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Hello and thank you...

This main hall of the Casino is dry (but not completly) and very tall... The recording is from a cybershot 16.1 HD... but they did some (very small) amplification with very close micriphones inside piano... but they know what they were doing... I tryed the piano with no amplification process and there wasn`T much of a difference because the amplification wasn´t that loud too... Sometimes amplification can really disturb the real sound of piano but to me it wasn`t too diferent in this case... Sometimes can be a real catastrofe...

Greetings

Thak you!

Well i think top, no matter their provinience can make a lot for pianists. Also different pianos can make a lot for different composers...

In the past 5 yeras we could see online top international competiotions such as Cliburn, Chopin or Tchaikovsky with several pianos to choose (Fazioli, Seinway (New York and Hamburg), Yamaha and Kawai for instance) and somtimes you get the impretion that the piano choice is more related to composer or type of work (solo, chamber or concerto)than pianist... And they even get to change piano choice in several rounds... For instance: no one would do a Prokofiev concerto in an hamburg steinway... but they love it to Debussy or Ravel repertoir because it has great pianissimo quality...

Anyway at some point you are right, small tail piano yamaha is not the best choice to record... but that we all know :-(

Greetings and thank you!

Hmm...my favorite - and most would say the benchmark - recording of Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Major is by Martha Argerich. Are you saying she did not perform on a Hamburg Steinway?

Thank you! "Highly trained and discerning" ears are important but maybe is not the case... :-)
The quality of receording is not professional... you are absolutly right... Anyway, the paino helped more than i would think a C2 would respond...
Another important thing is that i`m always controling una corda so the piano doesn`t get to bright to nocturne ambience... with no una corda it was a little histeric but never too much... wich gives me a bigger option in colors (and that i didn`t expect for C2 also).
Greetings

Andre--could you perhaps be more specific? What would you ask the technician to do to a new C3 (or C2) to improve it, and would your focus be to primarily change the touch or the sound? Thank you in advance for a reply.

Good point!!

I`m lazy too but unfortunatly the venus wich i play don`T always have Hamburg or New York Steiway or Fazioli or Yamaha CFX or Imperial Bosendorfer... so we have to get (unfortunatly) used to adversity... :-(.

Anyway, this one for me had a "forgiving" touch but i think he was very treated and i don`t think taht it`s a instrument that is played very often (so it was almost has new)...

We will always fight with theese small price pianos and sometimes i also get to fight with top pianos... It`s un unperfect world with unperfect pianos and we all have unperfect hands...

Greetings

I hope so... I`ve played in CF and have a litlle recording of Warsaw Concerto (live). Maria João Pires also had one (but i`m not sure is CF or CFX) and she played in several concerts with it...

Greetings

Hello
In this case we are talking of top Technicians (in Portugal also steiway representant) and they surelly know more about it than me... Unfortunatly i`m not a Zimmerman or Sokolov that not only plays very well but also knows and treats all the technic of the piano himself...

I also don`t know some of the terms in englih but in terms oh hammers a lot can be done to help softning the touch (i a have eared some great improvments in very bad hammer pianos). For chamber music, when i can, i ask to "clip" the velcrum of the hammers to soften the primary atack of note, so its easier to bound with other instruments. With orchestra it`s the opostie way...
2 years ago i had a 1/4 tail rippen with 20 years that was hard as heck and the technician spent 8 hours working on it (just mechanic) and it improved a lot... but unfortunatly its a job by it self and i would never get to learn it...
A good tuning can also give more resonance to the piano and make a brighter or darker color (and that we al know) but i`m not a tuner... :-(

I was talking about competitors... and it was a specific Steinway Hamburg D that had no high note projection... And for that no one with a Prokofiev concerto picked it (the competitors).

In terms of recordings my favourite is Toradze (5 Piano concertos) and it`s not in a Steinway Hamburg D... But i also like Argerich. Is it really in a Steinway Hamburg D?

Thank you for your reply, Andre.

It sounds as though you're suggesting work on the hammers more to affect the touch than the sound. Am I hearing that right? If so, this is a surprise for me to hear about.

I think i`m talking about both. For instance:
"I ask to "clip" the velcrum of the hammers to soften the primary atack of note" - In here i`m talking about sound for instance... And it can really change the sound of the piano...

Greetings

It is nearly always a Hamburg D. I can name some very few classical recordings that were made on other brands (Pletnev on Bluthner, Pizarro on Bluther or Yamaha, Schiff on perhaps Schimmel or Bosendorfer, etc) -- but I would wager that 95-99% of the classical piano recordings that I listen to regularly were recorded:

A. In Europe and
B. On a Hamburg Steinway

Andre,

Beautiful performance. Thank you for posting.

Andre:

Always nice to hear from other parts of the world especially some of my own favorite ones....

One question please:

What pianos are commonly used in Portugal in comparable venues?

Norbert

Thank you for replying. Forgive my ignorance but what does "velcrum of the hammers" mean?

Hello again

In big venues is the Steinway...
In Schools is a Yamaha world...
C5 or C7 are the most common to see in school auditorios with the exception on Lisbon, Porto, Coimbra and Braga that have also Steinway. In Coimbra we have Steinway Hamburg D in conservatory and a New York Steinway in a concert hall.

In my town there are also lots of Rippen (tail and upright)...

There are (i think )2 Fazioli in concert halls in Portugal.
I have myself a Kawai (upright) but is not very common to see a tail Kawai in concert hall.
There are also bosendorff but also not very common... My University has one but its not a common piano in concert hall.

Greetings
André

Hello agian

I belive the correct term is the hammer "felt" that gets in contact with the string.

Greetings
André

I belive the correct term is the hammer "felt" that gets in contact with the string.

Greetings
André [/quote]

Thank you. My new C2 comes with a free tuning and a free hammer voicing. This gives me something to discuss with the technician. Thanks again!

Technicians are the pianist's best "friends". In a recent interview with a famouse portuguese pianist, he said that he does not stand alone... He his the combination of himself, the manager and the technician... All three toghether is what makes him have a good sound a of course a carrear... We can't just stand alone in order to make music has we love it...

Greetings