#bechstein

[tristanginger]

Give me some vibrato- pitches love vibrato.

[pianotunerwolverhampton]

On behalf of me and to everyone at Broughton Pianos I would like to wish you all a very merry Christmas and a wonderful new year in 2024.

www.broughtonpianos.co.uk/

www.matthewjamesrichards.co.uk/

#christmas2023 #piano #broughton #kawai #yamaha #bechstein #steinway #whoffmann #Hailun #danemann #Dudley #stourbridge #brierleyhill #belbroughton #kidderminster #christmasmusic #pianist #pianotuner #pianoteacher #pianotuning

[thomschroeder]

© 2023 All Rights Reserved

No. 8056

[merriammusicinc]

Zimmermann S6 | Upright Piano Demo & Review | Designed by C Bechstein

Famed high-end German piano maker C. Bechstein offers a wider range of product offerings in terms of price than perhaps any other manufacturer. From the C. Bechstein Concert Series which are among the most elite pianos on Earth, to the new Zimmermann pianos available at an affordable price, built to compete with Japanese-made grands and uprights.

Today, we'll be taking a look at the Zimmermann S6 upright piano, an exciting new product for us, and an instrument that to this point is pretty well unknown to the North American market.

Utilizing a timeless design and Bechstein-supervised exacting quality standards, we're excited to be carrying Zimmermann instruments moving forward and thrilled to be diving into the S2 for you here. Let's start by checking out the action.

Zimmermann S6 - Upright Piano Action

Why Action Matters

it's really important that whatever piano you ultimately choose for your home, you're happy with the action and how the instrument feels.

It's more difficult to create a good connection between player and instrument as far as actions are concerned with upright pianos because you don't have the benefit of gravity working as the counteracting force as you do in a grand piano.

On an upright piano, it's a little more complex to get that really nice fluid motion because it has to be done with springs, counterweights and counter-movement. Often times upright actions feel slow, and a little bit clunky, and the repetition speed isn't quite ideal unless you're ready to drop $20,000 or more on a handmade upright piano. Here, great pains have been expended to produce a truly dynamic action.

Bechstein’s Bronze Line Action

With that preamble out of the way, let's jump back to the S6. We had a chance to try the S6 at Bechstein's Berlin showroom about a year ago and were quite surprised to see a product from Bechstein that was very much in line with what you'll pay for a Japanese product from Kawai or from Yamaha.

Naturally then, we're of course instantly thinking about how this action, the Bechstein Bronze Line Action, compares to a taller Kawai such as a K-500, or Yamaha U3. First of all, we noticed the S6 definitely has a more robust feeling construction than a U3, and that's obviously by design as the S6 has a heavier hammer.

There's more power that you're able to extract from S6, so particularly for people who already have some acoustic experience, they might really appreciate going to an instrument with such a pleasant touch that also happens to be very responsive.

Wide Dynamic Range

The geometry has been set up to produce a bigger dynamic range than what you would get out of a Kawai K-500 or Yamaha U3.

When you dig in, you feel a little bit more resistance, but it delivers this huge big tone, and then you start to understand why this is a very credible and interesting option to consider.

Action Wrap-Up

To sum up the action, we've got an instrument that is very responsive but also happens to have a few extra grams of resistance. The trade-off to that is if you already are familiar with how a grand piano feels or already have the muscles built up from spending lots of time with an upright, this is going to respond very naturally to you.

Let's dive into the sound now and some of the design features contributing to that tone.

Zimmermann S6 - Upright Piano Tone & C Bechstein Design Features Features

Our impression is that the S6 is giving us somewhere between 15% to 20% more upward dynamic range than what the K500 and U3 are able to produce. Now, whether or not you like the type of tone that it's producing is a very subjective thing, but it needs to be noted.

