Hi all,
Well, I'm looking at some grands tomorrow - all higher end models (2A and up in Fine, I think). One has new legal ivory keys. So, how do ivory keys compare with the usual thing? How much of a premium do they command in terms of cost? Are there any issues with maintenance?

Just because those ivory keys may be "legal" does not mean buying them is ethical.
Legal or not, buying ivory feeds demand.
Demand makes men pick up guns to get more ivory.

You have to decide.

Personally I love the feel of real ivory keys and struggle with the ethics of getting them for my piano.

There are serious maintenance issues with ivory. It is prone to chipping, discoloration, warping, and coming unglued.

In general, I am not a fan of old ivory, even when it is in pristine condition. It always feels a bit dry and slippery.
In terms of natural key surfaces, legal ivory is very nice. It is essentially new ivory. It is ivory key tops and fronts ( sometimes ) newly cut from real ivory that has been documented with Food and Wildlife as pre-ban. The interesting thing about legal ivory, is that it feels more like the new synthetic key surfaces than it does like the old ivory.
Mammoth tusk ivory is also available. It is more coarse than the legal ivory, and feels a bit "cooler" temperature wise. It has a bit more grey in color. This is the most fun key surface to have. Be the first on your block to have a piano made with Woolly Mammoth!
You can also get keys made from cow bone. I am not a fan of this key surface and much prefer the feel of modern synthetic key covers.

"You can also get keys made from cow bone".

Am I the only one here who has a bit of a problem in playing over a skeleton?

Ok, I also would like a natural sponge but never could persuade myself to divide my bath tub with a dead animal, so perhaps I am in the minority here...

NE-GG, does anyone offer the option of wood? At the end once upon a time the sharps were made of ebony, so what impedes the whites to be made of wood too?

Wood tends to be too soft and wears to quickly. Harder woods have more mineral content, so they tend to be darker.

Besides, wood is tree skeleton!

Hmm...one could play the Fossils section of Carnival of the Animals on Woolly Mammoth keys, I think. I'll let everyone know what I thought of the legal ivory keys.

But with my own 127-year-old piano with original ivory keys: there is only the tiniest chip on one note, no ivories are warped, and none are unglued.
There is a touch of discolouration; though I understand that keeping the fallboard open tends to prevent this - mine has always been closed.

Or maybe spring for Sabre-tooth Tiger teeth keycovers, and play ON Fossils of Carnivorous Animals...

"Besides, wood is tree skeleton!"

I love that! .

I know of many people who furnished their homes (chairs, tables) with skeletons made of wood, but of only one who furnished a room with skeletons made of bones and his name was Heinrich Himmler... (bbbrrrrr.....)

The ivory on my 70 year old piano is a lovely, ivory white, and has only one small chip on one key. I love the feel of it. It's cooler. It has a texture. My first piano teacher's much admired old piano had ivory keys and when I touched the keys on this one I felt I'd come home.

I hate ivory...because it's harder to play on, not because I give a damn about elephants. It's dry and slippery. It also doesn't last.

Some people claim to prefer ivory, but I think that's largely due to the mystique of being illegal and due to that tired old myth of Incontrovertible Old-Timey Superiority.

Give me plastic any day.

Don
Kansas City

...and don't get me started about ebony!

Dry and slippery? I've seen more plastic that's slippery than ivory. I need to put new keytops on my old, old upright. If I could afford the legal ivory I would use it (by the way, the elephants that gave up that ivory died decades ago). Plastic keytops, with the possible exception of Vagias don't look right on antique pianos.

There is no 'mystique' coloring my observations on ivory.

Plastic, being less porous, is slippery.

Ivory is porous so it absorbs moisture. The texture of ivory makes for a smooth, silky feeling.

It is absolutely right for ivory to be banned, however I can't help but like the way it feels.

I regularly play on cow shinbone. It is better than plastic, but can have some pointy hard edges. It also has a speckled appearance, so can seem to be dirty.

what do they do with the ivory when the elephant died of natural causes?(non poaching)

Sell it as legal ivory and theoretically plough the profits back into maintaining elephant habitat.

They sell salvaged ivory keytops (for craftwork, scrimshaw etc.) on ebay all the time. You might find a good enough set to use if you kept checking for awhile.

I've installed cow bone. I prefer to call it Ox bone. Sounds better said that way.

