Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner PIANO WORLD- the first years...

Well, it's the close of a decade and PIANO WORLD is how old??? I thought (and really, I consider myself a freshman member) I'd see what the original PW people think about this site during this decade. You must have see the growth first hand!! This is a really cool site and I learn something every day! This thread has no guidelines except here are some questions- (choose one, none or all)

Why do you visit PW? PC?

What have you learned from PW? PC?

How has PW evolved? (forum members who have seen the early years)

Has there been memorable threads on Pianist Corner?

Ah, yes, the legendary Coffee Room. Well worth a visit.

Ah yes, the Coffee Room. People who think things get contentious around here now should look at some of the big threads in the pre-moderated days of Coffee Room (while it still existed), Pianists Corner and Piano World.

When I look back at some of those threads....no wonder Frank closed it down.

Before there was PW, there was r.m.m.p.

Steven

In the very early days people used normal names like Dan, Amy, Alex, Brendan, though a few cool people were more inventive like pianoloverus (still around). There were a lot of us lurking back then before committing to join because it wasn't clear how websites and blogs were supposed to work.

Nobody knew what a flamefest was at first - in fact in the first few years there was more politeness. But that eventually gave way to some passionate fights in the Coffee Room. Most of the fights then and now are about pianos, with occasional dust-ups over composer likes and dislikes.

Ten years ago, certain brand names didn't exist or were just coming on to market, so there was a lot of curiosity about high end pianos like Steingraeber, Fazioli, Estonia, and Mason & Hamlin in its revived form. Very few people had ever seen or played these instruments. Steinway was therefore unchallenged on the high end, and it has been interesting to see their dominance weaken a bit in ten years time with all the competition. Steinway pianos still seem to me by far to be the source of ongoing controversies and fights, and after all this time I still haven't figured out what it is about the instrument that incites so much anger. If you've been around long enough, these flamefests get repetitive and you learn to avoid them, just as you learn to avoid certain teenagers who are convinced they know everything and like to throw out bombshells just for fun. As a general rule, I also stay away from dealer fights because they usually become exercises in name calling.

Perhaps the saddest thing that happened here in the past decade was the Piano Superstore fiasco. A lot of people learned to be a little less trusting of what people say or claim on the internet after that incident. But 98% of the time the information and opinions you get here are valuable and without any doubt Piano World has helped a lot of people become better musicians, more astute shoppers, and if you are in the piano business, better manufacturers and salespeople. That is quite an accomplishment so Frank B. has much for which he can be proud.

Well, in my time here perhaps the most interesting thread was the case of the disappearing Boesendorfer. The one that supposedly was left in a hotel room somewhere. This was also a thread about unscrupulous behavior and catching the guilty party.

Ah yes, I remember r.m.m.p

Those discussions were, um, spirited!

I managed to save a few threads from 10 years ago.

The Way We Were

I started Piano World as a hobby, something I could do with my new found HTML skills (web site programming for those who may not know).

Alas, my programming skills did not keep up, but luckily Piano World has, thanks primarily to the input of our members.

It is now my primary focus, and lots of fun for me.

I just hope we can continue to do our little part in helping people discover the joys of owning/playing a piano.

there's a narrative of the early days of pianoworld in "grand obsession" in chapter 6 "piano world" (naturally) and in chapter 15 "the piano crawl" in which you also learn something about frank's background in music, and also about the background and personal interests of several other early forum members.

i came on board when there were just a handful of us, and it was a much more peaceable universe back then. the attacks of sept. 11th set us off in a different direction for awhile, which you can also rediscover in a forum frank created just for discussing that event.

it's really quite remarkable that frank has been able to preserve this long social history. thank you, frank, for creating this place and maintaining it. i know it's a hugely important part of many of our lives, and some of my best friends in real life are now people i first encountered at piano world.

Over the last seven years, the main thing I have learned from Pianoworld is how most other people, especially musicians, think about music. That has been the real eye-opener for me. I completely lacked any understanding of what might be termed conventional musical perception. I met Matthew Collett through this site, even though he was living just a few miles away from me, and at his piano parties I have met and heard several other interesting players. Such is the power of the internet to bring people together constructively.

I spend much less time posting on forums of any sort recently because I am too busy actually playing and making recordings but I still enjoy reading what people have to say every day or two.

Anyone remember some ridiculous lady whose name in Russian meant Dark Eyes? Trying to sell some music product over and over and over and over?

Fun stuff.

Well, once upon at time, prior to September 9, 2006, there was no "Just for those Totally Devoted to Chopin" thread. Now it's hard to imagine ABF forum without it. We've had Hershey Felder (Gershwin, Monsieur Chopin, Beethoven as I Knew Him)and Dr Jeff Kallberg (Chopin at the Boundaries) post there. We've had Angela Lear (The Original Chopin)as a consultant. We've had our own representative (LisztAddict) make it into the second round of the Amateur International Chopin Competition in Warsaw this past October. We initiated the first composer themed recitals and coined the term "e-cital." We owe a great debt to LovesChopinToo Much (our Kathleen) for starting and nurturing it. The thread now has more than 5,600 entries and over 112,000 views. I don't know if this is some sort of internet record but I think it might possibly be.

Was that the one trying to sell SoftMozart in the teachers forum? That's when I first came on.

Cathy

"dark eyes" in russian (transliterated) is chornaya glaza. was there really a screen handle here by that name?

i missed that contribution.

the coffee room was insane sometimes, where you can read everything from WMD to Bush vs. Gore and etc. and believe it or not, many people argued about WMD as if it really existed somewhere in a Iraq secret place... just think how insane and intense that coffee room became then... so, it was closed forever, and i don't miss it.

I can't believe I've been hanging around here for 2 years now, mostly in the Devoted to Chopin corner. I remember quite a few years ago looking for something like this, but it didn't yet exist. (I'd been in a lute discussion group where the flames flew thick and fast, and had had enough of that!)

At Piano World I've met some of the most fascinating people I've encountered in my whole life, and I feel privileged to count them as friends. Thank you to everyone!

Elene

seems like this would make a great story on NPR...

Imagine PianoWorld before this thread:

http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1337474/1.html

LOL

Wasn't it something like "Ochi chernye", named after the song?

Hmmmm...do I hear a can opener?