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Joined: Aug 2013
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Thanks for all your replies. About $650usd was already spent repairing it 3-4 years ago, or so I've heard--it couldn't even produce sound. I was told that it was bought for my husband and sister-in-law to practice on when they were young, but they very quickly abandoned piano playing. Over the next few years, the piano was left untouched in a damp and humid basement which floods whenever it rains heavily (we receive a considerable amount of rainfall), thus the damage until the mom decided to salvage it. It's now in the living room.
She's hinted that she'd like her granddaughter (my niece)to use it in time, so I contemplated having the action regulated as well; at the same time, however, I've no idea when babies can start learning, but I'm guessing her lessons, if any, might start only in a few years, and I am ferociously saving money for a new piano-and more piano lessons- for when my husband and I move into our own apartment next year;) (In Sg, we wait about 3-4 years for new homes. Vast inconvenience. A friend of mine has to abandon her piano playing for a year & a half while she stays with her in-laws.) I don't think I'd want to negotiate a 50-50 with my mother-in-law; I'd gladly pay the cost since she's been so hospitable to me, but $650 is a lot of money...I might play on it for a few weeks more before deciding if it's worth the regulation. And yes, there's the CLP-230 on which I can play; I'm thankful I blindly decided to purchase it 2 years ago for night practice.
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Joined: Mar 2006
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Athdara, if you'd pop the lid and look inside, find the serial number and the model number. Most likely, the model is something like C116 or C120. It may have additional letters if it's a special finish. From this information, we can tell your when it was manufactured and what the current price of new models are. This information may help you reach a more informed decision.
"Those who dare to teach must never cease to learn." -- Richard Henry Dann Full-time Private Piano Teacher offering Piano Lessons in Olympia, WA. www.mypianoteacher.com Certified by the American College of Musicians; member NGPT, MTNA, WSMTA, OMTA
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My thought is to compare the cost of tuning, regulation, and repairs against the other alternatives.
The Schimmel upright is worth fixing up unless it was ruined by the water damage. What is the history of the basement floods? Was the piano submerged in standing water, or just exposed to humidity changes? The former is more likely to cause extensive damage.
Another alternative is to rent an acoustic piano. I don't know if this is commonly offered in Singapore. However, just piano moving costs would compare to the cost of doing the regulation. And then the rental fees on pianos (at least in my local market) are about $250-300/month.
Colin Dunn
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Thanks John and Colin. I popped my head in, a few times over the past week just to make sure I didn't miss anything, and couldn't find the model number, but I measured its height and checked out Schimmel's website and I think it's a C120. I have the serial number though--where can I go to find out when it was manufactured?
The piano wasn't fully or even half-submerged; perhaps, at most, in water about an inch deep, but definitely exposed to humidity changes. The technician has tuned it a second time and fixed certain keys. It's quite wonderful to play on now, save some echoes/ ringing which I guess are typical of older pianos? I am not sure how to describe these extraneous sounds but the tech mentioned they're caused by vibrations against the iron frame and soundboard. These sounds are not that obvious in the newer pianos I've tried.
Sorry I have digressed; the above should be more suitable in the piano forum.
But back to lessons/ no lessons/ piano or no piano--now that I have access to a playable piano and know I can work on the digital...still, my lessons can't exactly start till next year due to overseas trips and my work schedule this year--I'd end up missing 2-3 lessons a month if I started now.
In the meantime, I've dug up pieces to learn/sight read e.g. simple, popular scores from musicals, Clementi's Sonatinas, Mozart's K545, keep playing my exam pieces and scales, and have tried to learn more ambitious pieces. Still, regardless of what I'm doing, at the back of my mind, I'm paranoid that I'm practicing using the wrong technique/ arm position, etc, and I worry that it'll be difficult to re-learn them if I continue doing what I'm doing, to the point that sometimes I think it's better to stay away from the piano until I can start lessons proper. E.g. I've gotten through the notes of the 1st few pages of Bach's Italian Concerto, some of Reinhold's Impromptu, some Chopin Nocturnes, but I know I'm playing them wrong and it was *really* difficult trying to re-learn Bach from scratch last time.
At the same time, I worry that my hiatus from the piano would set me back even more. I've tried to read up on techniques but can't seem to translate what I read to what I do at the piano, largely because I can't spot my own mistakes. It's like getting a kid to spot his grammatical errors and awkward expressions in his own composition. Should the kid continue writing (badly?) in the absence of a teacher?
Thanks for hearing my rumblings and paranoid concerns...
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Piano
by Gino2 - 04/17/24 02:34 PM
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Piano
by Gino2 - 04/17/24 02:23 PM
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