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How would you technicians rate concert grands? In what order from best to worst?

Steinway
Bosendorfer
Estonia (the newer ones)
Bechstein
etc.

Is there a consensus among technicians about the top 3?

Bech

This question puzzles me. It does keep coming up from time to time and it always leaves me wondering, what is the point?

Just how are piano technicians supposed to rate these pianos? Are we to look for “cheap” materials? Or sloppy workmanship? Poor action regulation? You won’t find any of this in the top brands—most of them, anyway. So what, exactly, are we to use for an evaluation criteria?

One might well pose the similar question; how would auto mechanics rate the BMW, the M-B, or the Jaguar? What would be the criteria? On how difficult it is to change the sparkplugs? On the design of the brake calipers? As long as they are adequate to the task why should the driver care? Even the frequency-of-repair record, while it might favor one brand or the other, probably won’t significantly alter a driver’s perception of them. The driver is going to be influenced by his or her perception of the car’s beauty—broadly speaking, its style—and the totality of the driving experience.

In the same way we cannot judge and rank pianos simply by looking at the physical structure, or ranking the materials used or the lavishness of their detailing. In terms of build quality most all of today’s “high-end” pianos are superbly crafted. One might be able to find construction or detailing flaws somewhere but only after carefully searching for them. So, just how is this “quality” to be defined? I would suggest it can only be defined by the perception of beauty, both aesthetic and aural. And these are intensely personal criteria. They cannot be measured by calipers or by counting the number of grains-per-inch in some piece of wood.

The question is asked on another forum, “can a piano lose its ‘soul’ during the piano rebuilding process?” I would suggest the piano does not have its own soul; it is a symbiotic relationship—it exists only to nurture the soul of the performer and its audience. Its real quality can only be defined in terms of how well it fulfills that function. And that will be defined differently by each performer and by each audience.

(I might add that this is not something that is defined by price; there are some fairly inexpensive—yet very high quality—pianos available just now.

ddf

Bosendorfer
Fazioli
Bluthner
Bechstein
Steinway Hamburg
Shigeru Kawai
Yamaha
Estonia (the newer ones)

Another well-crafted, spot on post by Del!

According to Larry Fine's Piano Book the high end pianos are, in alphabetical order:

Vertical

Bechstien
Blüthner
Bösendorfer
Steinway & Sons

a lttle below these are:

Mason & Hamlin
Sauter
Seiler


Grands:

Bechstein
Blüthner
Bösendorfer
Falcone
Fazioli
August Förster
Grotrian
Mason & Hamlin
Steinway & Sons

a litle below these are:

Sauter
Seiler




In a second high level he puts:

Verticals

Astin-Weight
Sohmer
Charles R. Walter
Schimmel


Grands

Baldwin (Artist)
Schimmel

Why need there to be that many mistakes and discrepancies when referring to Larry Fine's ranking if it is safer to simply refer to a link of the page?

E.g. there is nowhere in this list given in this post a glimps of Steingraeber, Sauter and Seiler or not ranked equally but Sauter is higher ranked, Estonia is mentioned nowhere and Falcone does not belong here as Fine ranks it as 'entry level'.

L. Fine 2010 ranking

schwammerl.

As far as I am concerned, the best concert grands are the ones I work on. Build quality and design mean nothing if a piano is not well serviced. Sometimes the difference between a so-so piano and a great piano can be nothing more than the difference between a so-so tuning and a great tuning. A couple of notes poorly voiced can make a piano seem cheap and tinny, and five minutes work can make the same piano magnificent. All of this is independent of who manufactured it.

If you want a great piano, start by finding a great technician.

How often don't we as technicians run across a musician that will play on nothing but Steinway? "Ohhhh, there is nothing else!" Yeah? Try tuning a Steinway vertical once. Or yet another that will play on nothing but Bosendorfer? Or, Yamaha? Does this mean their preference is the "only one?" Of course not. It is just that, a choice, their preference.

Beauty, is in the eyes of the beholder and owner and player and the music they play and who is making money (pay off) on recommendations even.

And if I may, I would like to add, the best concert grands are also the ones that tune well and come out well.

