[CAUT] CCM goes "All Steinway"

[Greg Newell]

Amen to that Rick!!

Greg Newell
Greg's Piano Forté
www.gregspianoforte.com
216-226-3791 (office)
216-470-8634 (mobile)

-----Original Message-----
From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Rick
Florence
Sent: Friday, November 21, 2008 10:41 AM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: Re: [CAUT] CCM goes "All Steinway"

I'm sure the infusion of the new Steinways will be an improvement over your
present situation, but I can't help but think this is yet another sellout to
a brilliant marketing campaign.

I am constantly amazed at the number of educational institutions, whose very
existence historically is possible because of a die-hard dedication to
diversity and questioning status quo, making such a contradictory decision .
Music institutions are being bought and paid for, robbing their students of
the opportunity to make music on a variety of wonderful pianos, under the
guise of joining the "elite."  I wish more administrators had the guts to
say to donors, "we would love to accept your donation and offer a complete
musical education to our students by purchasing the best pianos from around
the world, including Steinway."  Instead, they are so excited about the
money, they ignore the cornerstone of education - diversity.

A sad day for music.

________________________
Rick Florence
Senior Piano Technician
Arizona State University
School of Music



-----Original Message-----
From: caut-bounces at ptg.org on behalf of Wolfley, Eric (wolfleel)
Sent: Fri 11/21/2008 7:59 AM
To: 'caut at ptg.org'
Subject: [CAUT] CCM goes "All Steinway"
 
Hi All,

Some of you may have already heard the news...Tuesday, the board of trustees
at the University of Cincinnati approved a deal with Steinway that will make
the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music an "All Steinway School". We
will be purchasing 165 new pianos for the school all of which will be
delivered before next June!  This is the single largest deal in Steinway's
history in terms of number of units purchased. The total price tag is 4.1
million. This deal is on the initiative of our new Dean, Douglas Knehans and
is the cornerstone of a new capital campaign and just one of a plethora of
sweeping moves he is making to improve CCM's global image. Here's a link for
the deal...there was also a NY Times article last Tuesday, but I can't seem
to make that link active.

http://www.uc.edu/news/NR.asp?id=9235

I just got back from NYC where we selected the first batch of pianos, 2 D's
and 8 B's and I was most happy to find the quality of the pianos in the
selection room to be excellent...we had no trouble choosing  our pianos. Our
first shipment of 27 pianos arrives next week. While the quality of our
performance pianos here at CCM has been perceived as excellent  over the
years, the age and quality of the pianos in the practice rooms, classrooms
and studios has been a challenge. Before this deal, CCM had the largest
inventory of Baldwins anywhere in the world I'm sure. The average age of our
inventory here before this deal was 35 years so this will be quite an
improvement for many years to come. I have no qualms or reservations about
the deal...there's no question the quality level of our inventory is going
way up.  I am perfectly aware of the challenges that the next year will pose
with all these green pianos but hey, there are worse problems to have. The
nature of our jobs here will change dramatically for years to come...much
less rebuilding, more tuning, voicing and regulating. I'll keep you all
posted on how things go.

Eric



Eric Wolfley, RPT
Director of Piano Services
College-Conservatory of Music
University of Cincinnati