Thanks to all again,

SparkyMcbiff,

Thanks for your support. I welcome all kinds of opinions and voices. The more I think about it, the more I feel that I am part of the problem because I could have done something at the moment. I did not take actions to make things better immediately, so all critics have their points.

Andrew,

Thanks so much for sharing your experience. Now I know I am not "alone" in this situation. Although I really don't think I can afford (or am allowed) to do a major installation like what you did. I will keep exploring the options if the negotiation with her does not go anywhere.

Boxijie,

I am not trading it in for another digital, but I am thinking maybe I should just get a "silent piano", like Yamaha U1 Silent if I end up having to spend too much money in sound proofing. I would be very sad to let my U3 go, and I am sure I will eat up some costs of my U3 too.

Aliwally,

Thanks again for your support. You have been a great help in everything. It's interesting to know that we live in the same area too. Maybe at some point in the future, we can connect and have some musical exchange. I will probably contact you if I need to move (that idea came up today - not only just the piano issues).

Pianolance,

Thanks for your kind words. I still have long way to go, both in English and in piano playing. Thanks for your Halloween Joke and Lang Lang example. I can tell you that Asian people are more tolerant in "noises" because in most Asian cities, there are too many people in such a small area. On the other hand, that means we are probably making noises of volume that we are not aware of. I think I misjudged the piano volume and the effectiveness of the sound proofing measures in my situation.

Rocket88,

I certainly don't want to drive anyone crazy by my not-so-good piano skills, or just simply unwanted noises. I will see what I can do after discussing this with her over the weekend.

Will keep everyone here posted - I probably need to start another thread to update the development of the episode.

You can actually add a MIDI silent device to ANY piano for about 2-3,000 dollars. Not every dealer knows how to do it though. Try to ask around and see who is able to do the job and how much they want....

I took a look at WhisperRoom's site and I would guess for someone who is handy, a similar room could be constructed for a fraction of the cost. I would take a good hard look at one in person and steal some ideas.


Go to images 101, 102 and 103 You won't see that number until you click on a photo and take a look.

Good Morning PW & Midlife,

Thank you and feel free to contact me anytime. My last thoughts on this situation, the main problem is the action I would assume. The digital just does not do it for you, the Yamaha U1 Silent would be a good option and probably cheaper than moving, as the market is not good right now.

At least with the U1 Silent, you will maintain your touch for an acoustic, and the new U1 has the Yamaha CFIII samples. It really sounds great from reviews I have read. I would not either bother with a used Silent or try to get one installed into your piano. The new U1 Silent is miles above the older versions, you will not need the digital anymore, you will have the best of both worlds. Also you will have the manufacture warranty for any problems which is good when you buy anything with electronics. I would bite the bullet and get the U1, U3, or YUS1 Silent.

If you move you might run into the same problems whether it be a house or condo. The plus side to moving into a house is you can buy a Grand Piano. So it will be costly either way you look at but the cheaper way I would go right now with the market the way it is.

When I lived in Japan, I did notice that a few professional pianists had the Yamaha Silent pianos in their apartments which where very small but expensive in Tokyo. They seem to be only concerned with being able to practice whenever they wanted. Regarding touch from Chris Veneables site:

"The touch on the uprights is very slightly less responsive, as the same action is regulated for earlier set-off (point when hammer is no longer driven by the action) to prevent damage to the hammer from the obstruction. This is a very subtle difference, but we must mention it. The grand piano action features a 'quick-escape' mechanism which self regulates the set-off when in Silent mode. Therefore, when in acoustic mode, the touch on the grand models is totally standard."

So go for the Silent Grand, move that Dining Room table out of there. The more I read your post and the problems that people have it might be wise for me to buy a Silent Piano too.

Yamaha is always making improvments, I just read on their American site that the U1SG has the quick-escape mechanism, it is listed for all U Series Silents. I just emailed Yamaha to get verification of that the quick escape mechanism is on uprights as well as grands.

Aliwally,

Actually I was researching the "Silent Piano" earlier here on PW but did not find something extremely useful. Then I went to the music store and talked to the salesman. He told me that Silent Pianos are not popular at all in the US (at least not in our area.) They had no stocks there for me to play. Their argument is that "Silent Piano", like Yamaha U1 Silent, is significantly more expensive than regular U1. Buyers can easily buy a regular U1 PLUS a decent digital piano for less money. As a salesman, he does not promote silent piano. They are much more popular in Europe and Asia - and the cost is not that much higher than regular U1.

I don't know how true his statement was - maybe he was just lying to me and did the sales talk.

