What Happened to Steinway?

[Music] I'm Robert EST you're watching living pi.com with such an interesting show today what happened to Steinway this is 20 Questions actually it's 20 statements that you can mark down true or false so get your pencil and paper ready but first a brief history of this venerable piano company of course you all know Steinway but I'm going to tell you some things you maybe you don't know about the company to kind of get your head around it Steinway actually in 1850 Henry Stein that that's right his name was Stein a German immigrant witnessed a show put on by PT Barnum you know the circus uh promoter and it featured a Chickering piano chering it was a piano company going back to the 1820s in the United States and it inspired him so much they could barely drag him off the stage and a few years later in 1853 he founded Steinway and Sons in New York and the company remained under family ownership for Generations in 1880 styley opened a second Factory in Hamburg Germany then uh many things you know he developing concert artists and all that but in 1931 The Accelerated action was introduced a new technology that caught the attention of many pianists and again in 1936 there patented diaphragmatic soundboard which was a way of tapering the soundboard in a unique way producing that distinctive Steinway sound finally in 1972 corporate ownership uh happened with CBS purchasing Steinway and Suns in 1992 Steinway introduced the Boston piano brand this was an oem piano uh designed by Steinway produced in in Japan by Kawai with many Steinway elements not the Steinway designed piano but many elements that Steinway specified in the pianos produced by Kawai and Japan in 1995 stanway merged with Selmer Industries you know the makers of woodwind and brass instruments then in 2001 Steinway introduced their Essex piano made by Young Chang but a few years later 2004 Young Chang suffered a bankruptcy so in 2006 they started having the Essex produced in China by the world's largest piano manufacturer per Pearl River which is where they're still made today in 2015 Steinway introduced spirio a player system that is only available in pianos that are built by Steinway and only on new Stein at that many Innovative Technologies like they took old recordings and digitized and so you can have your piano play Rubenstein when he was young or things of that nature and then in 2019 they added a record function to SPO all right so now get ready for the question the questions they're really not questions they're statements and you can say are these true or false and a lot of these you're going to have a hard time with particularly this first one and this is a very provocative question a provocative statement I should say which is Steinway makes a Mickey Mouse piano now that sounds like black doesn't it and some of you may wonder what I'm talking about here is it possible Steinway makes a Mickey Mouse piano the answer is true and this is a specially designed Steinway and it has hand painting and if you've got $375,000 you can get one of these limited Ultra limited edition sways for yourself now this isn't the only limited edition sty they have it's one of the more amusing ones though and I thought i' make you aware of this because they have all sorts of different types of designer pianos that have extraordinarily high price tags to match when you consider that even an entry level Steinway baby grand is over $80,000 you could see how these limited runs would be expensive next one Steinway has stopped producing their accelerated action wow this was something that many people look for in their pianos all the time is it possible they stop producing their accelerated action this is true now you may wonder why would they stop making the accelerated action that so many people like well a lot of it comes down to the fact that Steinway has made every effort to make the pianos that are made in Hamburg similar to the pianos that are made in New York for example for many many decades they had the 510 and a half uh grand piano model elate in New York and the exact same size model o made in Hamburg well they discontinu the L so the O was made in both factories another one a few years ago they reintroduced the model A in New York for decades the a the 6'2 was only made in Hamburg so they have made improvements in their action and felt the the accelerate action is no longer necessary I'd love to hear from all of you in the comments pianists and technicians how you feel about the discontinuation of the accelerated action that was only available in New York steinways next one Steinway sto making the 10 98 Studio piano is this true this is true you can no longer buy a Steinway Studio piano they do not make any Studio pianos now what about the Steinway are they discontinuing all uprights made in New York this is true the k52 the full size upright will no longer be made uh in New York and the only upright piano available from Steinway will be the K1 32 manufactured in Hamburg Germany next one Stein we has stopped making the model S baby grand you know at 5'1 in it's almost as expensive as the 57 model M which is one of their most popular models and there have been people saying that they're no longer making the model S is this true this one is false the S is still in production just as before just like this piano the model s that my grandfather got for my father in the 1930s we rebuilt it a number of years ago still going strong wonderful little baby grand another one Steinway moved their rebuilding offsite to Iowa is this possible they've always had their rebuilding in their New York Factory where they really be producing it in Iowa this is true that's right they are making all their rebuilds doing all their rebuilds of steinways in Iowa now they do ship them their pin blocks and soundboards in fact that's the only place you that soundboards and pin Blocks made by Steinway are available other than on new Steinway pianos made in New York and Hamburg next one Steinway refinishes their pianos in New Jersey now you may have heard this from people is this true this is actually it's partially true but I have to say this is false because indeed there is a facility in New Jersey they ship very very few pianos that have intricate Woodwork and think about the nightmare of the logistics trying to have all their pianos being refinished in New Jersey at first I thought maybe this was true because I had heard this rumor because maybe environmental laws with the new polyester high gloss finishes at Steinway is offering maybe they couldn't do that in New York and had to do it in New Jersey but no this is false only a few pianos are actually refinished in New Jersey here's another one for you you may have heard about that Steinway is going public is this true this is actually false they there were murmurs about this but they withdrew