How much would you pay for a decent new piano?

I'm sure this is a "how long is a piece of string" question, but if you assume that I'd pay between $2K and $4K for an electric guitar, maybe that helps as a point of reference. Oh, and I'm talking about one of the upright-shaped things, not a big-ass Grand.

This would be for home use. Five thousand? Ten thousand? More?

Cheers.

Aha! Finally!

You should be able to get a decent used starter piano for 2K and a really nice one for 4k or so.

I'm guessing you'd pay somewhere between 2K and 4K for one of those upright things, not one of those big-ass Grands.

(Hell, I dunno. I paid $21K for my big-ass Grand, so... Wasn't shopping uprights, so I'm no help, sorry)

Better check the delivery charge, return delivery charge and re-stocking fee...

Mark

Yo DLP, what plans do you have for said upright thingie? You've got a PC3x, what more do you need piano-wise?

Just pondering the concept of ditching all the synth stuff in favor of a piano. Pondering, you know.

You clearly will need a room full of pianos, with a lot of buying and selling on ebay.

Alright, fair enough! I'll give you all three (3) pages to mock me, and then you have to say something helpful. Or, post lolcats. Your choice.

Don't do it, unless:

-- You have kids whose musical talents you want to nurture;

-- Expect to entertain others with your brilliant reading of "Yellowbird";

-- Enjoy paying someone $100 every few months for tunings;

-- Truly want to hone your piano skills with "real" piano music.

Otherwise, it's not worth it.

Wait, wtf, there's no "autotune" button?

Seriously. You will be sad. There's no phat beatz, no "BWWAAAAAAARRRROOOOOORRREEEEEEEEEEEE", no ease of editing.

And no headphones.

I disagree with all of this.

But I could pretend to be Hugh Laurie in House, M.D.

Don't do it, DLP. You'll become EFG XD

No really, with all the stuff that has passed through your hands, you have finally made your rig a great one for recording stuff. Explore it a few years. You don't need a piano now, really.

I saw him play air-synth to "Baba O' Reily" on one episode. Much cheaper.

Three words. Gibson Robot Piano.

A nice upright is a true joy. Around $2500 will easily get you a decent-quality used one in good condition - at least that seemed to be the "magic number" seven years back when I was looking.

Older ones are nicer as the soundboards are usually a larger chunk of wood instead of a composite of smaller ones. Older ones will probably initially require some regulation ("tune up" - sanding hammers, leather care, lubrication, etc...). A piano will need to be tuned about once a year (approx $100).

No sample will come close to the real thing - in some ways a sampled grand dosen't even sound as good as a mediocre upright. Plus you can have lots of fun with mic type and placement.

I wouldn't know what to do without Marie, my Baldwin "Acrosonic" spinet...I keep her well-tuned and she loves me for it. Carnally.

A nice upright is a true joy. $2500 will easily get you a used one in good condition. Older ones are nicer as the soundboards are usually a larger chunk of wood instead of a lot of smaller ones. Older ones will require some regulation ("tune up" - sanding hammers, leather care, lubrication, etc...). A piano will need to be tuned about once a year (approx $100). No sample will come close to the real thing - in some ways a sampled grand dosen't even sound as good as a crappy spinet. I wouldn't know what to do without Marie, my Baldwin "Acrosonic" spinet...I keep her well-tuned and she loves me for it. Carnally.

Thanks for the info!

FYI, these thoughts were prompted by my PC3X needing repair. We'll see how long that takes. Made me think, ah, what if life were simpler...

Already? What happened?

carbon111,

Random question, but where do you get those square tiled thingies?

I lack squared tiled thingies.

A few years ago I spent about six months shopping for a new upright piano. Living in Chicago, I had the opportunity to try more instruments than I can remember, from relatively entry-level Yamahas at about $6,500 to Bosendorfers at about $26,000. If price were no object, I would have bought a Bechstein Model 8, which was beyond a doubt the most wonderful upright piano I have ever played.

In the end, I decided upon a Yamaha U3, a 52" professional upright that I would definitely call a "decent" new piano. As I recall, it was about $8,500, but that was a few years ago.

That is a beautiful thing. Thanks for the info! This thread is helping me greatly.

So do you have a "NAUGHTY" poster somewhere else in the house? :poke:

(above the synths, you guys - geez...)

One of the black keys (one of the B flats) suddenly started making a fairly loud mechanical clicking sound when pressed. You can sort of feel it, too. Something in there isn't right.

Well go to the local paper and check the prices for used pianos, it seems that people today can not sell a used piano anymore. Plenty of ads in my local paper, with prices like "for 100 Euros", for free or some people even trying to pay to have someone picking up their old piano to avoid having to bring it to the local recycling plant.

OK, these pianos are not top of the range Steinways, but it seems that piano sales have decreased a lot, ordinary people just don't buy acoustic pianos anymore (check the statistics for sales).

If they buy something they'll get a digital piano, but I guess even more reason is that kids today can't be convinced to spend so much time learning something as boring as playing the piano when they can be playing guitar hero, sending text messages or surfing the net instead....

So the point is, if you are the type of guy who is buying and selling equipment, pianos are not the best choice. Heavy as hell and there's not alot of buyers. Get yourself a decent secondhand piano for cheap or rent one for a while before you commit yourself to buy a brand new piano that you will have problems selling later.

They are diffusor/absorbers constructed from 4each Auralex DST-114 squares. The rest of the room, the area behind the monitors and the ceiling are treated as well for a moderately dead response to facilitate micing of vocals and acoustic instruments like my piano. I also have bass traps in the corners.