and I stopped to play for a good while when I was done tuning.

You can read more about Grotrians here on their website, or on Wikipedia. You can walk into Portland Piano Company and play several models of these beautiful pianos, or peruse their selection online here.

I’ll leave you with a couple more pictures of the grand at Reed College.
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I also installed a fallboard lock on this piano.
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Finest workmanship and materials evident here under the “belly.”FullSizeRender

The Upright Piano Complete Service Package

One of the main things I do for Portland Piano Company is refurbish used pianos that come in before PPC resells them. My goal is to get them playing and sounding their best. I usually spend 4-6 hours cleaning, repairing, regulating, voicing and tuning. I aim to get the piano as close as I can to “new” without starting to replace parts and “rebuild” the piano.

I’m now offering this service package to customers in their homes at a considerable savings. If your piano hasn’t been tuned or worked on in several years, or if it has some oddities or issues that haven’t been resolved in normal tuning visits, or if you want to give your piano the ultimate “piano spa” treatment, this extensive service visit might be a great way to get your piano back to playing and sounding its very best!
I set aside an entire day for this service and charge between $350 (if it takes less than 5 hours) and $450 (if it takes more than 5).

In a nutshell this service includes:
1. Cleaning
2. Action Regulation
3. Basic Repairs
4. Hammer Shaping & Maintenance
5. Case Touch Up
6. Tuning & Voicing

I recently bought an upright to do my teaching on and documented most of the process. Below are lots of pictures and concise descriptions of the normal steps I take when refurbishing an upright.

I begin by taking the piano apart. This means taking off all the case parts and removing the action and keys before vacuuming and cleaning the interior of the piano.

upright piano cleaning

I usually find mostly dust and dirt from years of use, but there have also been pencils, stickers, magazines, toys, pictures, letters, coins, and sometimes even dead rodents! (Eww) Here I found dirt and a comb… Removing dirt and foreign objects helps avoid keys sticking and making clicking noises. There have been many times I’ve opened up a piano to fix a sticking key and it is just a piece of junk stuck between two keys.

piano cleaning 1

piano cleaning

Next I clean the strings and the keys. The bass strings in pianos are steel wire wound with brass. When dust and dirt gets stuck between the coils of the wound strings, it inhibits its vibration and decreases the quality of sound (makes them sound “tubby”). Cleaning the strings not only makes them look better, but makes them sound better too.

I clean the ivory or plastic keytops, then sand the sides of the keys if they are dirty.The sides of the keys are wood and as they are played over the years they collect dirt and oil from hundreds of hours of playing. They look a lot better and are cleaner when I’m done!

sanding piano keys

I now move from the keys to the hammers themselves. The felt hammers are what actually initiate the sound coming from your piano, so their condition makes a huge difference in your piano’s tone. After years of playing, the felt hammers will develop grooves where they strike the string, and eventually even flatten out from their original rounded shape. Using sandpaper I carefully take off layers of felt until the original rounded shape of the hammer is restored. This changes the surface area that comes into contact with the string and improves the quality of tone and the length of sustain. You can read more on this process in a previous post.

This is a large part of the job and can easily take two hours or more if there is a lot of wear on the hammers.

hammer reshaping

Next I ease and space the keys. Piano keys sit on a “balance rail pin” (the middle of the teeter-totter), and the “front rail pin.” The wood and felt around either metal pin can get tight and/or dirty which adds friction and slows down the piano action, making it harder to play the key and slower to return to place when released. If the keys have become wobbly, the felt might be worn out. If it has to be replaced, I consider it a separate job.

piano key easing

I also straighten and space the keys evenly so there is no gaps between keys or keys rubbing together.

Piano key spacing

The keys get still more attention! They have to be carefully leveled so each is at the exact same height, and the the “key dip” (how far the key depresses before stopping) has to be set. These are set by putting paper and cardboard punchings of different thicknesses under the key at the balance rail and front rail.