I have one D that tunes terrible and a Bose that tunes better. I like the Bose in this case. On the other hand, I have another D that tunes better and cleaner than both of the first 2 pianos. Yet, I like the sound and tone of one of the other brands better. So, now, do I like this last one better because it tunes best? Well, yes but, yet am I to judge the tone quality and playability as well on this piano? I suppose so. Does this make the other brand better? Nope. It all depends on the piano, the over all quality of everything inside of this one piano. Was it built right, or not? If not, I probably won't like it much, especially if it tunes lousy. But, that doesn't mean I won't like the next one.

Whatever blows your hair back.

I think this is a profound and true statement.

I owned a late 1980’s Japanese Tokai G180 grand for a few years. After I posted a few threads here on the PW forums about my Tokai, some members here were coming out of the wood work to talk about what a poor quality piano it was. I was having second thoughts about buying it; but after some regulation, hammer-to-string alignment, string leveling, voicing and fine tuning, the piano played and sounded great.

In fact, I recently sold the Tokai and the guy that bought it was a professionally trained classical pianist. I had never heard anyone play a piano that well in person. He loved the tone and touch of the piano.

I just wish I could play the pinao as well as that guy!

Rick

Del,

At the end of your response you said there were some "fairly inexpensive pianos now" that are very good. In some cases as good as the most expensive brands?

I'm guessing the more recent Estonias for one. The others are........?

Bech

Rather than give you names and models—the moment I do that I start hearing reports back about how I have “endorsed” Brand X pianos—I’ll explain what I have seen changing in the piano marketplace over the past nearly five decades. And then the purists can tell me how wrong I am.

When I started in this business there was a very broad and deep canyon between what were called low-cost “entry-level” pianos and the expensive high-end, and usually high-performance, boutique pianos. The differences were readily apparent and it did not take an experienced ear to hear those differences in sound and performance or eye to spot them in the fit and finish. There would be gaps and poorly fitted components in a mass-produced Aeolian product (for example) that would be obvious even to the casual observer. Some of the hardware parts would be rough and poorly fitted. The bellywork, while functional, would look a bit crude with the occasional gap in what should have been tight joints, the odd glue run here and there and the generally utilitarian—if not sloppy—finish work. The action would be roughly machined, sloppily assembled and would arrive at the dealer poorly regulated and poorly voiced; probably with no voicing at all. To be sure, extensive dealer prep work could improve action response and smooth out the uneven tone but it was always going to be obvious that these were inexpensive pianos.

By contrast, the Bechstein (again, for example) would be meticulously fitted and finished. The hardware was carefully thought out and meticulously fitted. The casework was, by any standard, excellent and the finishes were flawless. Looking underneath the joinery would be precise and detailed; no glue runs here! Even the finish work on the belly would look good. The keys and actions were the best available, assembly and regulation first rate and the precision and smoothness of tone was obvious. One may or may not like the tone—even then this was a personal preference thing—but it was obvious to both the ear and the eye that these were not just pianos, they were high-class instruments. It was also obvious to the purse. Only the wealthy could afford this kind of precision and structural integrity. The line between the low-end and the high-end was readily and satisfyingly apparent to even the most casual observer.

Today that line has become somewhat blurred and, more than anything else, it has been the machine—specifically the numerical- and computer-controlled machine—that has made the difference. We all like to talk about the low-cost labor available, first in Japan, then Korea, now China and Indonesia and who knows where next—and that has certainly helped—but it is those increasingly smart machines that has made the dramatic improvements in the low-end products possible. Day after day—given reasonable maintenance—these machines crank out bellywork joints that are better than anything the most skilled worker can make regardless the amount of time lavished on them.



Actions and keys are being mass-produced at quality levels that were once only dreamed of. Even action assembly once requiring a great deal of hand labor by skilled workers is being done by machine with far more consistency and precision.

Machines have made possible at a much lower cost a level of fit and finish that formerly was available only by throwing huge amounts of skilled work at the process. True, it has taken these high volume manufacturers a while to figure out that picky details like wood moisture control and materials selection really are still important, but progress has been made. It has also taken a while for some of these manufacturers to figure out that there is a relationship between design and performance but, again, progress is being made.

