chris667

If you think you never overplay, it might be you.

Whatever you do, when dealing with any insurance company get the thing you've asked them for in writing.

I might judge you a bit.

Yes, but I honestly think that many musicians won't care. I'm not experienced with basses yet, but I've played lots of other instruments. I've played high end instruments that were just shite. Some high end stuff will always have value, but there is just too much good stuff out there.

That's sort of my point. Honestly, not so long ago a lot of new inexpensive instruments were often junk. Now, brands like Harley Benton make some superb instruments! Far better QC. And if you do get a bad one you send it back and you can have another one the next day. I reckon about a fifth of my ebay purchases work out. It's an expensive gamble.

Yes, but it's always a gamble!

Why bother with secondhand? The truth is cheap instruments are really good now. It's not as if young people can afford vintage stuff anyway.

This is all we will have if we don't support our local music shops.

The Knight had been a school piano for many years. Sadly it was a long way past economical repair. I would much prefer a 1970s Knight in good condition to a new inexpensive upright.

Well, Google vs Meta is a bit like choosing between Charles Manson and Fred West as babysitters, but Whatsapp can do polls which is useful when you have to offer a choice of dates to a group. Nextcloud could do all of this, but you either need to pay someone to host it or host it yourself. I really do like my Nextcloud and it's much more reliable than it used to be. I'd choose Nextcloud if any of my bands were up for using it.

Hello. I have been asked by a friend how to feed a low impedance (mic) output into a high impedance input (a pedal). If it was round at mine I'd just let them plug it into my mixer. But they want their own setup, and I think a line matching transformer like the Shure A85F would be more elegant. Are there any alternative products that come a bit cheaper?

Also, one other thing. My best mate is a pianist. He has a Bluthner grand in is front room (£95,000 new, and 3 months to build!). I think if he was being honest, he prefers his Kawaii MP11SE. It doesn't have the presence in the room obviously, but he can play things on it that he can't play on his Bluthner. It has a better action and it sounds really, really good.

I think you should go to a dealer. Most privately sold pianos are beyond economical repair. Beyond that, you need to go by the sound. Renting a secondhand piano for a few months could save you a lot of money. It's hard to recommend a particular brand because so many of the piano makers merged and just became badges on pianos that were made in anonymous Asian factories. A venue at a place I play at fairly regularly got rid of their ex-school Knight upright which was nearing the end of its life with a three year old piano which was donated to them. It was scrapped as it was unrepairable. Avoid cheap new uprights.

You say that but you should still get checked out. You could have one of those things or something else without realising. It won't cost you anything to try, at any rate.

Yes. It could be linked to quite a few other conditions, and there are therapies that are proven to manage it. The NHS pages on it list a few. https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/tinnitus/