You can see some of these keys (below) need to be raised a little. Having all the keys level and responding the same when playing is essential for real control when playing the piano.

piano key leveling

I finally move to the back of the key and adjust the “capstans,” an adjustable metal post which connects the key to the main part of the piano action (whippen and hammer). If this metal post is too low, the hammer will not begin to move right away when the key is depressed, giving a sloppy feel to the action. If the capstan is too high, it will not let all the moving parts reset when the key is let go, and it won’t be ready to play again on the next depression of the key. This makes a huge different on how your piano action feels.

adjusting capstans

Next I set “let-off.” An essential part of the piano’s action is the “escapement mechanism.” When a key is depressed, it throws the hammer forward towards the string. At the last millisecond, the “jack,” which pushes the hammer forward, stops pushing so that it flies freely towards the string and can bounce off. The string can then vibrate freely. If the jack trips too late, it will push the hard felt hammer right into the string, keeping it from vibrating at all. You will get just a “blat.” No note. It’s like pushing your finger against a guitar string. If the jack trips too soon, the hammer will never reach the string when you play the note softly. Setting the let-off gives you much more dynamic control of your piano.

setting let off

The last part of regulating the action is setting the “hammer checking.” I regulate how far the hammer is able to bounce back when the note is struck. If it bounces too far back, the note will not repeat quickly. If set too close, it could block the hammer against the string on a strong blow.

Each “backcheck” is on a metal wire that has to be bent to the correct position.

Regulate backchecks

These hammers are all checking evenly and at the correct distance.

regulat checking

At this point, the piano plays well and I will spend some time on the outside of the piano. I first clean the case parts, then touch up any small chips or scratches that I can. (This is basic touch up. There are several men in Portland that do piano case repair full time. I do small touch up, and not major miracles. The bench in the picture below had been chewed on by a dog. I made it look better, but not perfect.)

case touch up

I will touch up the wood finish on the bench as well as tighten the leg bolts. I also polish any brass pedals, locks, keyholes and knobs that can be shined up.

polish piano brass 2

When the piano case and bench look their best, I finally get to tune the piano! This includes a pitch raise if necessary (if the piano hasn’t been tuned for a long time or has been through drastic climate changes.)

piano tuning

After the piano is finely tuned, I voice the hammers so each produces the same quality of tone. Often some notes will stick out as really bright and noisy, or dull and soft compared to the notes around them. Through a combination of filing and needling different areas of the felt hammer, I even out the tone production throughout the keyboard.

Last I will regulate the pedals (fixing any squeak problems) and put the case parts back on the piano. I’m finally finished. I’m impressed if you made it to this point in this blog post!
This long process will look a little different on every piano I work on, and will include necessary repairs specific to the instrument (broken or missing strings, gluing loose parts etc.).

completed piano

This Complete Upright Piano Service Package usually takes about 6 hours for a well-used, but quality piano. Doing all this work in one visit saves me a lot of time in dismantling the piano and travel, and gives you as the customer more service for your money! If these various jobs were done individually, most piano technicians would charge well over $1,000.

If you know your piano needs a good bit of work, or if it has been getting a lot of use and hasn’t been worked over for a long time, this service could be very beneficial for your piano. Give me a call and I would be happy to schedule a day to come out and give your piano the deluxe treatment.

Please note that this service is for upright pianos. I am not currently offering this type of one-visit service for grands.

Kawai Upright Pianos

While working with pianos in the Portland area I’ve had the opportunity to work with all three of the piano dealers in town, Classic Pianos, Michelle’s Pianos, Portland Piano Company. One of the great things about working with dealers is the opportunity to really get to know and understand the different piano builders. I’ve now worked with new Yamaha, Steinway (Boston and Essex as well), Grotrian, Young Chang, Bosendorfer, Mason & Hamlin, Fazioli, and Kawai pianos through dealers. At the dealer I see them right “out of the box” from the factory. I get a chance to work with enough of them together I get to learn each piano’s strengths, weaknesses, and eccentricities.

A K15, or "Hobbit Piano"

A K15, or “Hobbit Piano”

Portland Piano Company has been representing Kawai now for about a year so I’ve been able to work with a lot of Kawai pianos! Here are some of my observations on these excellent pianos.
Kawai is a Japanese company that has been making fine pianos since 1927. They are based in Hamamatsu, Japan. Most of their pianos are made there, but they do build some of their more affordable models in Indonesia. Kawai has always been known for their innovative approach to piano building, specifically in the material they use for parts in their instruments.