their SEC filing uh recently they still may go public that it could happen but as of right now there are no immediate plans for going public I know a lot of people would like to invest in Steinway it's one of the strongest brand names out there another one for you half of steinle's made in New York have spio systems is that possible that people really don't play these pios or want to have the spal systems in their pianos well this is actually true half of the New York pianos have spio systems in them and they're selling them like hot cakes it's actually helped them tremendously to increase their sales another one is spirio spio is available on all models which we half of their pianos have them this sounds very plausible is this true this is false the spio is only available in their 5 foot 7 model M they're just under 7 foot model B and they're under 9 foot Model D concert Grands and yet half the total number of pianos they sell have the spio systems so a lot of D's M's and D's have got SPO on them here's another one spio adds $20,000 to the cost of a piano is this true this is false it actually adds $29,000 to the cost of a new Steinway can you imagine so if you want it it's the only way you can get it is on a Steinway next one for $29,000 you get the piano that records and plays back since they how have both Technologies now this is false if you want it to record as well as playback it's $ 48,000 additional to the price of a Steinway so the least expensive recording SPO Steinway the model M at 57 will send you back $124,800 here in 2024 all right another one spio cast plays live to other SP spio Pian so that somebody could play a spio in one place and other spos will play at the same time and you can have a Lang Lang player piano and and uh yua Wang player piano is this possibly true this this is true that's what spio is about that's why people pay the big bucks to get it because think about it since there's so many Steinway artists out there being able to have a library of Steinway artist is a big selling point for the SPO system another one Steinway owns rener you know the action company that's available on ons andorfer on foli on pet on so many pianos this is actually true stanway bought rener a few years ago and uh they do have renter they've been using rener actions on their hurg steinways for years and the next one Steinway Hamburg Steinway and New York steinways have the same hammers this is actually false there are unique hammers that are only available on New York steinways giving them a different sound from the hurg steinways Steinway doesn't make their key frames the way they traditionally have made them this is true they're using a thicker what they say is a sturdier construction now some technicians might find it a little harder because it's a heavier build but they say that they these are going to be more robust so indeed the uh key frames are not made the same way they always have been made another one that some people have been saying that sty sped up their manufacturing because of such demand and according to Steinway this is false they have added more workers to try to C keep up with demand but they still take just as long to produce their pianos it can take up to a year to produce a Steinway piano there's a lot involved in building posos here's one for you it is illegal to buy a Steinway decal like the name that's on the front of your piano or one that's on your soundboard this is actually true Steinway has made it illegal to buy the decal so if you have a Steinway piano that you've had rebuilt you might not be able to get a decal if your piano's been refinished unless you use all Steinway Parts but the catch is you can't buy Steinway pin blocks or soundboards so if you rebuild your Steinway and you can't you have it refinished you can't buy the decals like you count on virtually every other piano brand in the world now why does Steinway do this well Steinway says it's because they want to assure that anything that's a stey at the front has the high quality associated with their name so it doesn't tarnish the reputation some people say it's because used steinways are actually the biggest competition Steinway has because if somebody wants a Steinway they're probably not going to buy a Yamaha or a Kawai or any other piano they want a Steinway so they're probably going to seek out a used Steinway they can't buy a new one who knows what the truth is there could be elements of both in that another one 90% of concert artists play Steinway could that possibly be true with all the fine piano brands in the world this is actually false over 97% of concert artists play Steinway now why is this is Steinway that much better than every other piano brand I mentioned foli there's there's uh so many great piano companies beckstein uh and buendorf for you know but the fact of the matter is one by one all the piano companies supporting the concert Market dropped out the last hold out up until near the end of the 20th century uh close to the end of Baldwin's rign Baldwin had a good share of the concer market but think of the daunting task of having concer Grands ready in virtually every major city in the world at over $200,000 each even Yamaha tried to do that in the late '90s and couldn't swing it it was just too big a burden having these pianos prepped ready for the concert stage in every major city so any touring concert pianist really has no choice it's Steinway if they want to have pios to play on and concerts all around the world last question and leave in the comments how well you did on these 20 questions how many of you got right how many of them surprised you love to hear from all of you here at living p.com the most expensive Steinway cost a million dollar well you know that a concert Grand stanway costs over $200,000 are there any models that cost a million dollars well this is a misleading question because the answer is false the most expensive sideway is $2.5 million what pi could possibly command $2.5 million well this is a rare hand pain pained pictures at an exhibition named after the famous piece by misorski that hand paints all the movements of This Magnificent work on the Steinway piano for a one-of-a-kind piano that is just unbelievably intricate in its painting So anyway that is the 20 uh questions for you I wonder how many of these true and false you got right how many of them surprised you and if you have any other things that you want to mention about on we do it here at living piano.com your online piano store we're here for you thanks again for joining me I'm Robert EST here at living.com

Channel: LivingPianosVideos

Views: 75,089

Keywords: living pianos], Robert estrin, steinway pianos, Baldwin pianos, classical music piano, piano facts, piano industry, chopin, mozart, beethoven

Id: 3KAqSd2dc5s

Length: 16min 10sec (970 seconds)

Published: Mon May 06 2024