So, this whole thing started because of Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Well, sorta. Granted, no matter when Victoria and I went "antiquing" - aka checking out all the local, for wherever we happen to be, junk stores - I always had my eye out for a piano. But, luckily, there was always a reason to pass on a prospective purchase - too far away (no transport), too expensive, too plain, too.. whatever.
But Mardi Gras was coming, and we decided that this year we would dress steampunk. So we hit the usual junky hotspots, looking for those inexpensive bits and pieces of dials, gauges, tin, antiquy things that lend themselves to the steampunk theme.
Unfortunately, we weren't finding what we wanted/needed cheaply, so we decided to range further afield than we usually go - and I remembered an old antique/junk store we had visited a couple of years ago when we went to the Houston Art Car Museum. Kind of across the street, nice collection irony, farmy kind of stuff. So, on a swing through the better parts of Houston - the Heights, 19th Street, Westheimer, and all those other artsy places, we ended up at the Heights Antique Station on our way home.
While we pawed through various boxes of stuff, I happened to wander ahead - when we do this kind of thing, I'm usually the ranger (looking to see what pops out immediately) and Victoria is the seeker (looking to see what I missed). Well, I found The Piano.
I had never seen one like this - very ornate, brass CANDLE HOLDERS mounted on the front (so you could read the sheet music), a FOLDING SHEET MUSIC STAND (so you could hold up the sheet music), carved legs, beautiful inlay in the wood, what I believed were ivory keys.
And a price tage of $450.
More than I'd spend, but close enough to what I'd consider for a piano - and a beautiful piano, at that - that my interest was piqued.
I hauled Victoria over to look at it, and of course, she was totally taken with it. If nothing else, a beautiful piece of furniture. If nothing else.
But I, having previous piano experience, was much wiser. I knew how heavy pianos are; I knew how cantankerous old pianos can be; I know how hard they are to move. No matter how beautiful. I had to check it out.
Well, the front said 1865. When we cleared all the antiques off the top, and lifted it up, there were the signatures of various tuners who had worked on the instrument through the late 1800's into the 1900's. The sound board, when I got the front lower panel off, looked good - no more cracked sound boards for me. The back was an covered in what looked like authentic cloth with no holes - no peeking there.
Then I tried the keys... No sticking, no permenantly depressed keys, no weird buzzing sounds. But when I got my smart phone out with its guitar tuner app installed - well, that's where the love fest started to sour. Middle C was actually middle A#, and that was on a good day. The rest of the keys were in similar shape.
About that time, I decided to try to lift it, just to see if pianos were as heavy as remembered them to be. Surprisely, this one lifted several inched of the ground without throwing my back out. Good news! Then the right front leg supporting the keyboard bed fell off and clattered to the floor.
Bad news.
As I was fixing that, furtively hoping no one had noticed, one of the men who worked at the place came over. The leg was back on by then, but I was still checking the piano out... The conversation went something like this (unfortunately, I do not have total recall, so I'll paraphrase):
"You interested in that piano?"
"Well, maybe, it certainly is a nice looking instrument"
"Are you a musician?" (My hair was down and I get this a lot, as well as being mistaken as a woman by waiters/esses approaching from the rear)
"Kind of. I play guitar... I know a little bit about piano, but I've always wanted to learn to play better"
"Oh. You should probably walk away"
"Really? I know it's way out of tune, but a good tuning will fix that!"
"Man, this is an ENGLISH piano. A good tuning will fix nothing... Two months later, you'll be tuning it again"
"Seriously? Are English pianos that bad? Because they cam across the ocean? Warped, bad sound board? What?"
"Man, if you want to play a piano, I know a bunch available that you can look at. If you want a nice piece of furniture, well, then you can't do better than this - the lady next door that runs the garden shop has one just like that makes a dandy plant stand."
Now, one of my biggest faults is that I don't listen to people who know what they're talking about when they're speaking. I know that. It's just that I like to do my own research and figure things out for myself. So, about this time, that AM radio buzz you get when you go under a bridge or start to lose the signal began to intrude. I saw lips moving, but not a lot was reaching my eardrums. I got the fact that he didn't think buying this thing as a playable piano was a good idea, but I kinda missed the part on WHY.
So I checked everything out again - price tag (originally $1400, now $450), the label (Cadby piano, 1865), the keys, candle holders, signatures, broken leg, everything.
And Victoria was very supportive - we've always wanted one, the price is not bad, it's very beautiful (she said pretty, I refuse to type that except in parentheses), even if it was just furniture, it would be great!
But I knew. *I* KNEW. Pianos are heavy. No one wants to move - or help move - a piano. Pianos are boat anchors. And we are trying to downsize our household. I knew...
So we went home and I went on the internet. And that's when the depression started.
I knew nothing about vintage English pianos. Well, other than that they had probably be made in England (hence the name). In the Old Days (hence the term vintage). But I found out...
It turns out that vintage English pianos are very beautiful. A whole lot of work and craftmanship goes into the case and body. If you look on the internet, as I did, you'll find out. This one has the folding music stand like the one we'd seen:
I wasn't sure if the candleholders were original, but then I found this:
Now the woodwork of the one we'd seen wasn't quite as nice - close - but those candle holders are almost an exact match.
However, it also turns out that vintage English piano makers did not embrace the concept of an iron frame for the string harp. They used wood. Good English oak, usually.
Which explains why I could pick up the piano by myself, at least enough to cause the leg to fall off. Wood weighs a lot less than iron.
And also explains why the piano was so far out of tune (excusing just common neglect).
A wooden frame warps if temperature and humidity are not constant.
A wooden frame does not hold the string pegs tightly after 50 or so more years - the holes expand.
A piano with a wooden frame is NOT a candidate for rehabilition. It makes a lovely piece of furniture; it will never make a lovely musical instrument for a reasonable amount of money. In fact, it may NEVER make a lovely musical instrument for ANY amount of money.
All the experts said so. If I read the advice "walk away" when some poor besotted soul found one and "go find a more modern instrument" one more time in all the reviews, blogs, restoration sites I looked at, I'd probably puke.
Thoroughly depressed - I really thought this might be the piano - we went to bed and I resolved to forget about this supposed gem.
We needed to walk away.
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