Tapestry Opera receives a historic gift with the donation of a 9.5 foot Imperial B 290 Concert Grand Piano, among the most highly sought-after concert pianos in the world. Tapestry now joins just a handful of venues where piano players can tickle world-class ivories.
The Bösendorfer is 20 centimetres longer than the standard of concert-hall pianos, made by Steinway & Sons in New York City and Hamburg, Germany. It has 97 keys instead of a piano’s usual 88. Numerous composers have written works to take advantage of the Imperial’s broad range, including the “Great Gate of Kiev” movement from Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition.
The three-metre-long concert grand piano produces a rich, resonant bass sound that many pianists find deeply seductive. Superstar tenor Placido Domingo once joked how pianists try to sound like singers, but, “Me, personally, I try to sound like a Bösendorfer.”
At Tapestry Opera’s Ernest Balmer Studio, a decades-old baby grand piano (Heintzman), which was donated years ago by a big-hearted patron, has been replaced by the Rolls-Royce of concert instruments: a Viennese-made Bösendorfer Concert Grand 290 Imperial, worth about $225,000. This one is a gift too, from Ottawa residents who are no longer able to play it as much as they would like.
Robert Lowrey Piano Experts, the Canadian dealer for Bösendorfer, reconditioned the piano before having it shipped down to the Distillery, where it had to be hoisted by crane through one of the Balmer Studio’s third-floor windows.
“The move cost us nearly as much as the new $20,000 piano we couldn’t afford to buy,” chuckled Michael Mori, Tapestry Opera’s artistic director, after builders had put the tall, double-hung window back into place.
Steinway concert grand, Italian-made Fazioli, Shigeru Kawai grand piano, German Steigraeber & Söhne grand piano are few other top level concert pianos.
Source: thestar, Links: tapestryopera.com
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