The S6 simply doesn't sound like a Japanese piano and instead sounds a lot closer to what you would normally be getting out of a C. Bechstein Academy, W. Hoffmann or some of the darker German pianos that are out there in terms of tone. Steingraeber would be another example of this general tonal profile.

Hammer Materials & Design

There are several interesting design choices contributing to this specific sound. One of them is the hammer, which as we've mentioned, is a little bit bigger than what you'd normally expect out of a 50-inch piano. What's more, the hammer on here is actually mahogany. This is somewhat unusual until you get up into the $15,000, $20,000 range, though Kawai notably uses mahogany on all of their K series pianos.

Most pianos in this price range use Maple for the hammers as it's less expensive and easier to work with. Mahogany is superior though because it's a bit lighter and thus doesn't stay on the string quite as long, meaning any potential distortion is cut down.

Solid Spruce Soundboard

Second, we're dealing with a solid spruce soundboard here. Some people will assume this is somewhat of a given considering the price class, but it's always nice to see manufacturers still putting a white solid spruce soundboard on new pianos.

We've got hand-wound bass strings here and nice premium-grade Roslau strings in the treble.

Designed in Germany by C Bechstein’s R & D Department

Now, let's talk about where and how it's made since it says right on the piano "Designed by Bechstein" as opposed to "Built by Bechstein". Does that automatically mean that they've submitted the design to the factory and now they don't have anything to do with it? Not at all.

Bechstein has designed this piano from the ground up with their own Bechstein scale design, and Bechstein-produced hammers and a technical staff member from Germany directly supervises the assembly process at the production site.

C Bechstein Quality Management

Now, a lot of manufacturers with a sub-line that gets produced in another factory make the claim that they supervise the assembly process without really being able to back it up. In this case, Bechstein's Quality Management team has a full-time German engineer that literally lives at the factory and supervises a small group of employees who exclusively assemble the Zimmermann product in a separate area of the factory.

The factory we're talking about is of course the Hailun plant in China. This is a factory that was set up as a western-style factory, a business experiment a couple of decades ago. It has achieved a great level of success to the point that it has set a new standard for quality control and consistency for Chinese piano factories.

You'll notice that on all the Zimmermann products, there's actually a badge on the left-hand side of the keyboard that says, "The Bechstein Quality Management System." Obviously, a company with a reputation like Bechstein's wouldn't put a quality seal badge like that on something unless it was a high-quality instrument.

Limited Production

When some people hear Chinese assembly, they immediately think mass-produced, without much if any actual hands-on human attention. One of the most special parts about the whole Zimmermann project for Bechstein is the fact that it is actually a limited production piano.

This is an instrument that is only being outputted at a rate of between 750 to 1,000 units per year, maximum. In fact, we're only at number 8,217 for the particular piano here that we're reviewing. This project is a little more than 10 years old, so that gives you a sense of how much individual attention each one of these instruments is receiving.

Closing Thoughts

To wrap up, we've got a piano here that is a 50-inch class upright that is going to compete very well against other pianos in the size and price range like a Kawai K500 or a Yamaha U3. It is part of the Bechstein family with a Bechstein design, Bechstein components, and is assembled in China at the Hailun factory.

We think it's delivering an extremely unique and interesting option in a price range in the size range that is usually just a binary decision between Kawai and Yamaha.

So, if you have a chance to check it out, get into a showroom close to you. Of course, if you're anywhere near Toronto, come visit us. We've got the Bechstein Zimmermann product, both the grands and the uprights, like the Zimmermann S2, on the floor.

The post Zimmermann S6 | Upright Piano Demo & Review | Designed by C Bechstein first appeared on Merriam Pianos

2359 Bristol Cir #200, Oakville, ON L6H 6P8

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(905) 829–2020

[loveisinthebat]

Screamin

[rate-every-bat]

hii!! i love this blog because im a big fan of bats and love learning about ones ive never heard of before!

may i request the bechstein's bat and the common pipistrelle ? theyre probably my favourite bats from where i live, id love to hear your opinion!! thank you for running this blog!!!

