Dear List,  I have read with both amazement, disgust and amusement,
the various accounts of the various technician's encounters with new
"pianos".  (I use that word loosely here, and perhaps I should adopt
D.  L.  Bullock's phrase, "PSO's"!)

I got worried when I started seeing verbiage about "stenciling"
of pianos from the 1920's, as I have a 1923 Grinell Brothers upright
that my wife has had since her childhood.  To tell the truth, I had
never really cared very much for the sound of a piano, until I heard
_that_ one!

For nearly 20 years, it sat in our shop, as there was always the
"Cobbler's Shoe" (you know: the cobbler's kids go barefoot?) plan
for that piano for the living room of our home,

Well, amazingly, that finally happened, and even though it might have
made a "better" job of it, I chose _not_ to re-string the trebles,
although I did re-string the Basses.  That instrument has some of the
longest and heaviest bass strings I have ever encountered, and it has
a bass response and clarity that is to die for.  Frankly, many grands
can't equal this wonderful instrument's tone.

My middle son, who is majoring in music and uses this piano daily for
his studies, keeps "threatening" to "trade it in" on a new grand (which
is what he thinks is somehow the "ultimate" piano.  I've made it clear
under no uncertain terms that I would kill him with my bare hands if
that piano EVER left our house!

After reading these accounts about the "new" pianos, this all the
more reinforces what I have always intuitively felt: that "older is
far better", when it comes to any piano.

If my son decides his lusts won't be satisfied with anything short
of a grand, then I'll probably put him onto an old Chickering and re-
build it for him, for when he moves out!  But in any event, that old,
wonderful Grinell Brothers instrument will be bolted to the floor!
It ain't goin' _nowhere!_  If it does, it will be over my dead body
defending it.

Now, a question: were Grinells "stencil" pianos built by others?  The
plate is cast with Grinnell's name in it, so I'm presuming it was their
own manufacture?

I believe they were some of the finest pianos ever made!

Faithfully,

Richard Schneider, President
Schneider Pipe Organs, Inc.
Kenney, IL   61749-0137

 [ Your kid (mine, too!) is listening to his peers instead of his ears !
 [ Convince him that he should compare the tone of the different pianos
 [ where the audience sits, not where the pianist sits.  Use a cassette
 [ recorder -- the _same_ recorder each time -- to compare the good old
 [ Grinnell with the offerings at the local piano store.  -- Robbie