They have a wide variety of instruments to choose from. On the smaller end they offer a 44″ tall Indonesian-made upright and on the other end of the spectrum they offer the Shigeru Kawai concert grand, a beautiful 9’1″, 1100lb piano handcrafted in Japan. Kawai makes a piano for every space and price range.

Kawai K-200

Kawai K-200

Kawai’s smaller model uprights include the K-15 (I call it a hobbit piano), 506N (a sturdy piano with good wheels often used in schools), and the “professional models” K-200 and K-300. These are their entry level pianos with affordable price points. These pianos compare well with other pianos in their class. They tend to be mellow pianos (true of most Kawais in my opinion) with a responsive touch and pleasant tone. They are much gentler pianos than Yamaha’s equivalent, the T118, or their Cable-Nelson brand of pianos, and the action seems a little faster. The tone quality is clear, pleasant, and interesting but not aggressive. Steinway’s line of Essex pianos is priced similarly but I think the tone quality is better here in the Kawai. The Essex sound is very clear but almost boring. The bass range in these smaller Kawai uprights is not particularly strong, as in most short pianos.

 

k-400

Kawai makes even taller K-500’s and K-800’s but I haven’t had a chance to work with these yet.

Tuning stability is good and while the Yamaha professional uprights are easier to tune than Kawais, I don’t think either has the edge when it comes to the stability and longevity of a good tuning.

New pianos will need to be tuned at least twice a year for the first year or two, and then every 6-12 months after that.

Visually and aesthetically, the Kawai is classic and has nice lines. The polished ebony finish is the lowest priced finish, and is durable and never goes out of style. It shows fingerprints, but is easy to clean and maintain. They also offer satin black, satin mahogany and walnut and a white polish finish on some of their models.

In summary here are my simple pros and cons for the Kawai uprights in order of importance.
Pros:
1. Good value for price.
2. Fast and responsive touch.
3. Solid, mellow, and interesting tone.
4. Easy to play and control.
5. Good tuning stability.
6. Consistent construction means very few problems/sticking keys.

Cons:
1. Mellow tone makes it hard to get huge sound when needed.
2. Harder to tune than some pianos.
3. That’s all I can think of…

“What is a Piano”

I’m posting a link here to a blog post over on Portland Piano Company‘s website.
Here is a teaser quote from their post “What is a Piano?” You can read their article here.

“The two main requirements of a piano action are that it must multiply the power of a person’s fingers to strike the strings and the hammer must fall back off the string slightly after the strike so that it does not mute the string. Otherwise, the instrument would be called a pianomuffle instead of a pianoforte. ”

What is a piano

The Finest Pianos in the World

In preparation for Portland Piano Company’s Selections Sale, I have been tuning some of their finest European handmade pianos. The Fazioli piano came on the piano scene in 1981 with the goal of making the best piano in the world. Portland Piano Company is lucky to have the best selection of their pianos in America right now! They aren’t cheap, but they are beautiful and luxurious in every sense of the word.
Handmade in Italy, every step of the crafting process is carefully controlled by the small company to keep their quality the very highest. The visual beauty of the instrument is matched by the full and rich chocolaty sound produced by these wonderful pianos.
It’s a piano tuner’s dream to work on one these, and I got to tune two here in one day!
Fazioli

Tuning for a Two-Piano Concert

I had the privilege to tune one of Portland Piano Company’s rental pianos for Portland’s Monday Musical Club this week. Portland’s Monday Musical Club puts on concerts to raise money to give out in scholarships through the year (I received one of these scholarships myself as a teenager).
Their concert this week was a program of two piano music, so they brought in an additional Steinway B to match Reedwood Friends Church’s own piano.
My job was to tune the rental piano as soon as it arrived so it would be ready for their concert at 1:00.
After the piano was delivered at 10:00, I first checked the “home piano” and found out it was 7 cents (7/100 of a pitch) flat. And since these pianos were going to be played together, I had to tune the rental piano 7 cents flat as well to match the “out of tuneness” of the piano already in place. I touched up the unisons on the church’s piano and was on my way at 11:30. Wish I could have stayed for the concert at 1:00!

Two 6' 10 1/2", 760lb Steinway B Grand Pianos

Two 6′ 10 1/2″, 760lb Steinway B Grand Pianos