Broadwood & Sons piano

[DianeF]

Hi. I have a John Broadwood and Sons upright piano. The serial number is 82521. Its height is 51", depth 14" and length across top 55.5".
It has 50 Keys. On the first key on the left hand side, the name T. Smith is signed, and the names J. Campbell and W A Smith are stamped into the wood of that key. Also pencil marks on the wood reading WB and JC. From this information, would it be possible for you to tell me the date when this piano was made? I have looked everywhere on it and inside it and cannot find it anywhere. I am also interested in how much it might be worth. I know this would require an on-site inspection, but I am not at all bothered about accuracy. It would just be nice to know a region of i.e. under 50 pounds or more or under 1000 pounds or more. I have absolutely no idea but would like to know as it is in good condition but doesn't get much use, is it worth not burning? Any help would be very much appreciated. Thanks, Diane.

[TonyG]

What an intriguing instrument. I'm looking forward to the experts reply here myself. A 4 and a half octave Broadwood upright. Would it have been made for Church and Chapel use?

I can say with authority however that a Broadwood is not firewood! It may not necessarily be worth anything. But someone would really treasure it.

[Bill Kibby]

The number suggests about 1892, but is the top key marked with a date? Value is between 3 pounds and 3,000 depending on inspection by a tuner. The term "good condition" is meaningless without torque tests etc.. By "fifty keys" do you mean altogether, or just the white ones?

[DianeF]

Yes it has 50 white keys. Thankyou for your help.
In relation to the previous members question, yes i think it was made for a church because we were given it by a church.
Thanks.

[Bill Kibby]

So we are talking about a normal Broadwood 85-note piano with the normal 2 pedals, from about 1892. Most dealers over here will not touch anything that old, and museum won't take anything that "modern". Have you checked the righthand side of the top key for a date?

[TonyG]

Hello Diane,

I was assuming it was for a Church on the basis of it only being 4 and a half octaves. Thus just being used maybe as an alternative to a harmonium etc. In actual fact it is of a full octave range for that era and make. So I don't believe it was built for Church use specifically. However, being in a Church for years is better than being in a Club or Scout Hall etc. so it should not have been abused too much one would imagine. Broadwood is a name that will always raise an eyebrow though.

[Bill Kibby]

You obviously haven't been to the same churches that I have! Churches tend to be the dumping ground for pianos that nobody wants, and they are often bequeathed less-than-average or older-than-average pianos, which is embarassing if they don't want them.

[Tom Tuner]

I used to referr to churches as "the elephant's graveyard for pianos," it's where old pianos go to die. "Let's get rid of this old klunker. We can give it to the church!"

Tom Tuner

[PianoGuy]

I can say with authority however that a Broadwood is not firewood! It may not necessarily be worth anything. But someone would really treasure it.

In hundreds of cases, the equation is exactly:

Broadwood=Firewood

.... so what exactly is your authority, pray tell?

[Bill Kibby]

That's a bit like saying Ford cars are no good. Why did so many people buy them then? And why are there still so many out there? And why do the 140-year-old ones still work so well? Call them common if you like, but one cannot dispute their commercial success. You'd think someone who calls himself "PianoGuy" would love pianos, but he seems to hate them all!

[pianobrereton]

Well said ! Since I've started to view this Forum I've noticed a lot of cynicism particularly about Broadwoods. Why? They were the premier maker for many years and were great innovators. I have a broadwood upright on my rounds which has a full iron frame and a beautiful casework and still tunes to pitch and it was made in about 1840 . How many modern pianos will last as long as Broadwoods do ?
As we are the home country of Broadwoods there are still many around still being played a testament to there sturdy construction but we must remember that the older ones are not going to sound as they did in there prime. Any one who has heard mervyn Tang play the restored Broadwood grand of Beethoven ( and later Liszt ) would never talk about burning them , only marvel at the beautiful sound they make. They were the Steinways of the 19th century.

