Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Forum Gov. regulations (pending) affecting pianos with ivory...

Alex,

So sad to hear of your experience. The issue that you had with the movers is one that I predict will come to light here. The movers don't want to have to deal with the regulators because of the documentation and the instances of seizure but also because their own personnel doesn't have the skill to properly identify whether it is ivory or not.

The simplest answer for them is to refuse to move a piano with questionable keys.

Of course we are still waiting for an announcement of the rules here in the US but several states now have their own conflicting laws.

Thank you, Sally. I'm aware of it's low market value, but was wondering if I'd realistically be able to replace one of the ivory keys in the future, should the need ever arise....

You may not be able to have a keytop replaced. It will depend on how they enforce and what guidelines NY will give to technicians. As I read it there is no exception for repairs, only for the sale of musical instruments containing ivory made before 1976. This is the problem with hastily passed state legislation.

There are too many questions and no concrete answers for industry professionals. For instance in the new California law they are not allowing anyone to give away ivory if it is part of an item to keep people from saying that they are selling the piano but giving away the keys.

On the front page of today's Seattle Times there is an article describing how Paul Allen is funding an initiative to the voters of Washington State regarding banning trading in exotic species.

The article says there are specific exemptions for musical instruments.

Exotic species is a fairly undefined (broad brush) term. Any examples of what Paul thinks that the masses of ordinary people should be banned from having?

Shouldn't piano tuners qualify as an "exotic species"? Our ears are regarded as powerful aphrodisiacs in some parts of the world!

Dale,
I think you should be able to access the article at the Seattle Times website and get answers there. They listed a dozen or so endangered species and I can't remember them.

Ryan,
Just be careful what you stick in your ears!! You never know where or who they have been with in the past. Always practice "safe tuning".

What concerns me about these laws is that although they may exempt musical instruments, the situation for those of us who use salvaged ivory for repairs is unclear.

Received an email from one who supplied reclaimed ivory to us for rebuilds and repairs in the past. It seems that the person has been informed that neither Etsy nor Ebay will allow these to be advertised through their sites henceforth even forever and ever. And so the individual is going direct.

I guess he didn't get the memo.

On my return trip from China July 3 I saw at the Bejing airport a very large poster with Yao Ming, (the basketball player), Prince William, (heir to the British Throne) and,(I think) James Franco, (actor), with an english script asking people to forgo Ivory. There was Chinese script as well but I can't decipher it.

Really good news about Elephant Ivory and the US regulations. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has announced the proposed rule regarding the importation and sales of ivory. I still have to read all of this and pose some questions to the attorneys that I have been working with, but if this goes through without change the majority of issues will be resolved without affecting pianos.

The "de minimis" portion of the rule allows for small amounts of ivory that are included in a larger item. The date here is 1990 which will include pianos imported with ivory that were manufactured prior to that date. The amount of 200 grams will easily cover the weight of ivory on a piano.

http://www.fws.gov/international/pdf/african-elephant-4d-proposed-rule-copy.pdf

Here is the excerpt pertaining to musical instruments:

We propose to allow sale and offer for sale of ivory in interstate or foreign commerce along with delivery, receipt, carrying, transport, or shipment of ivory in interstate or foreign commerce in the course of a commercial activity without a threatened species permit for manufactured items containing de minimis amounts of ivory, provided they meet the following criteria:
ï‚· For items located in the United States, the ivory was imported into the United States prior to January 18, 1990 (the date the African elephant was listed in CITES Appendix I) or was imported into the United States under a CITES pre-Convention certificate with no limitation on its commercial use;
ï‚· For items located outside the United States, the ivory is pre-Convention (removed from the wild prior to February 26, 1976 (the date the African elephant was first listed under CITES));
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ï‚· The ivory is a fixed component or components of a larger manufactured item and is not, in its current form, the primary source of value of the item;
ï‚· The manufactured item is not made wholly or primarily of ivory;
ï‚· The total weight of the ivory component or components is less than 200 grams;
ï‚· The ivory is not raw; and
 The item was manufactured before the effective date of the final rule for this action. We have included the phrase “in its current form” in the criterion stating that the ivory is
not the primary source of value of the item, to make clear that we would consider the value added by the craftsmanship (carving, etc.) that went into the ivory component, not just the value of the ivory itself. We use the phrase “wholly or primarily” (in the next criterion) as those terms are commonly defined in the dictionary. We consider “wholly” to mean “entirely, totally, altogether” and “primarily” to mean “essentially, mostly, chiefly, principally.” We have chosen 200 grams as the weight limit because we understand that this is the approximate maximum weight of the ivory veneer on a piano with a full set of ivory keys and that this quantity would also cover most other musical instruments with ivory trim or appointments. We also understand the 200-gram limit would cover a broad range of decorative and utilitarian objects containing small amounts of ivory (insulators on old tea pots, decorative trim on baskets, and knife handles, for example).

Sally:
This reads like really good news - some reasonable, common sense, for a change.
Thanks so much for keeping us informed.
Karl Watson,
Staten Island, NY

Yes, this is good news. For the purposes of law enforcement, the instructions to officials in the field can be boiled down to two words: fuggedabout pianos.... ;-)

Lang Lang, too.

Very glad to see this law worked oot in favour of honouring the legacy ivory usage, while reducing new/replacement ivory market. As you can tell by my comment, I'm in Canada eh. I don't think we have such restrictions on old ivory, but am curious to see.

I recently acquired this mid/late 1800's Colley & Co. square grand, which I would assume used ivory.

Can anyone confirm from these pics if this is ivory?

It's ivory.

Thanks for keeping us informed, and I'm happy to read some (mostly) good news for piano owners. Sally worked really hard, behind the scenes, trying to educate officials about an industry they simply didn't understand.

Exactly.

I wrote my Congressmen and said BRAVO.

"Having said that, I have noticed that some higher end digital pianos make plastic keys with subtle groove patterns that mimic the same patterns of real ivory, and they do a pretty good job of it. I would hopefully suggest that the piano industries put some extra effort into refining that process even further."

I just hope this doesn't confuse regulators or movers in the future!

Not quite sure I agree here. Modern companies like Yamaha and others have had ample time to research and engineer something akin to "synthetic ivory", and the result (like Ivorite) has the tactile properties of ivory but not the inconsistencies and minor flaws of the real thing.

I have discussed this with several professional pianists, and they agree that the only reason ivory was ever used as piano keys is that there wasn't anything better to use 100-200 years ago. Now that there is, artificially adding things like grooves to simulate a surface that was less than ideal in the first place is not preferred, at least in their view.