89 note scale

[Stephen Airy]

I would play those extra notes on the Bosey, in fact
I'm working on writing an arrangement of an old hymn
in which I am very generous with the 8va's and ledger
lines below the bass clef.

I was wondering -- although I don't have the money
right now and probably won't for the next few years,
what do you think would be the chance that I could get
S&S to make a custom grand piano, say, 14 feet 7
inches long, with a range from C-1 to C9 (121 keys)? 
I was thinking it may have a C-1 speaking length of 12
feet or 12 feet 6 inches, and an A0 speaking length
of, maybe... 10 feet 8 inches.  With that size, do you
think it would be likely to have the lowest wound
bichord be at C1 and the lowest plain trichord at C2
(if the break is at B1/C2), or where do you think
they'd be?

Also speaking of extra notes in the bass, I learned
the hard way not to try to get F0 on a 4'11" baby
grand.  If anyone wants a small 10- to 15-second clip
of me trying that on my mom's YC PG-150, I'd be happy
to encode it to mp3 and send it to you.  Let's just
say, though, that a Wurlitzer 1170 series would blow
that piano off the stage when I did that... :)

By the way, if there is NO way I could get 10 octaves,
I could settle for 8 and a half (C0 to G8).  Contrary
to what Bruce Stevens in Bellflower, CA, says, 88 keys
(or even 97) just isn't enough for my style of
playing. :)

One last thing:  i had an interesting dream of a large
grand piano last night...

It was a large grand (at least 9 or 10 foot, maybe
longer).  What was interesting about it was the fact
that the bass strings were BEHIND the treble strings. 
As in... know where the tenor end of the treble bridge
is?  The bass strings were all BEHIND that (No strings
crossed over).  I thought it was very weird.

Now, how would they PLAY/BUILD a piano like that??!!


I'm curious about something:  What do you think would
be the best possible scale it'd be possible to have in
a small upright that, say, is 39 inches tall and 60
inches wide?  (by scale I mean speaking length, # of
notes on bass bridge, start of bichord and trichord
strings).  Provided that there's a way to have a
halfway decent backlength and whatever, would it be
possible to have an A1 speaking length of, say, 45 or
48 inches, start the bichords at note A1, the
trichords at D#3 and have the break at D3/D#3?

If I am wrong, then what books would you recommend I
look into buying that could help educate me on
stringing scales and piano manufacturing?

(If "88 Keys - the Making of the Steinway Piano" gives
detailed step-by-step directions on how to build a
Steinway model D concert grand from scratch using the
Bosendorfer Imperial scale, I might be interested in
looking into buying a copy of that book... :)



--- Delwin D Fandrich <pianobuilders@olynet.com>
wrote:
> 
>   ----- Original Message ----- 
>   From: Wimblees@AOL.COM 
>   To: pianotech@ptg.org 
>   Sent: November 02, 2001 12:27 PM
>   Subject: Re: 89 note scale
> 
> 
>   The concept of adding another string, or strings,
> beyond A0, is to give more length bridge. That is
> the reason behind Bosendorfer's extra notes in the
> bass. Sure, it's impressive to have those added
> notes, but how many people actually play them?  From
> what I was told, by adding more notes to the bass,
> it pushed the last octave, A0 - A1, closer to the
> middle of the soundboard, where it could produce a
> bigger and more defined sound. 
> 
>   Wim 
>
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> Yes, I've heard that as well, but I don't believe
> it. Surely the designer can put the bridge any place
> he/she wants it to be. If you want the lowest notes
> to cross the bridge closer to the middle of the
> soundboard, simply put them there. And if it is
> desirable for the bridge to be longer then just make
> it longer. There is no need to put strings on it. 
> 
> No, I expect the extra notes were added because some
> composer or performer wanted them. Once that first
> piano was designed and built it would have been
> relatively easy to continue building it. And why
> not? It's great marketing even if of little
> practical value -- although I imagine there were
> pianists like Oscar Peterson around back then as
> well.
> 
> Del
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 


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