[Bill Kibby]

It sounds like you are agreeing me, Broadwoods, in common with Wornum, Erard, Debain and many others, did not easily take on the technical advances like overstringing and iron frames, and their designs were behind the times, but as you say, how many pianos of that age would still work at all? I have just inspected an 1861 Erard that still works on every note, in spite of a thick coating of dirt. We have a D'Almaine from the 1840s in our Piano History Centre that plays well enough for its age, sounds warm and powerful, and will respond when it has had more tuning. That won't get done until we have got our displays looking better! I have to add that although Broadwoods tried some innovative case designs, they are not always the prettiest, and they seemed to go backwards aesthetically in the early 1900s.

[John Knees]

I have a Broadwood upright, a glorious but ageing beast, which sadly I cannot do justice to, having taken up the piano very late in life, and having been born with a pound of pork sausages on each hand.

At the moment I'm dithering between spending about £ 1,500 on having it renovated or buying a Clavinova - at the risk of mutiny by my musician sons.

Reason for posting, when trying to find out something about my piano, (serial 128051) I learned that Broadwoods provide a "history of your piano" service. No doubt some of the expert contributors have a view on it - I haven't tried it yet, but you'll find it at;

http://www.uk-piano.org/broadwood/serial_numbers.html

All the best,

John

[Bill Kibby]

The link you gave is on THIS site, so we are abviously aware of it!

[John Knees]

Actually my reply was addressed to the original lady enquirer, as none of the expert contributors on this page had thought to offer her the information in this thread.

I apologise for intruding.

John.

[Bill Kibby]

It's not an intrusion at all, but with search engines, we just assume that anyone seeking Broadwood information should already have discovered that Broadwoods will do a search for a fee. Unfortunately, people have come to expect information on the net for nothing, no matter how unique the resource. The original enquiry was simply about the date of a number, I gave that information.

[ok0510]

Well said ! Since I've started to view this Forum I've noticed a lot of cynicism particularly about Broadwoods. Why? They were the premier maker for many years and were great innovators. I have a broadwood upright on my rounds which has a full iron frame and a beautiful casework and still tunes to pitch and it was made in about 1840 . How many modern pianos will last as long as Broadwoods do ?
As we are the home country of Broadwoods there are still many around still being played a testament to there sturdy construction but we must remember that the older ones are not going to sound as they did in there prime. Any one who has heard mervyn Tang play the restored Broadwood grand of Beethoven ( and later Liszt ) would never talk about burning them , only marvel at the beautiful sound they make. They were the Steinways of the 19th century.

[PianoGuy]

Well said ! Since I've started to view this Forum I've noticed a lot of cynicism particularly about Broadwoods. Why? They were the premier maker for many years and were great innovators. I have a broadwood upright on my rounds which has a full iron frame and a beautiful casework and still tunes to pitch and it was made in about 1840 . How many modern pianos will last as long as Broadwoods do ?

Possibly none, but the fact Broadwood were great innovators means that actions are often of obscure design, experimental and not very successful. Build quality is not the problem since as you and Bill quite rightly say, there are thousands of survivors which is partly testament to build quality and partly due to the fact that since Broadwood was the UK's premier maker for so long, examples are more likely to have been revered and kept as family heirlooms regardless of soundness of design or tonal attributes.

Excluding squares and antique pianos (Yes, I'm PianoGuy, not AntiqueGuy) there were only a handful of designs which have stood the test of time as classics, including the Barless models, the divine little Model Eight upright, and a few beautifully made and designed models of upright from the '20s and '30s, many of which were innovative and gorgeously put together, and I'm certainly aware of Broadwood's contributions to the evolution of the piano as a whole, but consider the one-way alleys and turkeys: The Collen Broadwoods; the quad-strung grands; most of their cheaper ranges of straight strung uprights; the stunningly beautiful (but in the 21st Century inadequate) series of grands with the tapped wrestpins; anything (especially the unplayable and unstable grands) from the 1950s to the 1970s right up to the last monstrosities made by the BPMC, the build quality of which is so variable they range from the half-decent to the unusable.