Thank you for your patience! I just posted about the Common Pipistrelle, so let's dive into the Bechstein's Bat!

Today's Bat: Bechstein's Bat

Environmental Impact: The Bechstein's Bat is a British native species currently being threatened by a loss of deciduous tree habitat. In other areas of Europe, they qualify as near-threatened, while they are actively endangered in Wales. They're arboreal roosters with interesting social habits (more on that later), and they're vital in the areas they inhabit for insect control. An article I found from 2008 cited a distinct lack on conservation effort for the species, and my (admittedly brief) research didn't turn up anything to dispute that.

🦇🦇🦇🦇/5

Beauty: How photogenic! Their ears are their true beauty. So amazing are those lovely ears, the Bechstein's bat actually listens for insect sounds rather than relying on echolocation to hunt. The pink skin that peeks through the lighter areas of their fur is just adorable.

🦇🦇🦇🦇/5

Power: Alright, time to talk about socialization! Because these bats roost in trees, their colony sizes often outgrow the surface area of their chosen roosts. Therefore, they've developed an interesting social habit: individuals cycle from roost to roost, maintaining relationships with every colony and ensuring that everyone has a friendly place to rest their head. During the autumnal mating season, this behavior is taken even further, as colonies meet and swarm in order to introduce as much genetic diversity as possible. The power of friendship!!

🦇🦇🦇/5

Overall: A beautiful friend who deserves some eyeballs. If you're aware of any specific conservation efforts being made for these little guys, please let me know so I can update my information!

🦇🦇🦇🦇🦇/5

(Today's sources: BCI, PTES, Bats.org, 2008 article from British Wildlife)

[oeuvrinarydurian]

This is going to be my first scheduled post for Snarky Little Shit Sunday. It’s also the first one I’ve posted myself. I was re-watching Fugue, and I wanted to showcase this absolute “go fuck yourself” hairy eyeball situation he’s shooting at the back of the departing Jakes in the train yard. 

I’m celebrating my niece’s graduation from college and my nephew’s graduation from high school, and we’re throwing my birthday in a little belatedly so I won’t be around much. Have fun celebrating our beloved little Snark monster.

[adarkrainbow]

Do you know about Ludwig Bechstein? Well you should.

But do not worry: if you never heard of his name until now, it is perfectly normal. In a similar way to madame d'Aulnoy in France, Ludwig Bechstein was one of the great names and influential sources of the fairytale in Germany, but fell into complete obscurity due to being overshadowed in modern days by a contemporary (Charles Perrault for madame d'Aulnoy, the brothers Grimm for Bechstein).

Ludwig Bechstein was, just like the brothers Grimm, a German collector of fairytales (Märchen in German), and just like them he published an anthology of them. However, whereas the brothers Grimm started publishing their work in the early 1810s with re-editions later on, Bechstein published the first volume of his collection in 1845, and the second volume in 1856.

And here's the thing: Bechstein was MUCH, MUCH more well-known in Germany than the brothers Grimm, for the rest of the 19th century. While yes the brothers Grimm were a big success and a huge best-seller, Bechstein's fairytales were even more so. In fact his fairytales were THE de facto German fairytales of the 19th century - until the brothers Grimm's international celebrity (because their fairytales had crossed the Germanic frontiers into English and French-speaking countries, while Bechstein's had not) came back and made their own fairytales overshadow, and then completely eclipse/bury Bechstein's own fairytales.

