Thanks MetalMan, I'll have to try that.

I'd like to see the Petrof-Monsoon bridge. It states that the bridge pins are replaced by Stainless Steel Screws.

Those were concerns, not reality.

ddf

No problem at all.
Here you are (EuroPiano, April-June 2011, p.10):



"Bridge pins are replaced with small stainless steel screws (imbus). The screws are lighter than the pins used before making the bridge more efficient in frequency transmission to the sound board."

"It [the PETROF P 237 Monsoon experimental prototype with steel frame] also has special bridge pins, which in fact are not pins but screws with conical heads that allow the normal angled seating of the strings, although the "pins" stand vertical to the bridge surface."

I would bet that is just another gimmick that does not make an audible difference.

The most beautiful shape of a grand piano frame - simply for aesthetics sake - may be a barless design. Despite of any notable aspects of scaling, statics, choice of material, engineering and production technology, it´s the stunning harp-like resp. harpsichord-like looks of the early fortepianos what makes it so intriguing.

I prefer to judge instruments by how they sound, not how they look.

Fine for you.

BDB, with all due respect a completely dispensable comment.

They look like a buzz waiting to a day after tuning. Are the (imbus) screws adjustable? Do they allow for more or for less down bearing? Wonder if this will make it to USA?

Del, understood from your earlier post! Looking forward to hearing about someone taking you up on $200K for a custom flat strung instrument, assuming I read your earlier posts correctly. If I had the money....in the meantime, my SF10 (complete with Renner Blue hammers, not my choice!) will have to do. I was very fortunate to have a technician spend a lot of time with them (apparently they took in the order of 80 odd pokes each with a needle to tone them down).

My original post asked how a flatstrung piano would look and sound - comprehensively answered - but the next question was who would like one. To answer that we may need another thread with a different slant, but can we clarify which musicians might find it appealing?

To summarise the pianos would sound and look elegant. They would sound well balanced, smooth, warm and clear. The two versions mentioned were 200 cm (6' 7") and 250 cm (8' 2 1/2"). It would certainly be different from any other piano in the showroom.

Possible customers are pianists who want instruments with a "room sized" sound to play at home, soloists, accompanists and chamber musicians?

It would certainly appeal to the accompanist who was the catalyst for this thread. She complains about modern pianos drowning out singers. She has a 1906 Blüthner.

Who do you think would go for such pianos?

The people who have expressed interest in the pianos I’m building fall very roughly into two seemingly disparate groups. The first seems logical; pianists with a primary interest in music written before the advent of the big, powerful “modern” piano. These pianos—either the semi-overstrung version or a flat-strung version—would have a sound much closer to the mid-19th century instruments. Not as light as that of the all-wood fortepiano but not as powerful as the modern overstrung piano either. With the planned very light (by modern standards) hammers the action response will be close, though not identical, to instruments of the same era; light and quick with a moderately shorter keystroke than is common with today’s big, heavy actions.

The other group has kind of surprised me. I’ve had several primarily jazz pianists enquire about them and show some interest in them. Sadly, most jazz pianists can’t afford what these pianos will probably have to sell for.

ddf

This makes complete sense to me, and it is the reason I'm so interested in this type of sound.

The slight reduction in power can allow the piano to be voiced so that the actual pitch of each note as well as each note in a texture, is more clearly defined and perceived. This as opposed to the sound of a powerful modern piano where the percussive content of each note predominates such that the pianist or listener has to supply, from memory, a fair amount of the missing pitch content.

When a jazz pianist plays an improvised set of chord changes, the voice leading can be quite unexpected, unusual, dissonant,etc. Improvising with a piano like we are talking about, allows the pianist to actually play a "duet" with the instrument. He can hear both the pitches being produced, and, for me this is a real biggy, he can clearly discern and play with the upper partial content of the pitch(the upper partials are where dissonant jazz chords coincident partial reside). Further, when the root is only implied, not spoken, as is often the case in jazz, the pitch content of the tones must be crystal clear...percussive-ness obscures this clarity.

For a classical pianist, because the changes are known and practiced many many times, the sound of those chord changes as well as voice leadings are contained in musical memory. It is a memory which is so practiced that it can supply both the missing pitch content and characteristic voice leadings itself without actually clearly hearing it.

This is precisely the reason why, for me, the "complex" sound(as people like to refer to it)that people attribute to "steinway" actually thwarts my musical ear. It is a sound that masks pitch and favor of power.

...My take anyway...

Jim Ialeggio