Barrie, since you bring up the Ford analogy, buying something is not necessarily a mark of its quality or usability. As well as some very fine cars Ford made the foul Consul Classic, the dreadful Zephyr/Zodiac MkIV which was prone to self ignition, the Edsel, and they had the impudence to fob the British public off with the prehistoric sit-up-and beg Popular E93A, the technology of which harked back to the 1907 Model-T right up until 1962. In other fields, people in the UK buy gallons of near-poisonous keg beer; millions of loaves of plastic Chorleywood bread in wasteful plastic bags and millions of aluminium cans of toothrotting Coca Cola every day, so don't try to use the popular=good myth with pianos!

As a technician, I regularly have to let customers down gently that their eBay purchase/heirloom/gift of a Broadwood is a dinosaur, and is unlikely to offer them the performance they expect from such an illustrious maker. Very occasionally though, I see a gem, which makes up for all the rest.

As we are the home country of Broadwoods there are still many around still being played a testament to there sturdy construction but we must remember that the older ones are not going to sound as they did in there prime. Any one who has heard mervyn Tang play the restored Broadwood grand of Beethoven ( and later Liszt ) would never talk about burning them , only marvel at the beautiful sound they make. They were the Steinways of the 19th century.

It's Melvin Tan. Mervyn Tang is the Welsh bloke who runs the Chinese chip shop up the road. And the 'beautiful sound' has a touch of Emperor's New Clothes in my opinion. Whilst I'd be the first to applaud the historical significance, skill of the restorer and importance in keeping these old instruments alive, it impacts little on my everyday life as a tuner.

There's a huge difference in respecting something for what it once was and making it limp along as an unsuitable substitute for a newer or better item. I'd never expect to use an MGA as a daily driver, because compared to current transport it's noisy, unreliable, draughty and is lacking in brakes and lighting, but they certainly should be preserved. Same with pianos. The reason I have no time for some old instruments is that their owners expect them to perform as modern ones.

[pianobrereton]

oko510 seems to have reprinted my earlier post ? Odd !
The point i was trying to make was that Broadwood were great inovators but the pianos that were made in there prime are now very old and will not sound as good as they did , so its not right to compare them with a modern example. The screwed in wrest pins you mention has now been revised by Stuart Pianos of Australia and there metal bridge studs were used by Hurstwood Fm Pianos in the developement of there Phoenix system now used under licence by Steingraeber .So the ideas weren't that bad . You were right about the spelling it is indeed Melvin Tan playing Beethoven Broadwood and i do beleive you can call it "a beautiful sound " . I also have a recording of Andras schiff playing the same piano before it was restored and it doesn't sound as good . After restoration we can hear more of what it would have been like when 1st made and understand why Broadwoods were so revered in there day. I know what you mean about tuning old pianos with a dead tone ,it can be soul distroying . We should convince the customers to have them restored too.

[PianoGuy]

I know what you mean about tuning old pianos with a dead tone ,it can be soul distroying . We should convince the customers to have them restored too.

So difficult whilst decent UK restorers are thin on the ground, the Poles are offering glitzy but iffy restorations for half the price, and there are Chinese instruments available for a fraction of the cost of either.

I had no idea the Stuarts had screw-in wrestpins. Are you certain? I think Richard Dain's Phoenix and the Stuart both use Collen-Broadwoodesque bridge studs though. I'm sure they must've done something drastic to eliminate the deadness and falseness of the Collen.

[Horses]

well we have many very old Broadwood pianos and couldnt find a better piano of that era. We own an 1843 John Broadwood grand and it is one of the nicest pianos we own. We have over 20 pre-1900 pianos and apart from our Grotrian-Steinweg, it would have to be the best in our collection. and considering John Broadwood taught Stienwey the art of piano making, we think they should be of fairly equal quailty??

[Bill Kibby]

I don't know where you heard that one! Steinweg was German, and learned in Germany, then went to America, where his name was anglicised. Grotrian Steinweg also made excellent instruments.