Why is this important? Because Bechstein had in his collection several fairytales that overlapped with those of the Grimm: for example, as I will show above, both collections had an "Hansel and Gretel", and " Little Red Riding Hood". But while we know today the Grimm's version better, it was the Bechstein's version that the 19th century children knew about. And there is one big difference between the two sets of tales: while the brothers Grimm were obsessed with an "accuracy" of the stories (or what they believed was an "accuracy"), stitching stories together or writing them so as to create what felt like a traditional oral story as it would be told to you by a random German person, Bechstein allowed himself a more "literary approach". He never reached the level of an Andersen or a d'Aulnoy that would entirely rewrite a folk-tale into a long poetic epic... But he allowed himself to correct inaccuracies in the stories he collected, and to add personal details to make the story fit his tastes better, and to develop the dialogues into more than just nonsensical little rhymes, so while he kept short and simple stories like the Grimms, they definitively were more literary stories.

To give you two good examples of the differences, here are Bechstein's changes to the two stories I described above.

The main change within Little Red Riding Hood is Bechstein making the girl more intelligent and well-meaning than in the Grimms version, and the Wolf's deception even more devious. When the wolf tells the girl she could go pick up flowers and play outside of the path, like in the Grimm's tale, Bechstein's Riding Hood stops and asks roughly (not a quote I recap here): "Hey, mister Wolf, since you know so much about herbs and plants within this forest - do you know about any medicinal plant around, because if there is an herb that could heal my sick grandma, it would be super cool!". And the wolf jumps on the occassion, pretending he is a doctor - and he lists to her a whole set of flowers and herbs and berries she can pick up that would heal her grandmother... except all the plants he describes to her are poison, and the Wolf just mocks his intended victim. The joke also relies on the fact that all the plants he lists are named after wolves, with the beast convincing the girl it is because wolves are good and great things. (There's the wolf's-foot, the wolf's milk, the wolf's berries, the wolfswort - names which do correspond to real-like plants such as the spurge laurel or the aconit).

The ending is also slightly modified. The hunter is attracted to the grandma's house by hearing the unusually loud snoring of the wolf - he thinks something is wrong with the grand-mother, maybe she is dying, only to find the wolf in her place. He immediately grabs his rifle to kill it but then pause wondering "Hey, the little grandma is nowhere to be seen... and she was a scrawny woman... Better check if he did not eat her". And so he opens the wolf's belly (and the wolf is still asleep during all that, he really is a deep sleeper). When the humans decide to put stones in the wolf's belly, they explicitely reference in-universe the "Wolf and the seven goats" story, which gives them the idea. (Quite a fun and accurate detail since we know that the brothers Grimm attached the episode of the stone to the Little Red Riding Hood story by taking it from the "Wolf and the seven goats" one)

As for Hansel and Gretel, the witch is described differently from the Grimms (she is still a very, very old woman who has something wrong with her eyes, but she isn't red-eyed like the Grimm, rather she has "grass-green" rheumy eyes, and she has no cane or crutches, Bechstein rather insisting on her being a hunchback and havin a very, very large nose.) But the main difference occurs in the climax, which is very different from the Grimm.

The witch still tries to push Gretel in the oven, but she doesn't ask the girl to check if it is "hot enough". Rather she put bread in it to go with her Hansel-roast, and she asks the girl to check if the bread is brown yet. And Gretel is about to obey... when the snow-white bird that led them to the house reappears and warns her of an upcoming danger with human words. The girl immediately guesses the trick, and pushes the witch in the oven. Second big change: the "treasures" the children obtain are not the witch's, nor do they find it on their own. As they exit the house, the treasure literaly rains on them - because all the birds of the forest arrived and dropped the precious items on them while singing "For the crumbs of bread / Pearls an gems instead". As the children understand, the birds were grateful for what they believe was food offered to them (the bread crumbs) and reward the children with the treasure.

Oh yes and the mother (no stepmother here) doesn't die. Rather she and her husband are miserable in their house because they regret leaving their kids, so they are very happy when they return, and with the treasure they all are certain to never go hungry again. Happy end. (Because here the mother isn't a bad person like in the Grimm - she just really, REALLY was a desperate woman who didn't want to see her own children die before her eyes)

[deutschland-im-krieg]

A sketch of Adolf Hitler from 1926, by Ernst Paperfait. Several people who knew Hitler said this was the best-ever likeness of him, regardless of the time period. Paperfait was introduced to Hitler in 1925 by Helene Bechstein. Hitler sat for 90 minutes in Frau Bechstein’s hotel room at the Hotel View Zahreszeiten while Paperfa toiled away.

