Baldwin piano tone

[kyaw han]

Hi Barrie,
Am wondering of this Baldwin tone quality and sound board design??
I came across to see Baldwin (made in USA label plate was inside the cabinet). It was 110cm tall with pushing key cover. When I played, I felt something is lacking for the touch (it has shortend keys). Tone is unexpectedly not attractive and no singing except a few notes, low bass power. Sound board doesn't look like solid spruce to me. The grain is in horizontal (Does it mean improved design?)And that piano is very new, only 10years old with serial no. of 1,500,000++. Pretty new inside out.

Do all baldwin console have shortened keys? (I am sure they do all for spinet)

Any idea will be appreciated.

[PianoGuy]

Baldwin has no tone quality to speak of, and soundboard design is poor.

To get a good Baldwin, you need one from the 1950s or earlier, and preferably a grand which are sufficiently Steinway influenced. They're ok.

All others are either indifferent or horrible.

[Gill the Piano]

I've never met a Baldwin I liked the sound of, either. I use the word 'sound' as it has no tone!

[Barrie Heaton]

Hi Barrie,
Am wondering of this Baldwin tone quality and sound board design??
I came across to see Baldwin (made in USA label plate was inside the cabinet). It was 110cm tall with pushing key cover. When I played, I felt something is lacking for the touch (it has shortend keys).
.

Yip short keys. quite a few I have seen have step down keys and have quite a big angel in the bass which results in bushing replacement a lot sooner also Baldwin have a shallow depth of touch (dip) 9mm which can feel odd if you are use to the 10mm

Tone is unexpectedly not attractive and no singing except a few notes, low bass power. Sound board doesn't look like solid spruce to me.
.

They are laminated soundboards and lack sustain and yes the Tone not good but some do like that sound, they must do or they would not sell!

Do all baldwin console have shortened keys? (I am sure they do all for spinet)

Any idea will be appreciated.

They do on the ones I have tuned did 2 new ones about 2 years ago when Gibson took over was not impressed to be honest I have never tuned one that I like tones wise and if you tone them down they are just dead

I have only tuned a few grands and I was not that impressed. However, some say that the big ones are very good

[PianoGuy]

I came across to see Baldwin (made in USA label plate was inside the cabinet). It was 110cm tall with pushing key cover. When I played, I felt something is lacking for the touch (it has shortend keys). Tone is unexpectedly not attractive and no singing except a few notes, low bass power. Sound board doesn't look like solid spruce to me. The grain is in horizontal (Does it mean improved design?)

I don't think the word "design" can be applied to a Baldwin. Horizontal grain in a soundboard smacks of cheapness and was used here in the UK for only poor straight-strungs and the likes of the humble Bentley, itself a dreadful item when equipped with the Harley Check Action. Foul.
It probably is spruce, but of the lowest grade from quick hydroponically grown warty old varieties best used for match-wood.

They claim:
"Solid Eastern White Spruce" on their website. Probably from Eastern Nevada.

Note the following, also from the Baldwin Website:
"SynchroTone IITM bass strings, a Baldwin exclusive, are actually pre-tuned through the string design and production process to provide a clearer, more distinct tone."

Well I wish they'd use normal strings because their tone is about as synchro as my old MGTC's crash gearbox.

[kyaw han]

Great!! Thanks a lot for all your thought on this.

[PianoGuy]

Coincidentally I tuned a Baldwin today, a 1980s Monarch model which I have tuned since 1985 when it was only a couple of years old. It was bought new from a branch of Minns Music who I recall had some tie-in with Cranes at that time, and they seemed to have sold a great number of these when the £-$ exchange rate was favourable. I sincerely hope they don't think of importing them again now we are at a similar state of affairs.

It's a runty little console piano (ie not at least one of their utterly foul spinet designs, but something along the lines of a conventional compact upright of the Yamaha b1 format) standing about 105cm high and is fitted with a seemingly unfinished Pratt-Read action which has pilot holes drilled for bridle wires but these and their associated tapes are absent. Add to this the fact that these actions have inefficient suspended butt springs hanging off the damper slap-rail (as is the Yanks' wont) and it's a wonder that the hammers return to rest at all. Repetition is best described as "leisurely". Dampers are badly placed and strangely long in design, making action removal and refitting tricky without knocking groups of them off altogether. Hammer felts have been pressed out of a material redolent of used floormops and affixed to the hammer cores with what appears to be dried snot.

The soundboard is as kyaw han has observed of the horizontal grain type, and is made of low grade softwood. The frame is crudely sand cast and could be used effectively as a striker surface for household matches, and the strings are fitted to the ensemble with the care of a Leyland worker under Red Robbo. Some wrestpins are heavily endowed with four coils, and others skulk in the back of the changing rooms with two. The overall build quality is as poor as any Soviet piano that you care to name.

Regulation of the action is difficult, especially seeing that there are some components lacking, and the tuning process wasn't helped by the total inconsistency of the wrestpin tightness. A few years ago I actually performed a successful pitch raise on this feeble instrument,and that at least appears to have lasted well.

Casework is equally nasty; the top door attaches with polypropylene and metal clasps whose purpose seems to be one of percussive accompaniment as well as fastening, a job they do less well than the former. The bottom door (which must be removed during every tuning to adjust the automatically-loosening sustaining pedal system) is fastened with a Fort-Knox inspired combination of strong spring clips, wooden wedges and Philips screws. When closed, the fall doesn't quite meet the lockrail, leaving a couple of millimetres of the key-fronts on display, the whole instrument appearing to grin with a menacing underbite.

All of this makes me wonder how the Yanks ever sold these wretched things at all in their homeland, or possibly these are "Export Models" and they actually reserved items that bore some basic resemblance to pianos for the domestic market.

I'm glad I don't tune many.

PG



PS: The latest Baldwins made by Gibson Guitars have a strangely black-stained action. Can anybody enlighten me as to what that's all about?

[Openwood]

I had a look at those Gibson pianos on the Baldwin website. I think you're all giving them a very hard time, I mean look at this

in addition to the signature guitar-like finish, the piano features a rich cherry Lyptus body with arms shaped like a guitar, legs shaped like two guitar necks joined at the fretboard, feet in the shape of the top of a headstock, the Gibson logo inlaid in the center of the upper frame, guitar-style tuner buttons for the piano pulls, and brass hardware.

Come ON, guys - what's not to like????

[David B]

Pianoguy, you've been tuning this wretched Baldwin for over 20 years? This implies that the owners have actually been playing it for that long? How could they?

[PianoGuy]

Pianoguy, you've been tuning this wretched Baldwin for over 20 years? This implies that the owners have actually been playing it for that long? How could they?

I know.... It's not as though I've ever been particularly polite about it either!

[Gill the Piano]

Perhaps they're sadists, and PG is their unwitting victim...