I think we can all agree this is a stunning piano. The curves and overall shape give the luxurious curvy overtones (no pun intended) of a 1925 Rolls Royce Phantom. The futuristic V shape makes you question how on earth it stays standing upright. The body is beautiful. The lines are gorgeous and the styling is exceptional.
The action on this piano should also be exceptional. It is using a German made Renner action which is considered one of the best in the world. We know that this piano is going to feel similar to other pianos using this action – Bechstein, Boesendorfer, Grotrian, and (Hamburg) Steinway. It sounds as though the action was left mostly untouched.
Here we get to the interesting part. These folks sound like they’re taking ‘Out with the old, in with the new’ quite seriously. They have decided to use a carbon fibre soundboard.
For those of you who are new to pianos, the soundboard is the piece of wood that acts as the speaker for the piano which resonates and creates the sound you hear. Almost all soundboards are made out of wood, specifically spruce.
I am all for innovation. I am all for using carbon fibre in pianos. However, I am uncertain about this carbon fibre soundboard idea. Carbon fibre actions are incredible.
Carbon fibre is an excellent material to use in the mechanical side of a piano due to it’s lightness, and strength. Unlike wood, it is not effected (in any noticeable way) by humidity. This makes it a very reliable, fast, and low maintenance material to build the piano action out of.
The soundboard however, is the voice of the piano. This is what gives the piano its characteristic tone and colour. You can hear a difference between soundboards made from spruce collected from different forests. It is incredibly important!
I have not heard this piano firsthand, nor is there much information online about this piano.
That being said, I would be very surprised to hear the sound quality come anywhere close to that of a well selected spruce soundboard. The complex colours and textures that come from a spruce soundboard are so dependent on the quality of the wood.
The “super clear” tone they are claiming it has, could be colourful wording for “Flat”. They claim it has a unique tone which I am certain it has. It would be nice to hear it in person to see how pleasant this unique tone really is.
Take a look at the piano in the photos below, and read what they are saying about their piano!
Hungarian pianist Gergely Bogányi recently gave the classic grand piano a makeover with a futuristic twist. The Bogányi Piano presents a sleek two-leg design that looks like a sideways “V” in profile.
The streamlined style offers practical benefits: Supporting the piano with two legs instead of three lets sound waves waft unobstructed to the audience. Inside, when struck by the hammers attached to the keys, the strings vibrate against a composite wood-and-iron soundboard, which produces a set of distinctive tones.
While changing the grand piano’s design may seem unconventional now, piano models actually went in and out of style in the 18th century much like cell phones do today.
The current, standard concert hall piano design has gone largely untouched since the late 1800’s, but before that, a series of evolutions enlarged the instrument to better fill large venues and morphed the sounds it produced.
Bogányi didn’t take the task of changing the grand piano’s characteristic sound or technology lightly.
On a promotional website, he says the design took shape over a decade of working with “a devoted, genuinely talented team of designers, engineers, piano craftsmen and music technicians.” “We experimented through some 8,000…engineering hours with modern materials, particularly with the soundboard, searching for new technical solutions, constantly analyzing the derived new [spectrum] of sound,” he says.
The Bogányi Piano website via [Dezeen, Slate] Via mymodernmet.com
18 Cool and Bizarre Piano Designs | Walyou
In addition, Pianos have been admired not just for their beautiful music, but also their visual appeal which would turn an ordinary looking room into something really opulent. In fact, a house without a piano was once considered a poor old house. As the years passed by, the piano too evolved and modern decades have seen avant-garde pianos that completely take everyone by surprise. Via walyou.com
Daniel Barenboim reveals radical new piano design: ‘I’ve fallen in love with it’ | Music | The Guardian
Ive fallen in love with it, beamed Daniel Barenboim as he unveiled what he believes is a groundbreaking new piano, one which he conceived and commissioned, and has been dreaming about since 2011. What no one could disagree on was the maestros passion for his new instrument. Photograph: Lauren Hurley/PA The exterior looks much the same as any other modern concert grand piano but inside there are some dramatic differences. Via theguardian.com