Her son-in-law said in 2001, "this is exactly as Hitler looked in the early days. It captures his eyes, his determination and it just looks exactly as he did." Egon Hanfstaengl said the same thing before his death in 2007. Bild published his remarks, "it’s neither flattering or unflattering, it’s just him precisely (Es ist bloß ihn, ganz genau)."

Hitler himself loved the sketch and presented the original to Frau Bechstein (of the Bechstein piano concern). The sketch was made into a postcard and Hitler signed many of these at the 1928 and 1929 Reichsparteitag der NSDAP

[todaysbat]

My bat adopts arrived from BCI. I got (in order from left to right):

Nimba Myotis (orange and black)

Jamaican Flower Bat (light brown with big muzzle)

Bechstein's bat (brown)

In hindsight I may have bought myself a duplicate Bechstein's bat. No big though, they are social animals in real life after all.

[mask131]

A trivia not many people know about: the Humperdinck opera of "Hansel and Gretel" is NOT based on the story by the brothers Grimm.

While, yes, the "Hansel and Gretel" story most well-known and famous today is the version given to us by the Grimm, there was actually another collector and writer of fairytales who was much more successful and more well-known than the Grimms back in the 19th century Germany. It was Ludwig Bechstein, who published a collection of fairytales a few decades after the Grimms released theirs - and he immediately overshadowed them in German literature. The German children of the 19th century were more aware of the Bechstein tales than the Grimm's.

And in his collection Bechstein wrote several fairytales that were alternative versions of the Grimms - including his own version of "Hansel and Gretel". The Humperdinck opera is not an adaptation of the brothers Grimm story - but of Bechstein's own take on the fairytale. You notice this due to a lot of small details in the opera that can be found only in Bechstein's version of the tale, not the Grimm's version.

[ghostjelliess]

Ludwig Bechstein's books were initially more popular than Grimm's in their competing era of publication (~1800s). I got these from a library book sale and this is what I went to look up. But here's what else I learned from Wikipedia:

*His mother was a German countess and his father was NOT THE COUNT. 👁️👄👁️

*His father was a French immigrant who mysteriously disappeared before his birth. 👻

*He grew up in the nearby orphanage in poverty, like, within sight of his mother's castle.

*His uncle Johann (mother's brother) was a respected scholar, we're talking: naturalist, forester, ornithologist (birds), entomology (insects), heptologist (amphibians) etc. In a time when the natural sciences were not necessarily divided between biology, zoology, botany, etc. The guy founded schools, classic wandering scholar archetype.

*Unkle Hans returns home and finds out he has a nine year old malnourished nephew living in the streets. Pissed (I assume). He adopts little Ludwig and immediately sends him to school (which would take a lot of catching up for NINE YEARS in these streets).

*Luddy boy studies philosophy, has connections with some big sponsors, apprentices as a pharmacist, ugh, moved to literature.

*Lutz gets a lifetime post as a Duke's librarian, where he happily writes romance novels, poetry, and published collections of folk tales.

*When he died they built a fountain (not a bench) in the English garden of the estate.

[oeuvrinarydurian]

Literally everyone is re-blogging this, and I don’t want to get left out. This is one of my top three episodes, but it is jarring. It pulls me out of S3-onward rapturous lust-filled reverie (read: dirty thoughts) in order to revisit Baby Morse’s episode 2 hair and the terrible cheap suit.

However, we get excessive levels of Snark, which perhaps compensate. Perhaps there’s a direct correlation between Snark and glow-up. Somebody needs to make a graph.



endeavour - ep. 2 - fugue

[loveisinthebat]

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