Now back to my own U3, I would not have purchased this used U3 if I did not like the sound, or if I did not think it's a great deal. It really is a fantastic piano. I even installed the climate control system on the piano to keep it humidified all year round. I don't think I will return the piano to the store - maybe just sell it on my own if I have to.

The Silent piano began selling in America again from Yamaha about 3-5 years ago from what I remember. It was not even on the market in the US 10 years ago.

Bechstein has a similar system called the Vario. I don't know how it compares to Yamaha's silent system.

It does sound nice in reality, the fact that you are sitting in front of a real piano with headphones on, and the action is firmer than a digital I think I would practice more than sitting at my digital. I can only bare about an hour a day on my digital, I think because the action bores me after an hour, the sound is fine.

If you talked to Jordan Kitts, I heard the same story. Dan at Downtown Piano Works has sold a few of them, from what I remember talking to him. You can probably haggle the price on those because they don't sell them as much, especially if one is sitting in one of the Kitts stores. Since they got rid of a few stores things are a little tighter now.

Midlife,

My point was not to criticise you or to clear the furniture for yet another PW barn dance, but to state a fact that seemed lost in all the enabling: you annoyed your neighbor by playing a 500 pound musical contrivance 5 feet above her head as she sits in her living room . . .

Any jerk can continue playing while the neighbor resolutely bangs on her ceiling. I never thought you were that jerk, nor do I think your neighbor is best charachterized as a bitter, unemployed shut-in with pronounced delusions of grandeur resulting from her condo presidentcy. However cult-think wants to paint her, we are still hearing only one side of the story. Your side.

It also helps that a few respondents realized the practical and legal differences between owning a condo and a house . . while you have rights, they do not extend into your neighbor's living room . . . while this point is often lost on jerks and emotional half-wits, it does not seem lost on you, nor does the idea that your rights, when they encroach on your neighbors', are not as important as your responsibilities . . .


Mike

Hello Mike,

Absolutely. You are right about it. If I am only insisting on my "rights", I would not even posted anything here asking for advice because it would be too easy or too "cut-throat", which is not my style at all.

I definitely should hear from her side before I go any further.

Thanks for your input. I truly appreciate it.

Mid-Life the neighbor I wrote about told me he is senstivie to noise and believe it or not he taught at a music school, plus there was construction going on nearby. He even wanted me to go around to the construction site and ask them to start at 12PM instead of 7:30AM - I thought he was kidding, he wasn't and no way was I going to do what he asked. NYC isn't the quietest city on the planet and I don't think anything would have satisfied him - as the policeman said "he should live on a desert island."

I agree with the other posters who suggested you have a friendly talk with your neighbor but from what you've written it probably won't help much. With some people it's "my way or the highway", can't hurt to try, you might be pleasantly surprised and both of you will come to an agreement. The management probably feels it's between you and your neighbor, so I wouldn't wait for them to get involved. It's not easy to find a solution. I wonder, do you know someone on the board? If you do, the two of you could arrange a meeting with your neighbor and over coffee try to find a way so that each of you are happy.

Keep making beautiful music.

"It's so hard to be nice--- when you're not," as one of my friends pointedly told me.

I'm reminded of a scene from a film biography of Beethoven's life. Might have been "Immortal Beloved," though I could be wrong about the title. An elderly woman, one of his close neighbors, who lived in an airless hole without even a window, used to keep her door open a crack so she could hear the master at work (and breathe air).

She did not complain about the "noise." As she told one of her friends, "I'm the envy of all Vienna."

That reminds me of a bumper sticker some of my jazz musician friends used to have:

"Use an accordion, go to prison" ;-)

Better yet, get a sense of what she's doing rhythmically, and improvise along with her.... ;-)

People who expect to be somewhat noisy should make a point of trying to live in places where everyone will not hear every peep they make. Those that are overly sensitive to other peoples' noise or who are just easily irritated also have some responsibility to make a point of secluding themselves from noise and not automatically expect everyone else to drop everything and tip toe around them. It goes both ways. I realize that in some real estate markets people may not have as many choices as others but I would have to say that personally I could never live somewhere that dictated in writing that I was not allowed to vacuum after 6pm on weekends. I wish I had more practical advice.

All right, I'll respond to Mike Carr's lovely post above. Falling into his category of "jerks and emotional half-wits" seems to allow me to do so, as apparently I do not have the intelligence to restrain myself.

