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When I was a toddler, my father (a poor country preacher) bought an old 1906 Whitney upright made by Kimball in Chicago at an auction for $6. It traveled with my family to Kansas, back to California, Arkansas, and Missouri before we gave it away to an upstart church. The church auctioned it off for charity where it brought $50 in about 1988.

That old piano was a former player (had the little door in the bottom board where pedals used to be) and was incredibly heavy even though we took most of the led tubing out of it. However, it was the piano I learned on. It was a beautiful mahogany piano with the woodwork indicative of it's era. It was never an extraordinary piano, but it was ours. While I wouldn't suggest anyone give their kids lessons on one like it today, it was all we had, and we were grateful.

Now I'm 40 years old and have been "in the business" half my life. I've had the privelage of owning and playing the finest pianos in the world. Today, I find myself a little nostalgic and wonder if I could ask a question I hope will become an entertaining thread:

What was your first piano?

Feel free to post pics if you have them!

Well, my first piano wasn't all that long ago (2004), so it will be a short walk. It was a Kohler & Campbell 42" console that I paid full asking price for, not knowing anything at all about pianos. This was after shopping around for used pianos in my city and getting discouraged on multiple occasions when a piano that was described as "excellent condition" and "like new" would be discovered to have missing pedals, keys that wouldn't hit, etc.

I upgraded after a year and haven't looked back.

My family's first piano was a Knabe spinet, it's long gone. My family's second piano was a Hardman Peck grand that my maternal grandfather bought, my brother has it now and a few years ago had it totally rebuilt (I know, not worth it, but he thought differently). My then wife and I purchased a Samick console a few decades ago and a few years ago I purchased an Estonia 190 from Ori.

The first piano I actually purchased/owned was an old upright that had a name on the cast iron plate “Cadillac”. Of course it was not made in Detroit .

Best regards,

Rickster

I learned on a beaten up old Gulbransen that had been purchased for my mother. She hated piano lessons and never progressed. So naturally, she pushed ME into lessons and made me practice on the same beaten up old piano that she had used.

I can't say I have any fond memories of it. When I was 15 we got a Kawai 550 grand masquerading as a Howard, which was heaven by comparison.

Actually Rick, it might have been. The only info I found in pierce piano atlas was 1910-1922 Detroit, London!

My first piano was a 1930 Wurlitzer studio upright purchased by my mom in 1965. It was bought from a used piano shop that had a lot of those old "mirror" pianos. This was the only piano in the shop that hadn't had its case cut down and replaced with mirrors.

It had very clean lines and beautiful mahogany finish. The action was good, but it never really sounded right in the bass section. Many years later I pulled it out from the wall and discovered that the ribs were separating from the soundboard. The shop's "fix" was to jam old scrap wood between the back post and the rib to keep it from buzzing. The scrap wood stayed in place for forty years.

It was still in my mom's home when it was inundated by Hurricane Katrina. After the water went down, I found that the old piano had pretty much exploded. The plate was on one side of the room, and parts of the action, case and strings all over the rest of the room.

My piano now is a Charles Walter console which is light-years beyond the old Wurlitzer.

Dennis C.: Actually, that was several years ago. However, I learned some valuable lessons when I bought that old piano. I learned that you should always inspect the bridges for cracks and splits before you buy a used piano . The local piano tech told me that it would cost more to fix than it would be worth; so, to overcome my embarrassment, I took on the project myself. I fabricated a new bass bridge, replaced the old yellowed key-tops, replaced the key punchings and under felts, regulated the action and tuned it; I refinished the cabinet and played the heck out of it for about a year. I finally sold it for almost what I had in it.

Then, about 3 years ago, my mom reinvigorated my interest in pianos when she gave me an old Conover Cable console. Of course, it was in a lot better shape that the old “Cadillac” .

Best regards,

Rickster

My first piano was a Chickering upright. Ribboned grained mahogany, it was built in a style to look like a square piano--it wasn't but the lid fit over the entire top half of the piano.