Most chipped ivory is caused by my clients children and often the ivory is very thin from being played on for 90 years.
The best story I have been told by a customer is when his boy took his drum sticks and played the piano. 42 chipped keys!!!!!

Unfortunately elephants are still being slaughtered for the ivory. Perhaps not for pianos but mostly for Asian carvings.

you'll fit in nicely here

As usual, Whippenboy and I are in agreement. I just find that plastic does become slippery. The organ at church I play has rosewood naturals and pearwood sharps. They absorb the moisture and just have a quality feel to them. BTW, I would try to keep old ivories.

Also went with Ox Bone when rebuilding our Steinway console. My wife kind of fell in love with the feel after playing a concert on a piano with them. She's never been crazy about ivory, however. Probably one too many pso with yellowed, cracked, curled or chipped keytops.

Howard

My newer Yamaha irritates me with it's plastic slippery keys, while my older Knabe just feels glorious with it's non-slip ivory keys. One of these days when I settle on a new piano, no ethical issues will stop me from getting ivory keys. Excuse my bluntness, but give me a new piano and the choice between plastic and ivory and I'll pull the trigger myself on that big ol' gray keytop factory.
It's funny - but one of the countries that runs a nature preserve for the elephants (and was - if I remember - one of the countries who originally pushed for the ban) was begging, some years ago, to be allowed to sell the ivory they had gathered over the years from the elephant preserve to continue funding the preserve. Oh the irony....

I bet someone could come up with a plastic that imitates the feel of ivory pretty well for maybe $100-200 a set. The problem is that the plastic that we get costs $20 a set.

One could always sand plastic key tops so they would not be as slick. Removing that top layer, and getting down to the more porous plastic below would probably go a long way towards minimizing the difference in feel.

_________________________________________________

The German key covers cost more but are much better. Those cheap $20.00 sets are not very good. Ya know the ones I mean, the notes are on the tails of the tops so you don't get them mixed up.

If someone comes up with synthetic key cover that stays white and works well I will gladly pay $200.00 a set for material.

Yamaha has something now that works but they will not sell the material.

Shameful

"It's funny - but one of the countries that runs a nature preserve for the elephants (and was - if I remember - one of the countries who originally pushed for the ban) was begging, some years ago, to be allowed to sell the ivory they had gathered over the years from the elephant preserve to continue funding the preserve. Oh the irony...."

Oh the.. Ivory!

But seriously, this shows just how good the system works for everyone: elephants, local economies and piano players....
Just a couple of decades of elephant protection has largely eliminated the extinction danger, elephant numbers are increasingly rising - I think in some places are now reaching overpopulation - and in this way larger amounts of perfectly legal ivory from naturally deceased elephants is available to the market.
Nothing wrong in that, the problem was not the ivory per se, but the fact that elephants were endangered because of it.

On the contrary, the indiscriminate poaching, if not stopped, would have rapidly made new ivory unavailable even for those who - shockingly - do not care for the elephants.

cruiser wrote:[/b] Agreed.

I've been wondering for a while if Steinway has some proprietary plastic they use on their pianos. Is it the same cheap white plastic that is sold for replacements? I had the impression it was something more special. If there is something better out there, I'd sure like to find out what it is. Bone doesn't attract me at all.

Mammoth ivory is used for lots of things, believe it or not, but I haven't heard of it being used for piano keys.

Comparing the keytops of a Yamaha P22, Clavinova, and C3 I find that the P22 and the Clavinova are about the same (they become slippery and greasy), while the C3 was slightly better than those 2. Not perfect, it still became slippery and greasy, just not as fast. The dealer said the C3 had an improved keytop but in my opinion, it was not too different from the others. I have much more confidence playing my Knabe than most modern pianos with plastic, ivorite, or whatever gimmick they are trying out now.
If you talk to David Warther at the Warther Musuem, he sells complete sets of ivory keytops and can also reccomend a proffesional installer who is experienced with the process of replacing plastic with ivory.

And as for being ashamed of ivory keys: as a lover of classical music and classical instruments I would only be ashamed if I were to apply modern political views to my classical loves.

I've seen it named in the specifications of some very high end pianos.

Here's a source for a variety of keytop materials including legal ivory, wooly mammoth, and bone:

http://www.pianoandorgankeys.com/catalog/index.php?cid=1

Also mineral ivory (acrylic) and European acrylic. Problem is its hard to guess what you might like without playing some first.

