A new partner Upright to my Steinway grand!

Shelter in Place has become tolerable by having two compatibly resonant musical sibs in my dwindling living room. The shrinking multi-purpose space holds my side-by-side pianos, webcams, tripods, Big Mac, and HP monitor. (not to mention a sequestered sleeper sofa) The latest instrumental addition, Knabe WKV-132MD, a space-saving upright that replaced my mid-size Baldwin grand,…

Evaluating an Acoustic piano before purchase

I've often been asked about the nuts and bolts of assessing a piano, even before a technician lays his hands on it. (A Registered pro will explore facets of internal assembly while my journey of discovery is intuitively tactile and tonal, forged on behalf of students searching for an alternative to the digital universe.) The…

A piano that DRAWS is a sacrilege: or how I otherwise spent Christmas Day

As a prelude to my bottomless pit experience at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco that featured the desecration of an upright piano, I'll first provide readers with the necessary back story.... Following 8 days of Chanukah candle lighting, I found myself in search of meaningful things to do on Christmas day, knowing full…

Adoption in the old piano universe

Today's good deed was my hands on effort to place a gorgeous sounding old upright in a deserving home. And judging by the attention this Emerson vintage piano eventually received after I played it for well past an hour at a Berkeley thrift store, there may be hope that an old veteran like this, can…

On the Meat Rack of used pianos: One that Never Left Its Home

I received a phone call on a June morning from a man who inquired about my piano-finding services. He sounded like he might be from India, but I wasn’t sure. “Do you help with selling a piano?” he inquired. "On occasion, I do," I replied. "It depends on the quality of the instrument." I could…