The interesting thing is that on the harp of the piano (of all Chickerings, I think) is a Legion of Honour award from Napoleon III. When I moved to NYC to live on 57th Street my condo looked down over the building on the north side of the street and one of them was (or must have been) the Chickering building--next door to Steinway Hall.

The store in the building is long gone--but at the top of the building is a huge copy of the Legion of Honour star that was in my Chickering.

I have pictures at home--I'll post them when i get back.

Here's what the star looks like:

My first piano was an old pre-WWI German upright which had been the piano my father also learnt to play on in the 1920s. It is (I say "is" because I still have it, and still use it!) a Mignon, distributed by the (now defunct) Sydney firm Nicholson and Co. (they distributed other German pianos like Feurich, I believe). Very nice veneer on the fallboard! I don't know when the candle-sconces were ditched, but long before I was around!

I keep it tuned, and use it as a second piano when teaching. For its age and the amount of use it's had, it isn't too bad! All the notes play, the action is loose but relatively even, and the sound, whilst not strong, is quite mellow and sweet, though a bit fuzzy now in places.

My father taught me to play initially, and between the two of us it got a lot of use! He played Bing Crosby, Fats Waller, Irving Berlin, Tiger Rag on it, and I played Chopin and Beethoven. To say it has immense sentimental value is somewhat of an understatement! When I play it now I can hear him play once more, though he died more than 30 years ago …

Currawong, why do the keys feel delicious to the eye as though fingers would love to touch them? Is there anything unusual about these keys?

It's a beautiful piano with such lovely memories.

KS

I think they're the standard ivory keys of the time (and they do feel nice). What is perhaps unusual is that they haven't yellowed at all. This may have something to do with my father's philosophy on pianos: you never close them up because you are sure to be walking past a few times every hour and will want to sit down and play. I think I've absorbed this philosophy too .

The first piano I had was the Stark studio piano that my mother bought when she first went to work in the 1940's. We traded it in on the Acrosonic Console in the early 1960's. I still have that piano as well as my Mason-Hamlin "A".

When I started lessons, my parents bought a spinet (these were the 1950s) carrying the name "Bremen," in a blonde finish. Ten years later, I was doing most of my practicing away at schools, and did not own a piano of my own until 1970, and an old ornate upright at that.

My brother adopted that old family Bremen, and even had it refinished in satin black. It's a mind trip to go visit and see my childhood piano!

My parents bought a cheap Kurtzmann upright in 1974 hoping their 8-year-old son would take to it. I did and that was my piano until I moved to an apartment and had to give it up for a Roland digital that would not bother neighbors. The Kurtzmann was never very good, but it was good enough. I do know where it is: my mom and I let a good friend of ours have so that she could perhaps motivate her granddaughter to learn. When I moved to this new place in this past fall, I got myself the piano of my dreams, a Steinway B. So I doubt I'll ever have that Kurtzmann in my home again, but it is somewhat reassuring to know where it is and that it's with good people.

Rafael

My parents bought a shiny new Baldwin Acrosonic spinet for my sister and I for the princely sum of $1795 (I have the original receipt)in 1965. I just gave it away last year. It wasn't a great piano, but it was good enough for one semi serious student and one very reluctant one to try to learn on.

My very first piano was purchased by my Tante Caroline for my family when I was little morethan a toddler. It was a Winter console.

Hey Rich: top o the mornin. But empty your inbox, man!

First piano? No clue.

Painted brown upright my father purchased for $800 and moved himself right into my bedroom. He insisted it was a good piano - and I'm certain it was. He knew quite a bit about technology of musical instruments in general, but I hated it! The albatross of my room. Even stopped playing piano for several years because of it!

Maybe my owning a piano store is some latent pent up feelings about that piano

My parent's piano now? Shigeru Kawai SK-7 that I personally picked out. Boy are they lucky.

BC

Wow .... would like to think that one day my kids, too, have such fond memories