Good materials are always going to cost more than poor materials so the pianos at the lowest rung of the ladder are not going to challenge the high-end boutique pianos any time soon—although even these have improved considerably—but there is a developing class of instruments somewhat above these entry-level pianos that are still mass-produced but in which are found somewhat better materials along with a bit of actual design expertise. It is these instruments that are showing the potential to challenge the performance of the very best pianos. Not as they come directly from the factory, to be sure, but once they have been placed in the hands of a skilled and knowledgeable technician they can be made to sing quite beautifully.

It would be interesting, I think, to conduct a truly blind test in which a variety of these instruments could be compared with it being impossible for the pianists or audience to be able to discern their brand. With the pianos tuned but otherwise as delivered from their respective factories I think there would—in most cases, at least—be clear differences. All that wonderful attention to detail at the factory level would surely show. At least it should. But given a few hours of attention of those skilled and knowledgeable technicians I think the results might be some embarrassing to both the pianists who would have gone in certain they could pick out their favorite six-figure piano and to the manufacturers of some of those six-figure pianos that might not have been found clearly superior.

When the wraps are removed perceptions would immediately begin to change, of course. The evidence of the performance and sound would begin to fade, excuses would be created to explain the momentary—but certainly understandable given the flaws of the testing—lapses in judgment and the differences would again become obvious; class and detail would rise to its rightful place at the top.

To be sure there are still design, materials and workmanship details separating the mass-produced piano—even the best of them—from the very high-end boutique pianos. But the gaps have narrowed and they will continue to narrow. The canyon is not nearly as wide or deep as it once was. There is considerably less difference even in the visible aspects of the pianos; the finishes and detailing of the upper end of the mass-produced piano is getting better. The boutique pianos still do this better—they should—but the differences are less obvious today than they were forty-some years ago. If one is interested only in performance and sound, is willing to forgo the pizazz of an expensive name and is willing to find and work with that skilled and knowledgeable technician—or find a dealer who has already done so—there are some true bargains out there.

ddf

Del,

Outstanding reply. Thanks very much.

Bech

I am contemplating buying a 1997 RX3. As it is an older model of the RX3 when they were relatively new, are there any problems with that year that you experts are aware of? I've heard through the grapevine but not from any reliable source of shoddier plastics in the early models. Is there any truth to that? Is there ANYTHING I should be especially aware of?

Patty

I’m sure you would get further posting this question on its own; with its own heading. But, since I can kind of tie it into the response I made above, I’ll at least give you my opinion:

I’m assuming you are referring to the Kawai RX3 grand with its fiber-reinforced plastic action components. The Kawai action has earned and excellent reputation both for its performance and its reliability.

This is one other direction in which manufacturers are able to both improve the performance of their pianos while simultaneously reducing their manufacturing cost. The plastics used in modern piano actions—and there are many manufacturers besides Kawai using at least some plastic components—have a superb track record for both performance and longevity.

Their only detractors are their competitors who persist in making up all kinds of horror stories in their attempts to discredit the piano makers using them. Increasingly, however, these attempts are backfiring on them as consumers become more aware of just how good some of these actions are.

(Note: On more than one occasion I’ve heard a salesperson berate the Kawai “plastic” action only to open up one or more of the pianos on their sales floor to point out the plastic components in the pianos they are selling. Truth and integrity often don’t seem to matter all that much though.)

ddf

Thanks for your reply. Was there any differences between the early year Kuawai RX3s and the later ones that you are aware of?

Sorry, I have no idea. I am not an expert on Kawai models.

Again I suggest that you place these questions on their own thread where they will attract folks who have this information.

ddf

My personal experiences are exactly as BDB states. I have had four different tuners tune my piano. From best to worst (yours truly), there is a remarkable difference in the way the piano sings. I vote for finding and using a crackerjack technician, rather than obsessing on minor "quality" differences.

Hop

Are you sure you'd trust THIS guy to work on your piano??

Patty,
The Kawai RX action was upgraded in 2004 to include carbon fibers, and the design of the action was subtly changed at the same time. The change was done to improve the performance of the action.

There is no difference in material quality from a longevity standpoint - the older ABS material will last as well as any. The new action just feels nicer and repeats faster.

Maybe not.

Hop