For all Piano Officianados

[Uncle Al]

Hi folks

Thanks go to our member Zorba - "The Veiled Male" for the following info.

If you've ever wanted your own piano and don't have room for a full size grand,
see Fold Up Piano for a printable alternative to add to the decor of your home.

Have fun "building" your own piano

Uncle Al

[Tor]

There's a fun little thing. Almost tempting to print and make one - but the question for me would be "What do I do with it?" - and I've got enough other things to be making without adding things like that.

Tor

[Kirbstone]

I'd only be interested if one could get a tune out of it at the end.

Once I was presented with a miniature hand-wound music box by my younger son. It played 'The Entertainer', but in G. I was shortly due to take part in a musical evening with a quorum of piano teachers among the guests (as was the host). I prepared a few bars of that rag transposed into G and when my turn came I mounted this little thing on his eight- foot Steinway and wound out the recognisable little jingles, followed by the few bars in G, stuffed in a G-seventh chord and roared away in C major, Scott Joplin's original key.

It got a few laughs, anyway.

T.

[crfriend]

[...] I prepared a few bars of that rag transposed into G and when my turn came I mounted this little thing on his eight- foot Steinway and wound out the recognisable little jingles, followed by the few bars in G, stuffed in a G-seventh chord and roared away in C major, Scott Joplin's original key.

Oh, that strikes a chord with me (pun intended) as I positively adore ragtime -- and Joplin was one of the grand-masters of the art. It also pains me no end that so many folks confuse ragtime and jazz; the two cannot be more different!

In any event, here's a perennial favourite of mine, The Maple Leaf Rag as played on a pedal harpsichord -- a superior instrument in my view. Too, ragtime is new enough that we have "recordings" of the genre in the composers' own voices: The Maple Leaf Rag, again, this time on a player-piano roll created by the master himself. Isn't technology grand.

It got a few laughs, anyway.

I'd hope it got uproarious applause!

[Kirbstone]

Some time ago Joshua Rifkin in a series of TV broadcasts & tours brought ragtime and Joplin in particular back into the public consciousness. I bought a book of Joplin rags and devoured it. The Maple Leaf rag is about the most difficult of them technically to play and for a time it was one of those I could deliver by heart.
Over time, however it has fallen into personal disuse as that piece is jolly hard work to play and hard work on the ears too if delivered often. Should I require it for some future event or show I know exactly where to find the music and after a few runs through we'd be flying again.
Jazz on the other hand took Joplin themes and chord sequence ideas and projected them tangentially onto quite another plane. With that development 'Swing' also emerged, spawning a treasure trove of gorgeous melodies and tunes promulgated by 'the Greats' to which we all still dance today.
My still very athletic MM is a flyer on the dance floor and only last night/this morning we danced to a small group of Swing & Traditional Jazz artists until we perspired/expired at not far short of 2AM.

Friday night next we celebrate 44 years of Marital Strife & we have some 30 mostly musical 'usual suspects' showing up at Castle Kirby dressed for 'A night at the Opera'. After they have been well fed & watered we'll get going with the personal contributions for which we have rehearsed several already....e.g. 'Three little maids from School' from G&S's HMS Pinnafore and the bit from the Magic Flute where thre guy (Can't think of his name) plays the little run on the flute several times (ME!).
Our little nr. will be from LLoyd Webber's' Phantom'...'All that I ask you'. I know it's the duet sung by the character 'Raoul' with Sarah Brightman, but that other nr. 'Music of the Night' sung by the Phantom himself hasn't a note in it for the girl.!!
Anyway, that evening will no doubt end with a lot of us dancing to a compilation of 20's to 60's Swing & Jazz No.s which we have on disc.

T.

[the_scott_meister]

Nice little find. I've got to print that out and put it on my shelf. I've got several other little diplay pianos that are fun to look at. I used to could play the Maple Leaf Rag, though not very good. I could muddle through it.

[mugman]

I already have a 1/12 scale grand on a shelf with a pianist to match so not much point in more dust collectors. I seem to specialise in collecting dust collectors.

Pete

[Different_Trains]

I build guitars, mandolins, ukuleles and all manner of stringed instruments but not paper ones! (nor pianos actually...)

[Sarongman]

An impressive lot of instruments in your site. Have you built any bowed instruments, dobros or lap steels? I'm impressed that a real live luthier has graced our forum, probably my fault in not investigating the personal details earlier.

[Different_Trains]

An impressive lot of instruments in your site. Have you built any bowed instruments, dobros or lap steels? I'm impressed that a real live luthier has graced our forum, probably my fault in not investigating the personal details earlier.

I have built some bowed instruments. I built a few medieval fiddles and their South American relatives. I usually do plucked instruments though. I've restored a lap steel guitar before.

[Kirbstone]

Impressive, D_T. I've added that stringed instrument database to my 'favourites'.

T.

[crfriend]

A few posts back I mentioned that I hold the harpsichord in high esteem and cherish its ability to do things that any and all of the pianos I have been exposed to cannot. I am no Dr. Kirby and cannot sit in front of any (musical) keyboard and acquit myself well (Hell, at all), but know what I like.

This is not to say I don't like piano music, for there are many very good works for the instrument out there. However, I have always held a soft spot in my heart for the harpsichord.

And this may be why. I just finished out another loud bout of Biggs and the Maple Leaf Rag (marvelling at how technical that piece actually is), and jammed a search into youTube for something I have not heard in almost a half-century -- and a (CORRECT!) result was coughed up in deciseconds. All I could do is put my head back, listen, marvel, and recall -- because a whole pile of stuff came back in a flash. Fortunately, it was mostly good.

And, somewhere out of that, so many years ago, began an understanding of harmonics and dynamics that actually helped shape my life. Isn't music grand!

[Kirbstone]

Lovely clip that, Carl. I have had the pleasure of playing Jane Austen';s Square piano in Chawton, Hampshire, her old home, but alas I have never played a harpsichord. Small portable examples have just one manual and are light enough to be carted around easily, but the big two manual jobs are the preserve of serious keyboard professionals and are nearly as difficult to shift as a grand piano. Reason is the beefed-up case to take the tension of a great many more strings.
Here in Dublin we have a harpsichord maker who used to be a cooper (making wooden barrels) for Guinness. He makes splendid instruments to order.

T.

[Sarongman]

The middle class of England has, for some few centuries, always liked it's keyboard instruments. Back in the time of the Great fire of London, Samuel Pepys noted that one out of every three lighters on the Thames full of household goods had a pair of Virginals in it. And this was a general term as the spinet and harpsichord were rapidly supplanting the virginal by the 1600s. ( A pair of virginals, by the way, like a pair of trousers, meant a single instrument!)

[crfriend]

( A pair of virginals, by the way, like a pair of trousers, meant a single instrument!)

I recall a number of years ago attending a recital done on a double virginal. This was an interesting device in which the two keyboards and string boxes could be decoupled from one another and played separately by two people or combined and be played as a single instrument by one player.

I recall the sound being quite harpsichordish.