Howard

I think that it is just the standard keytop for whatever manufacturer made the keyboard. When Pratt Read made their keyboards it was Pratt Read tops. Now I suppose it is Kluge. I do not notice that much difference.

I suspect many of you, if not all of you, are aware that the predominant material in ivory and in teeth and in bone is the same, hydroxyapatite (calcium phosphate). Hydroxyapatite accounts for > 90% of the suface material (enamel) of teeth (and tusks). Differences in texture may be due to other components in the tusk/tooth/bone. However, a tusk is just an external tooth.

So when I had all that expensive dental work done and told the dentist to keep the teeth, I lost out on a golden oppurtunity? Dang it.

Nonsense. A legally harvested elephant will not only provide ivory for keytops and such, it will also provde food for quite a few villagers. It's a resource and should be managed as such.

On the other hand, poachers should be shot.

I've played on various kinds of plastic keytops all my life including the new ones I had put on my Yamaha G7. I think they're called ivorite or something like that. They feel right to me, not slippery or anything. I occasionally apply some Yamaha 'Key Sparkle' that makes them feel great.

I don't really have a philosophical problem with these other legal materials but there is something about playing on dead animal parts that makes me a little queazy when I've played pianos with ivory keys. They always look a little shabby to me too, although the ones I've played just may not be maintained correctly.

Maybe it's just what you get used to over the years.

I guess if you're squeamish, then the idea of playing on "dead animals" can be a little frightening. I don't think there's much difference between ivory keys and eating a nice steak or pulling on a pair of leather shoes or getting money out of a leather wallet or eating jello or sushi. I suppose the main difference is that the elephant was scarce when the ban was enacted, but there are plenty of cows and chickens running around because we have farms for them, so the National Geographic Magazine can't make us feel sad for eating them.

There is also an allure to something that is "taboo".

But the country who wanted a lift on the ban for their circumstance had a point: all the elephants had "died of natural causes" so why not sell the ivory? Of course if an exception is made for them, human nature will find a way to make more elephants die of "natural causes" and then nobody will get exceptions.

It's a touchy issue and will touch different people in different ways. In the end, neither side can claim to be right definitively. But after you own an older grand with nice aged ivory keys, it's difficult to go back to plastic and it's clinical perfection.

But the country who wanted a lift on the ban for their circumstance had a point: all the elephants had "died of natural causes" so why not sell the ivory? Of course if an exception is made for them, human nature will find a way to make more elephants die of "natural causes" and then nobody will get exceptions.

why not cultured Ivory,like cultured Stone cultured Pearls..?

then there's Cuban cigars..some say there's nothing like them..others say no big deal..

I really have no idea if that would give the same feeling or not honestly, as I have never had the oppurtunity to try it. I wouldn't be above trying it, that's for sure - any alternative to some of the plastic keytops available now would be welcome if there was an improvement in touch. I'm only a fan of Ivory because of my experience with it, not because I know for 100% sure that ivory is the best (which I can't say without trying alternatives). And who knows - perhaps it's old ivory I prefer and I might recoil in dissapointment at the touch of new ivory - I haven't had the chance to play a piano with a new ivory keytop laid down.

Cuban cigars are special.

If your piano contains shellac (at least the original kind) you should know that it is an insect secretion.

One of my musical instruments has decorations in mother-of-pearl, which is secreted by a mollusk.

Consider the plight of organists, who play on cow shinbone keys (if they are lucky enough not to have plastic keys); the wind system of the organ requires yards of sheep leather and it is held together with something prosaically known as "fish glue".

If you played a stringed instrument, you might have to contend with horsehair bows and catgut strings (which are made from intenstines of various livestock, but not from cat).

Pianos have deer hide and sheep hair in them. The difference is that people have not killed nearly all the sheep nor deer.

A legally harvested elephant...?

Just let me say this - you are of course entitled to your views but, please do not label my mild response to the - let me be kind - offensive original quote above as 'Nonsense'.

how many piano keytops would a tusk cover?

Maybe it's just me, but this discussion seems a bit like wondering how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, to use that old expression. Having owned pianos with both ivory and plastic key tops, I can honestly say that for me, I find no particular difference in feel. To be more specific, if I'm not playing, I can run my fingers over the keys and feel a slight difference, but once playing and concentrating on the playing, I no longer notice the key tops.

I have maintained that blindfolded, the difference in feel between ivory and plastic whose surface has been appropriately textured would be unnoticeable or de minimus.

So, my advice is spend more time practicing and less time worrying about what your key tops are made of.

