Ori,
It was no surprise to any of us that know you and Rebecca that your new place of business is nothing less than MAJESTIC!! The pianos, the ambiance and the location are all befitting of the type of business you run. May you have many years of success and happiness there, bringing the joy of piano music to all that walk through your doors. I enjoyed myself very much at the "Event" on Sunday.....you've come a long way from the evening three years ago when I walked into your living room to meet, for the first time, the Estonia of my dreams. To this day I continue to be amazed at the the incredible beauty of that instrument. I had the pleasure of speaking at length with Dr. Indrek Laul and his wife at the party. What wonderful people they are.....and his rendition of Gershwin on that Bosie Imperial was spectacular!!! I thanked them for what they've done to "recreate" the Estonia, and make it a pianist's piano, while keeping it a tremendous value. Anyway, thanks again to you and Rebecca for a really nice day. I, too, look forward to speaking with you more.
Dan

Interesting tidbits that I learned last weekend while talking with the owners/representatives there:

The first one I'll share was rather embarassing, but I guess it is funny in the end. And it needs to be shared...

I often hear it called, and call it, a Steingraeber piano, rather than Steingraeber and Sohne. So I asked Udo who might this Sohne person be. Oh, he is not old enough to be in the business yet, he answers.
'????'
Oh, says I, thinking there was a language difference in understanding what I was asking. I didn't mean your 'son' I meant the Sohne in the logo. Smiling (I don't know how he could keep a straight face) he correctly pronounces Sohne as Son-he, or something similar, and says that Sohne is German for Son.
I wonder how red I got?
Who knew that? Did you? So it is Steingraeber and Son!

Indrek met his wife, who also is a concert pianist, when she came in to check out the Estonia line. They now have two angelic light blond sons. Indrek travels giving concerts and Triian will be playing for the Queen of Estonia soon!

Christian Bluthner stands out in a crowd. He is 6'6"! He has some rather colorful descriptions of pianos. Ask him sometime how a piano can be described as a 'juicy' orange.

You know those extra low keys that are on a Bose Imperial? During a discussion, I mentioned to Bose Eric that I thought that they would throw me off balance while playing. Apparently they are more for resonance than for playing (correct me Eric if I am saying this incorrectly). At one time they used a cover for them similar to an extended cheek block. It went up and down but some owners tried to close the fallboard cover without first closing the low key cover - so they did away with it. The fallboard name appears where it should be - centering over middle C

Larry Fine plays a beautiful Brahms 118-2.

PW Frank hates Florida weather. I wonder how soon it will take for him to come back to live in NE!

Ori doesn't know how to pronounce Party. Apparently neither do I!!!

Thank you Ori and Rebecca for inviting us to your new place. Sam (the blond playing the Bluthner - Khachaturian's Toccata) thanks you for letting him play. He was excited to meet Christian Bluthner. I remember when we first came to visit (3 years ago?) and others told us to be prepared to play for hours. I didn't know what that meant. We left after 4 hours. You even offered to feed us. This didn't happen just once. In fact, on one trip, when we were trying to make a final decision on a Bluthner, you saw that we were hesitant and told us to go away and think about it. This is a little different than the time at another piano store when the hovering salesman asked if we were going to buy anything that day. I also remember Sam playing a Bluthner in your living room while we spent a long time talking about boats. Are you going to put a little boat in the pond in back?

Bluthner - Model 4 - rosewood

smh,

I had no idea that you were a PW member!!!
Thank you and your family for coming!

Sam had become a fantastic player.
It's very rewarding to see a student that has one of our pianos reaching such a level a few years later.
Yes, of course, his talent is more important than the piano, and the teacher has much to do with it as well...but I'd like to think that playing for the past few years on your gorgeous Bluthner also played a role in his musical development and the high level he achieved.


The pond in the back of our building, by the way, was created by damning a stream in 1905. The family who owned the property at that time, and who owned it until the time I purchased it, was in the ice business...and used it to harvest ice.
At winter time it’s all frozen, and I’m told there was a time when ice skaters were welcome to use it 9not anymore, unfortunately).

Now, it's like a forgotten piece of nature preserve right outside of our windows.

The pond and its surroundings has nice size fish, snapping turtles, geese, ducks, Blue Herons, Egrets, and other wild life. there is a whole family of woodchucks as well, and looking at these, wondering calmly on the grass, through the windows just a few feet away, provides for a very peaceful setting.


The problem with getting a little boat on the pond, is that our customers would probably be too busy fishing rather than looking at pianos. So no boat in the plans!

NO FISHING !!!!

that is one party I would have loved to have attended. What an event! and congratulations Ori.

What a beautiful piano showroom!! The party looks like a grand soriee!! Thanks for the info on the pond. My only concern is that the pond doesn't flood or rise. Congrats on the store, Ori!!

The showroom is about 10' above sea (pond) level, should be safe :-)

You're right though, it was a great time.

ORI---GREAT!!!! Let me know when I can try it out!!!

Remember "The Sixth Sense" with Bruce Willis? The same director made a movie called 'The Happening', I didn't see it but here's a quick synosis from IMDB:

"A woman walks her dog and a breeze begins to blow. A traffic cop (Don Castro) walking through a traffic jam stops and comments to a taxi driver about the chilly weather. Suddenly everyone stops in their tracks, and the dog runs across the road after his leash drops to the ground, leading us back to the cop who is now standing still in front of the cab. A gunshot rings out and he drops to the ground. As blood spurts from a bullet wound on his forehead, the taxi driver gets out, walks over to the dead cop, picks up the gun from beside the body and shoots himself in the forehead as well. A woman in high heels steps off the sidewalk, picks up the gun again and we hear another gunshot."

Ori,
All the best to you and Rebecca. Your new showroom is too spectacular for words. I recently completed my graduate studies and haven't had a chance to check out PW since this past spring. What a surprise to see all the great new things going on since then. It's wonderful to see how many people showed up. I'm sure everyone had a blast. I wish I could have been there.
Best regards,
Roger

I've posted 3 10-minutes videos on YouTube:

Part1:


Part2:


Part3:


Enjoy!

Wow...The who's who of the Piano World!

ORI- Congratulations on the new store and good selling!
Great looking store, next time curb the drinking for some of those celebrities.

Thanks Jeff!

Great camera work!
I only wish I had a darker color shirt with the Imperial in the background (no, I didn't gain 30 pounds that night, really!).

Stupidly, I didn't set up microphones to record it all, but oh well, I guess we'll do it next time!

Thank you all for your comments and congratulations.

Ori

Wow.

I see that this thread is no longer a sticky, and will disappear soon...
So I just wanted to thank all of you again for the wonderful comments, pictures, videos and company!

See you next time!

Ori

Ori, there was no doubt in my mind that your new facility would be a class act. All of the pictures and videos have not only proved my assumptions to be correct, but have exceeded my imagination!

Best of luck and much success.

Ken