Yes, Midlife's rights (or anyone else's) do not "extend into your neighbor's living room," but neither do the neighbor's rights extend into Midlife's living room. If Midlife is playing at reasonable hours and obeying condo rules, Midlife can play his piano, and as far as I am concerned there is no other side to the story. Reasonable hours of playing and obedience to condo rules is all that one's neighbors can demand.

There comes a point in time when interests are not reconcilable. Midlife wants to play the piano, and his neighbor wants him not to play his piano. If a happy compromise cannot be reached, someone has to win on this one, and someone has to lose. Given that the neighbor wants to stop Midlife from doing something in his own apartment that Midlife seems to have a property right to do, it seems to me that Midlife's interests prevail, with the provisos mentioned above.

It would be nice to know when the downstairs neighbor is out. Like if she goes to church Sunday mornings from 9 to 11, etc. Then these open times could be used to play away.

This reminds me of a joke,

"Last night my neighbor pounded on my door a 2:30 am! Can you believe it? Two thirty! Luckily I was up anyway playing my bagpipes..."

OT, but I just love bagpipes!! (but i don't know how to play them...)

>sound-absorbing egg carton

Just FYI, egg carton does not absorb anything nor does it keep sound from going through. Maybe it scatters the sound a bit in the high frequencies, but for that curtains look a lot better .

If you want to prevent the sound to reach the wall, you need something heavy (a second wall for example). If you want the sound to be absorbed, you need some sound absorbing material.

Thanks Rank Piano Amateur for your encouragement.

Stanza,

She is a jewish - nice try though.

Wouter79,

Apparently the sound proofing measures did not work for her. It does make quite a bit difference from my end, but I am right in front of the piano so it probably doesn't matter.

I will explore further options after talking to her this weekend.

Midlife, thanks for keeping us up-to-date. I hope thing work out for you. Keep making beautiful music.

Anyone know about those earphones from Bose (I think)?

They are suppose to filter out outside noise?

Maybe she would enjoy using them to listen to whatever while you play.

Just another thought/suggestion before you talk with her this weekend.

Noise canceling earphones only work for incoherent noise sources (white or pink noise, etc) not coherent tones.

However, I also may suggest a gift to her of standard closed-back earphones attached to her TV.

Ultimately the best option is to add more sound-isolation in your walls and floors. I concur with above about acoustic foam which does very little to block (isolate) sound. Acoustic foam may do well to make your room sound better though.

If you can't change your walls/floors you could always buy a temporary room within a room (much like some drummers use to isolate themselves). Such as sold by this company:

http://www.whisperroom.com

I suspect you'd have to be at wits end to have something like this sitting in your living room though... You might get most of the benefits however by simply making a floating floor (that is dense but has space between it and the floor). I.e. an acoustically isolated dense platform. A good carpenter should be able to build something that isn't altogether unattractive. This itself could greatly reduce the transfer of acoustic energy to your neighbor below.

Best of luck,
Ryan

This is not the case. Noise canceling earphones will suppress any ambient sound by 20 or 25 dB. These units do a remarkable job of pushing ambient sound into the deep background but unless the sound is well below 60dB it will not be eliminated altogether.

However, I can't imagine the downstairs neighbor being enthralled by the suggestion of buying a $200 pair of headphones to wear while the upstairs neighbor is playing. Somehow, I just can't see it happening...

Still, as our own Steven remarked, "It is easier to wear slippers than to carpet the world."

Simple ear plugs will block most of the noise. I wear a pair of ear protectors that look like over the ear headphones. They were very inexpensive, $3 at Harbor Freight Tool Store when I'm in my shop as I run the shop vac and the power mitre saw (which are both very loud power tools), it effectively blocks out an unbelievable amount of sound. They work so well that I have to shout at my daughter (who is also wearing the same ear protectors) and she has to shout back at me to be heard while wearing the ear protection. They're not the most pleasant thing to wear as you can feel them on your head and they can get sweaty during hot weather, but they work amazingly well. It makes working with the power tools much more relaxing. Here is a link: http://www.harborfreight.com/industrial-ear-muffs-43768.html

We had one of those once. Not all that great at attenuating sound, and a heck of a white elephant when you have to get rid of it.....

Hi Midlife - how are things going, have you spoken with your neighbor?

Keep making beautiful music.

Yeah, it is pretty quiet lately. I hope he is okay. This situation can be depressing. Hope to hear from you soon Midlife.

One could just as easily say the downstairs neighbor wants to "do" sitting in her apartment without hearing a piano.

Thanks everyone - I do have a recent development about this whole thing. I talked to her today! (Applause everyone??)

I will start another thread because it's pretty good story...

Also, if any of you knows how to link this thread to the new one, please help me out.

Many thanks!