ShootCraps,

How about turning the poachers teeth into keytops instead of shooting them?

Regards,

Robert

Hi all,...

FYI,... past Ivory vs others debate,...

http://www.pianoworld.com/ubb/ubb/ultimatebb.php?/topic/1/14506.html

http://www.pianoworld.com/ubb/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?/topic/1/6187.html

Regards,

Robert

I have a Lesage upright that I personally replaced the ivories with plastic covers. The plastic does make the piano look very clean and nicer but I do miss the feel of the original ivory...there is a difference...its not as slippery. As for the ethics of harvesting animals for this and their edible meat, if it can be done without loss to wild elephants or their habitat, do it. After all "vegetarian" is an old native Indian word for "lousy hunter". What I find shameful are the old videos of huge piles of tusks being burned as a political message. All this did was waste a valuable resourse, drive up the value of illegaly poached elephants, furthering this abhorrent practice.

It was nice of you to share this, and it was interesting, but MAN, I have never seen such a messed up site in my whole life. Nothing works, pictures don't come up and text is overlapping. What a complete mess. If I owned that company I'd be embarrassed to have my company associated with such incompetence. All I found out is some of the prices.

LOL

If my statements were taken as offensive to some people, it was not my intention. I am a pianist, not a nature lover. I try to spend as little time as possible with nature and as much time as possible in an air-conditioned home playing the piano. I enjoy a good steak frequently, I put my soda cans in the same garbage bag that holds the remains of my occasional lamb dinner, I don't own a hybrid car or car pool with others to work, I leave lights on in rooms I don't frequent for hours at a time, I don't donate my time at homeless or animal shelters, I don't stand along the road with various other unwashed people holding a sign that says End This War, I don't lie down in front of tanks or bust test animals out of science labs.
I'm just a simple person who enjoys life and is not scared of making the most out of the little time I have. If I choose to spend my time playing a piano with ivory keys, then so be it. I find it a little disturbing that when discussing ivory keytops on a website dedicated to pianos, I get replies like "shameful" and "offensive". It's the equivalent of being an antique muscle car lover and then installing a catalytic converter on it in time for the big race.
Ah well, I still haven't met anybody in person who (after comparing the two) did not fall in love with ivory keytops over plastic. All it takes is a few hours of playing and you're hooked. I advise some people to try something before they judge it. And remember that not everyone is a card-carrying member of The World Wildlife Federation.

You're right that it's hypocritical to feel queazy about playing on ivory keys but wear leather shoes and all those other things. I'm not a PETA member or anything, I've even been a small game hunter in the past. I can't really explain it, it's just a feeling I get. Like I said, I have no problem whatsoever with people using any material they like. I'm just used to plastic keys and am happy with mine. I am one who has tried both ( One of my cousins had an old Steinway with ivory keys that I played a lot)and I indeed like my plastic keys better, I was always happy to get home to my piano.

I don't always make sense even to myself. :rolleyes:

Well said, Mattardo!

I wasn't going to jump in on this one, but I feel that I have to. I have no objection to playing on ivory keys on an old piano that has them; any issue of elephant lives lost is way in the past, and the keys predate the international effort to protect the elephant population. Ivory keys derived from an illegally poached elephant are a very different matter. I would not refuse to play a piano that had them, but I would refuse to buy one. (Not to mention that it would have been illegal to import such a piano into the United States, as far as I know.) At least for me, there is a large difference between wearing leather shoes and buying a piano with illegal ivory keytops. The leather is derived from an animal that was raised for slaughter; the ivory was derived from an endangered species. This makes a difference in my view.

Actually, what caused me to respond on this thread was not ivory at all but rather Mattardo's rather gleeful assertion that he or she actively avoids recycling soda cans, although I was tempted to respond to one of Mattardo's less sympathetic earlier posts on this thread (someone else beat me to it). Recycling is a very easy and very simple contribution that anyone can make to the environment. I feel that it is not good to be wasteful, at whatever level, just because we can. And I cannot imagine getting pleasure out of leaving lights on for hours at a time when no one is in the room.

Sorry to sound preachy, but so be it.

