Grand Piano ... getting shot of

[NickA]

Anyone ever tried to get rid of a grand piano?

 

My mum has a Brinsmead baby grand (from 1925 or so, with a then fashionable, fetching, G-plan style, teak veneer finish ).  Not been played properly for years.  Lots of fluff, rubber bands etc under the strings.  Badly out of tune.

 

Needs to go.   But how? Bloody thing must weigh half a ton and takes up half her living room.

Edited August 11, 2023 by NickA

[chris_b]

I took an axe to an upright once. Very satisfying.

[paul_c2]

The few times I've looked, pianos are indeed one of the best value secondhand instruments on a £/kg basis. Even upright pianos are undesirable because you can buy a decent electronic version for about £400. So, anything bigger and secondhand/old/a bit worn, will start at that and be on a sliding scale to £0.

 

House clearance firms might be a good try. Or some random hopeful thru classifieds? Maybe if you offered delivery (work out the cost of a van with taillift hire and borrowing a few mates) it would go. I believe the way to shift a grand is to use a frame/device to 'set it upright', remove the legs then wheel it on and off a van/truck on a platform or trolley.

[Waddo Soqable]

Pianos it seems are a thing you can't even give away, I occasionally see them smashed up in skips or in bits outside a house being refurbed or whatever. I found a perfectly good one just left in the middle of Kingsland Rd Hackney once, I had a play of it for 5 mins and walked away with great sorrow that I had no way to rescue it. 

I do find it very sad that these things once so desirable (and expensive when new) are now just junk. 

I've got an old upright thing here that I have a bash on very occasionally, which was a freebie locally, I made a kind of dolly with wheels and myself and a couple of mates wheeled it home. (it was only a few streets away) 

Obviously a grand is a much weightier proposition to move.. Why not initially put it on ebay, gumtree, etc etc for £5 buyer collects, and see what happens, you never know. 

[PaulWarning]

not a piano but I got rid of a bloody big side board and a massive drinks cooler (not at the same time!)by putting them  ebay, 99p start, buyer to collect

[chris_b]

I inherited a lot of very old and very large Victorian furniture when my Dad's aunt died.

 

In the end we needed the space and couldn't sell it so we gave it to a local hospice charity.

[Hellzero]

Did you try the second hand piano stores, they could be interested in it for free as moving these things imply some knowledge as they need to be disassembled?

[pete.young]

10 years ago I gave away my 100-year-old boudoir grand. It went to a guy who runs a local recording studio.

[NickA]

Thanks folks. 

 

So far I've found a piano recycling co who will take it away for around £300 and some sales & auction Cos who will take it away for £270, tune it for £75 and then pass you 80% of the sale cost if it sells.  If it doesn't sell ....who knows, probably dump it on your driveway and charge another £300.  eBay is chock with pianos, might give it a try tho.

 

Bluthners, Steinway's, Bosendorfers, Bechsteins & Faziolis will sell. (£50k for a restored 1911 Steinway in Mansfield).  Brinsmeads maybe not. The genuine elephant ivory and real ebony keys might be of value, the rest probs not.

 

The axe solution is appealing but I don't think I could strike the first blow; I've known it for 50 years! And all those bits ( cast iron frame etc) still to dispose of. 

 

The village fete used to feature a competition between the ( then 5) village pubs in which they each had to smash a piano and pass all the pieces through a 6" hole in a sheet of chip board.  Winner got free beer from the other pubs ...or something.  Uprights tho.

 

It is indeed a crying shame as many hours and much material went into building it and it cost my dad a few £100 back in 1972. Still, it has spent the last 10 years as a thing to put plants on top of and store various cellos, guitars and a viola da Gamba beneath .... more furniture than instrument, so mustn't get sentimental

[NickA]

Browsing the piano companies .... Some things you cannot un see ( and it sounds like it looks!).  £13,000 !!!

 

[Rosie C]

22 hours ago, NickA said:

Anyone ever tried to get rid of a grand piano?

 

 

I listed our baby grand for sale about six months ago. Although it's been regularly tuned and all working, there wasn't much interest. In the end we arranged to donate it to our local evangelist church.

[bass_dinger]

I always wonder what use can be made of a piano soundboard - a big sheet of spruce, that's been aged for 100 years, and played in.  Surely that's useful for an acoustic guitar top?

 

There is a high end grand piano in the lobby of my dad's care home. 

