Best piano in your world.

[Stéphane Collin]

Hi Richard.

Magic, magic.
How would you explain that some old pianos with no more bearing, rusty 
strings, flat hammers and at least 5 wide open cracks in the board are 
sometimes able to cause true aesthetic emotions to some musicians ?  Ok 
, they play in a certainly less predictable manner than a new Steinway D 
out of the box, but who said that this is the whole story ?  Aren't 
there less predictable stories that appear to be truly thrilling ? 
But then, you restore the promizing instrument, put new everything 
(board, strings, action, etc.) and what do you get ? Well, just another 
nice piano sounding like any new piano, but the magic is gone.  I heard 
many times this very common story (and not only from beginner techs).  
Some so called defaults appear to be of more aesthetical value than so 
called perfection.

I am sure that time (setting, pounding, ageing) has good effects on some 
pianos (not all, obviously).  I also hear sometimes that pianos get the 
sound that their usual player is seeking for.  I can believe this, 
certainly when we admit that "sound" is better defined by some relative 
definition including the ears that are listening to it.  Can't we 
imagine that the qualities (all the qualities, even those that nobody 
knows about yet) that make a soundboard sound good in a certain piano 
are evolving with the time ? Same for strings and for wool.  Of course, 
mixing all the ingredients, there is (like in béarnaise) a time before 
and a time after the glory time.  But why should this be 1 month ? or 5 
years ?  Why not 50 years ? why not 120 ?

My definition of magic sould be understood here as the rules that 
command the world and that lie beyond the scope of our actual 
formalization of that world.  I can see lots of magic in the world, also 
in the piano world.  This is probably due to the poor level of 
formalization that I reached so far ;-) .

Best regards,
Stéphane Collin.

Richard Brekne a écrit :

> I find it quite suprising that the only person to cite a new or even 
> recent piano so far is myself.  Everything else has beed 50 to 100 
> years old.
>
> So... how do you guys account for the fact that all of you are 
> declaring your <<piano sound to die for>> as coming from such old wood ?
>
> Grin
>
> Cheers
> RicB
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