Shootcraps, you are welcome to the last word in our little exchange of views. I have more productive things to do than engage in a prolonged, futile battle of words with you on the subject of animal welfare. However, before quitting this thread, allow me to remind you, Mattardo and anyone else who may be interested, of your earlier statement. This - and only this! - is what disturbed me :

no ethical issues will stop me from getting ivory keys. Excuse my bluntness, but give me a new piano and the choice between plastic and ivory and I'll pull the trigger myself on that big ol' gray keytop factory.[/b]

Meant more in humour than in seriousness? ...then I'm probably guilty of over-reacting, in which case, let's forget it.

Best wishes
cruiser (wearing leather shoes)

I'm sure this is right - my favorite keys are on my 35 y/old upright Yamaha. Have no idea how they're made - plastic over wood? but they feel just right to me.

Ivory keys feel too slippery to me, and modern keyboards too plasticy.

I think you misconstrue my assertions as gleeful or willful acts of eco-desctruction. On the contrary - I was merely pointing out that I am truthful in my speach and actions (at least, I try to be) and not necesarily enviroment-friendly in all my actions, deeds and throughts. I don't take a sadistic pleasure in leaving lights on, not recycling soda cans, endorsing the use of huge animals tusks for my musical pleasure, etc. I'm just being honest about some of my actions. I don't tiptoe through life. When 100 years of recent history and political correctness becomes more important in the grand scheme than millions of years preceding it THEN I might sit up and take notice.
And if someone out there is truly concerned about "the eternal struggle of animal welfare" (Another recent train of thought that is FAR from eternal or having lasting precedent), then I would like to see them stop doing anything that hurts animals - even farm-raised animals, otherwise its a little bit hypocritical to pick and choose (I like that panda, he's cute - but screw that snake, kill it! That one is endangered, but there's plenty of monkeys - let's have monkey stew). The animal suffers and dies regardless of it's status on a list.

I"m not jumping in on the whole ethical question. Just a report on the ivory keys I played on. They were on a piano I didn't like - and so it is a bit difficult to say how that colors my view.
I liked them. They didn't feel slippery to me. The color was pleasant. But they didn't blow me away. I would not particularly seek them out, or pay to have them added to a piano I ordered. (A somewhat weak point since I don't think I would ever order a piano anyway.)

I haven't tried new ivories, only 80 year old ivories - which probably have a totally different feel to them from a new set.

There's a company in the NE that actually sends you a box for your action to ship to them, so the process can be done to a piano you already own. Of course, you have to live without your piano (or parts of it at least) for a little bit, but it's a decent trade if you need major action repairs performed anyways.

Ahh Mattardo, I am glad to hear I am not the only one who doesn't recycle. I don't for political-eco reasons. First of all, mostly the Mafias' own the recycling businesses. Secondly, it was originally touted as a cost effective way to be eco friendly that was suppose to reflect back to us customers in the reduced retail price of the product. Did you ever notice the price of pop going down?...lol. It just went into the recyclers pockets. Also, it is a fact it creates more greenhouse gas as a byproduct to recycle aluminum than to produce it from raw bauxite ore. The greenearth guys get the old "deer in the headlights" look when confronted by this. And think of all the bauxite miners you unemploy by recycling. As a final insult and method of increasing profits...the recyclers are now asking us to sort and clean and de-label the refuse which they used to do. It is just a way to create jobs and profits for themselves at an added expense of our labor and time. Sweat shop labor is less shameless in my opinion. A big sham. As for the people who claim we are running out of room for garbage...theres hundreds of thousands of square miles of ice in the antarctic that can be covered in a protective reflective layer of aluminum litter to protect it from global warming. I love playing on ivory, its like petting an elephant and playing at the same time.

Mt tech likes to say that they only used ivory in the old days because they didnt have plastic. I like the feel of ivory better plastic is slippery. I havent played much on pianos that have the faux ivory so I cant say if I'd like that. I can say theres allot of antique ivory out there. Old elephant tusks go for more than 20K for the pair. Thats what I have on my custom brace of Colt single actions.

I am fine with most plastic. High-grade plastic feels pretty fine. I can feel a difference with ivory but for me it's not "a difference that makes a difference."

I've only played one plastic set that was really terrible, and that was a on a rebuild I was investigating years ago. I just could not keep my fingers on the keys. Weird, I didn't think they got that bad.

Emery: I would love to be able to read the background material behind your assertions about recycling. Could you please post your sources for your assertions about ownership of the recycling facilities and about the higher cost o recycling over mining?

Thanks.