 

And my evangelical church has at least 3 upright pianos dotted around the place. There used to a couple upstairs too, but they seem to have disappeared.  We use one of those ubiquitous red electric pianos for services.

 

 

[Happy Jack]

 

[bass_dinger]

On 31/07/2023 at 21:57, NickA said:

it sounds like it looks!

Formidable? Or formica?

[NickA]

32 minutes ago, bass_dinger said:

Formidable? Or formica?

"Jangly" & "grating" are words that come to mind 🙂

[NickA]

6 hours ago, Happy Jack said:

 

Yup, that's the one.  Bit before my time; but that could easily be the Buckden Village Fete. 🙂 🙂

[bass_dinger]

7 hours ago, Happy Jack said:

 

The musical equivalent of a banger race. Nobody wins, but all the entrants are sent to the scapyard. 

 

 

[Maude]

Chop it up and make a shelf. I actually really like this. 

 

 

Edited August 5, 2023 by Maude

[BigRedX]

This thread makes me sad.

 

The idea that what was once a relatively expensive musical instrument has been reduced to having no value, and people are actually destroying them as entertainment.

 

I would love to have a proper piano. We used to have one in the family (it originally belonged to my Gran) but when my sister who was the last owner decided she no longer wanted it, I said I'd have it, only to work out that I wouldn't be able to get it into any room in my house without taking down actual walls! I think it left behind in her garage when she moved.

 

On the other hand it should probably also serve as a cautionary tale for those paying over-inflated prices for "vintage" Fenders and enormous amps and cabs. There will be a time when no-one wants them either.

[AndyTravis]

The amount of pianos we used to “recycle” when people would trade against the latest iteration of Yamaha Tyros (urgh…) or Clavinova used to make me sad.

 

Anything teak/70’s/80’s used to get skipped - if the cabinetry was deemed to be outdated/unfashionable - they’d get trundled up on a forklift and dropped into a container.

 

But as stated - we couldn’t give them away - offered to schools and charities, nobody wanted them.

Madness.

 

 

 

[snorkie635]

On 31/07/2023 at 00:34, chris_b said:

I took an axe to an upright once. Very satisfying.

Must try that one on our guitarist. 😎

[NickA]

3 hours ago, AndyTravis said:

Madness.

Very sad indeed.  The same happens with double basses.  Bit of damage and the cost of repair (UK labour cost) is more than the cost of buying a whole new Chinese Factory Bass.  Bassbags down the road from me skips plenty .. and sells plenty of new ones.  Only stuff worth £10k and more gets properly treated.

One of my kids really wanted to play the piano for a bit and we promised one if we got the big old house we tried to buy. Didn't get the house and he had to make do with a Yamaha portasound - which despite making a million noises, doing auto rythms and harmonies and having a midi interface ... just wasn't the same.  So he stopped playing.

I think mum's teak clad grand is off to scrap at my cost.  Be nice if some of the parts get preserved or re-purposed at least. 😞

 

PS: re cautionary tales.  In 1998 I paid £800 for a state of the art 350W Trace Elliot GP12SMX combo.  In 2018 I decided it was a) too heavy, b) too loud, c) not HiFi enough. Couldn't shift it.  Sold to a Hungarian bloke for £150 who used to tour the UK picking up bargains and flogging them round Eastern Europe.   But at least it did sell.

Edited August 7, 2023 by NickA

[tauzero]

Makes me sad too. My grandfather had a baby grand in the living room - I suspect that got sold when there was still a market for them. There must have been half a dozen grands in the music building at my old school - no idea whether they got transplanted to the new building when Sir Paul Ruddock decided to splash out some of his earnings on his alma mater and pay for a new performance centre.

[snorkie635]

Sad indeed, but time marches on and what was once the bow-wave quickly becomes the wake. ☹️

[bass_dinger]

See also: mahogany radiogram cases; sewing machines; 2-manual organs with rhythm accompaniment; home-use reel to reel tape recorders. All aspirational items of home entertainment at one time.

 

My dad made a sewing machine case out of the shell of an old radiogram, thereby ruining two historical items (or perhaps he made them both usable).

 

I have a friend with a grand piano in his lounge (picked up at auction when nobody much else bid for it), and a two manual church organ in the back room.  So, a few people want them, but one is more likely to see someone who is getting rid of these sort of items).

Edited August 7, 2023 by bass_dinger