Elvis's Piano

[Robert Goodale]

Hello all,

An interesting day.  At Bally's here in Las Vegas there is
going to be an auction tomorrow of a sizable collection of
Elvis's personal belongings.  Among them is one of his cars,
a Harley he used to ride, a juke box, a bicycle built for
two, tons of custom made clothing and jewelry, furniture,
you name it.  It is a significant event and fills a large
grand ballroom with a stage.  Also among the goodies is his
personal piano that he played regularly at Graceland.  He
has been photographed with it numerous times.

Earlier today Alan Meyer and myself had to move it off a
stage where it was being displayed via a ramp, (scared me a
little because it was so steep), and then across the hotel
into a showroom where it will be played in a special show.
Tonight at 10:30 we will be returning it back to the auction
room stage where it will go up for bid tomorrow.

We took the opportunity to take a close look at it while we
were alone in the showroom.  It is really quite a piece of
junk, an old Aeolian Knabe model 'B'.  This particular
Aeolian was a pretty modest piano to begin with but as a
bonus it has also been significantly screwed up.  Sometime
about 15 or so years ago (we are guessing), someone decided
to have some restoration work performed.  The "rebuilder"
did so many things wrong I can't imagine how they chose this
person for the job on a historic piano.  The sound board had
been repaired less than neatly in several areas with what
appeared to be colored epoxy.  Since then many new cracks
have formed.  The grotesque part of it is that in order to
make it "look good" they sprayed the entire board with a
clear super high gloss lacquer including the bridges and
rusty bridge pins!  The plate also been repainted badly.
The color was a rather obnoxious bright gold with no clear
coat.  They also sprayed over the agraffs which had blobbed
in various areas.  The understring felt was poorly measured
and uneven.  The duplex scale was not muted which should
have been on this particular piano.  The keys had been
recovered but in the process they sanded down the sides so
much that there were gaping spaces between the keys.  The
lid prop did not appear to be original.  The finish on this
piano is an ivory white with gold trim but glossy black
rubber tacks were installed on the lid which looked
horrible.  The action was in desperate need of regulation
although the hammers and shanks looked like they may have
been put on relatively recently.  They appeared to be of
generic quality.  Two different types of damper felts where
used, one with red backing and the other without.  The tone
was fair but with the lacquered bridges and the grooved and
painted over agraffs and capos it was full of false beats.

Because the plate had been repainted by someone with
complete disregard for historical value no serial number was
to be found.  We pulled the fall board off and on the front
center of the hammer rail was a piece of old masking tape
that read "Knabe, #70545.  We also located an impression
stamped case number on the bottom of the key slip, #4671.  I
quickly located a piece of paper and a pencil and made a
rubbing of it.

The piano is expected to bring between $250,000 and $300,000
at auction.  In other words, someone will be purchasing a
used poorly "rebuilt" Aeolian Knabe with a retail value of
probably less than $3,000.00 for 1000 times it's actual
value because Elvis played it.  Hey, if the new owner
invests another $15,000 for a proper rebuilding they might
actually end up with a piano that is worth $9,000!  Only in
America!

For what it's worth I will post the case number rubbing in a
separate e-mail.

Rob Goodale, RPT
Las Vegas, NV