I am also a real hater of all those the-world-is-doomed-if-you-don't-d--as-I-say- people, of the dramaqueens of the next impending catastrophe (there is one every couple of years: global cooling (YES!); global warming; mad cow; overpopulation; end of oil (this one goes around since mid XIX century and will never leave us) etc; I am also really, really sick and tired of the world improving primadonnas who are simply unable to enjoy life and decide instead to be against everything that they themselves cannot afford, feeling very beautiful and very powerful in the process.
-------------------------------------------

Having said that, to ask for a minimum of common sense (say: respect for the law; love of natural diversity; protection of elephants)is not really a mind-boggling sacrifice; and to pouch elephants is a very serious crime.

So the statements commented sound to me not different then "I like Porsches and provided I can have one, who cares from whom it has been stolen".

Also incredible to me is that there are people out there who do not see the difference between eating cow meat or pork belly (a commodity in every sense of the word, also in the financial one) and the forbidden endangering of a animal species. One has the best right not to be a vegetarian and more power to him, but the difference is plain to see: pigs are not endangered.

So I would suggest anyone to enjoy his big SUV, his steak and potatoes, his big house with air con , his big piano and, in the end, his common sense; but to use his common sense also to understand that it cannot be right, and it cannot even be intelligent, to destroy animal species for a very short term advantage.

Again, elephant protection makes legal ivory available in bigger quantities in the long term, thus more affordable, perfectly legal and satisfying for everyone.

I'd rip them ol' tusks out of the socket with my bare hands like the caveman that I am.

My assertions about ownership and costs are my own observations around my own area and may not be applicable everywhere as a generalization. There are several studies indicating that recycling aluminum is very cost effective but they are looking at the "end process only", that is, the remelting of it VS creating it from ore. They do not take into account the fact of how much manpower energy and transportation involved to collect transport, process, re-transport ect.. When I see a huge gas guzzling truck come by every week with 3 employees on board toss a blue box worth of aluminum (maybe a lb ) from every house it doesnt seem cost effective if alcan can only give a rebate of aprox 1 cent per pop can. My main objection to this is that we were sold on the idea of recycling originally that it would be a big cost savings that will be passed to us as consumers...it never happened. So now people are making jobs and profit off our work. Its a rip-off.

I once tried to calculate how much a garbage/recycling company can earn by comparing how long a garbage truck spends picking up garbage on a route and the total cost of the garbage bills paid for that route. I tell you what - I should have opened a garbage/recycling company. There's a reason companies engage in huge bidding wars for the "privelege" of being a county or cities garbage company. I bet the owners of those companies have no problem being able to afford their own elephant farm to supply them with as many piano keytops as they want. It's extremely difficult to have sympathy for companies (who are in it for money) that offer recycling and then make you feel bad if you don't do it (less profit for them).

This thread has been enlightening. My piano, vintage 1921, has real ivory keytops and I really do prefer them to various plastic keytops I have tried. The feel of ivory (some resistance to sliding and an almost grainy feel) should be reproducible using advanced material engineering. Sooner or later some company will invest time and money and produce a keytop material that is even better than ivory. Such a material may have micron size holes and be layered to wick moisture. Be that as it may, killing elephants for ivory is evil. The video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He7Ge7Sog...dE_fqjOsKNWp.04 shows a little of the intelligence of elephants. Killing such an animal for a slightly better keytop is unthinkable.

Ah - you have the exact same year piano that I have and the ivories are probably in the same condition. I feel a great confidence when I play on those keys, whereas on my Yamaha I frequently miss and have second doubts about whether that leap or this leap will end up with a slippery mistake. They are very grainy and it helps absorb moisture from the fingers.

I'm not so sure that I would use intelligence level as a criteria for killing or not killing : it seems a little bigoted against the more stupid animals out there (if there are any - after all, how can we truly judge what degree of intelligence is needed before we judge an animal worthy of our "sympathy and empathy": sure, my Tuna is "dolphin safe" and that's fine and dandy because Dolphins are cute, and smart, and playful oh how nice - but why is my Tuna not Tuna-safe? What makes it any more right to kill and eat a Tuna than a Dolphin? Probably because of the perceived "intelligence" issue).

And we're really not seriously talking about going out and killing elephants for a single keyboard - many people have pointed out the legal avenues for procuring ivory keytops in the modern weepy age that doesn't require killing an elephant. The fact still remains that we kill animals and people every day in the name of food, luxury, beliefs, oil, clothing, racism, house-hold goods and most of the benefits we receive from these killings are temporary : it fills our stomach for a few hours (there's an old saying, and I won't mention what country, that states "if it's back is to heaven,it's edible"), it adorns our shoes and purses until we tire of them and buy new ones on a whim, etc. At least an elephant's tusks can supply many, many pianos with a product that will last for at least 100 years if properly maitained, if not more. The lasting value of the elephant's sacrifice seems more valuable than the temporary gains we receive from our killing of "stupid" animals.

I know some people have said they can't tell a real difference with plastic to ivory and I'm wondering if they are using new ivory or slightly older ivory in their tests. I think our 1921 ivory keytops have a better feel than new ivory, personally. The aging helps the feel.

"They do not take into account the fact of how much manpower energy and transportation involved to collect transport, process, re-transport ect."

I'd say all these cost will unavoidably been taken into account in the price that Alcoa & Co. pay for the material they buy, so in the recycled aluminium you buy all the costs which are not externalized are already in.

Having said that, the recycling craze seems a bit questionable to me too. In Germany there is a recycling system which calls for the separation BY HAND of the various recyclable material from household bags meant for those materials.

The system is, as you might expect, extremely expensive. With the time new more authomatized systems have become available, but they cannot be used because the public bodies responible for the recycling have already stipulated long term contracts with the firms doing the "recycling by hand"; this in turn was necessary to allow the firms to make the very heavy investment necessary to operate in the first place.

There is a say in Italy, that "better is the enemy of good". Sometimes these issues just seem to slip out of hand and become an exercise in money wasting.

Having said that, I am absolutely contrary to killing an elephant for his ivory, or to illegally killing animals for any scope whatsoever (general poaching etc.).

But animals are generally there, sorry to say, to provide food for other animals, including the most advanced of them all.

When I eat a good steak (medium rare for me, thanks; just olive oil and salt....) from a non endengered cow species, hopefully raised and dispatched in a halfway civilized way, I do not do anything cruel or hypocritical.

I just follow the big plan of Nature.

bluntness i can excuse, but lack of ethics reminds me of the dung beetles that live off the elephant's droppings - tasteless

For those who don't like the feel and look of plastic key tops, there's always Scotch-Brite. And yes, I'm serious.

I just switched from plastic to old ivory (1929). There is a difference, but it really doesn't matter much. Regulation is vastly more significant than the key surfaces.

I do have a little different feeling than most -- I had a disc collapse in my neck, so I have some nerve damage -- very little feeling in my right index finger, maybe about half and half for the thumb and middle finger. I don't think it affects my playing really -- the feedback is from the ears, not the fingers. Not that I was any good to begin with....

I try to play as many different keyboards as I can, because I've found that getting too accustomed to one instrument makes me absolutely suck playing another. (That's instead of just my ordinary moderately sucking....) It's so weird -- it's like a different action blows out my memory. That's why I also have the little Kawai.

I really despise the holier than thou types who want to control other people's lives. I recycle, and turn off the lights, drive a high mileage car, and lots of that stuff, but not because I believe in the eco-religion. We may do many of the same things, but my reason is different: I'm a cheapskate. ;-)

The African Elephant is not an endangered species. It is classified as vulnerable. They can and are hunted legally and the ivory are LEGAL. There are places in Africa that there is an overpopulation of elephants. When they raid crops of substinence farmers and become "problem animals" they are shot and the government keeps the LEGAL ivory to sell. The meat is given to local villagers, same goes for legally hunted elephants. Each hunter also leaves in the neighborhood of 20-50k per elephant to the local economy. It is easy to say nice elephants when they are not trampling on your food, family and dwelling and from ten thousand miles away. Remember, the people who live in elephant country have to put food on the table also. They are animals and a resource no different than the oil in the ground and in the Gulf. If they become a nuisance or problem they are dealt with no differently than a Mountain Lion coming down into an elementary school looking for water during a severe drought. Poachers are another matter altogether.

Note to those who wish to respond to certain posts: all but the last four (plus this one) are more than three years old.

A crime to the elephant and to that poor marsuipal! OUCH

Ivory is icky. Too rough and fragile. Plastic is smooth but is not porous. Composite materials are best.



Promise me you won't get upset when the environment craps out because everyone else litters the oceans and drives V8s

It turns out that the sky's not really falling. This is our third cooler than average summer in a row.

Yes it's been nice, but not for the rest of the country. Anyway, local climate...

Give it another 30, 50 years... Even if we don't have climate change, there are plenty of other growing problems.