Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Welcome to The New Coffee Room. We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
A visit to Cunningham Pianos; lots of pics
Topic Started: Apr 28 2008, 06:38 AM (452 Views)
plays88keys
Pisa-Carp
On Saturday I went to Cunningham's with my friend Laurie, who is in Philadelphia from British Columbia to attend a nursing conference.

First of all, Rich Galassini is "da bomb!" What a gracious host he was indeed, going out of his way to accommodate both me and my Canadian friend Laurie with tours of the Cunningham piano factory, mini tutorials on rebuilding and allowing us leisurely access to a myriad of fabulous instruments.

We arrived shortly before noon this past Saturday and were immediately charmed by both the neighborhood and the building facade:

Posted Image

After a few minutes of introductions to his business partner Tim and several other people, he took us around the corner to the actual factory for a tour:

Posted Image

Posted Image

We saw some beautiful instruments in various stages of rebuild, including a Mason & Hamlin AA, a Bechstein sent to them for restoration from Brazil, a charming Cunningham baby grand with cabriole legs in a lovely walnut finish and this piano with the most amazing veneer finish I've ever seen:

Rich, showing the piano rim and strips of the veneer that had been applied. More of the veneer can be seen on the floor behind him:

Posted Image

And this is the finished result:

Posted Image

Forgive me Rich, I can't remember what type of wood you said it was, but I do remember you telling me that it was next to impossible to get it anymore. It is absolutely stunning!

We got a lesson on different kinds of Renner actions:

Posted Image

Posted Image

And an explanation of the function of locator pins:

Posted Image

Posted Image

And saw some signs I liked:

Posted Image

Posted Image

Circa WWII sign on the facade that I thought was great:

Posted Image

After seeing the factory, we headed back to the showroom for a sampling of all the instruments on the floor(s):

Here's Laurie playing a 1927 Grotrian-Steinweg with a fabulous Art Deco stencil on the fallboard:

Posted Image

By far the biggest aural treat was a Bosendorfer 225. If I were a kenny clone, that piano would have been sold to me on the spot! Every single tone was so clear and powerful that the pianist becomes fully exposed - there's simply nowhere to hide, thus making it a great tool for improving technique and tonal shading. Oy Vey! I want that piano!!!

Posted Image

Posted Image

Here's Rich's business partner Tim treating us to a mini concert of Debussy's La Cathédral engloutie:

Posted Image

Rich left us to noodle around on various instruments while he attended to his business, then provided us with a liquid refreshment I'd never heard of and instantly loved:

Posted Image

When I finally checked my watch to see what time it might be I was amazed to note that four hours had passed! Laurie and I thought at this point we had surely worn out our welcome and gathered up our music to leave. Before going, I had her take this one last shot:

Posted Image

Rich, thank you so much for an interesting and enlightening afternoon. You went out of your way for us and we truly appreciate it! It's a day I won't forget and look forward to another opportunity in the future to visit your store
You can never get enough of what you don't need to make you happy.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
George K
Member Avatar
Finally
:clap:

Wonderful pictures! It's so cool when a dealer (and in this case a "friend") just lets you "noodle" around on his pianos. When I was shopping, Saphir's was that kind of place. Instantly felt at home, and hours and hours go by. It's so neat that you got to try all those wonderful pianos. Remember the "workshop" pic that Rich posted a while ago? It's been my desktop wallpaper for months (though some of Deb's pics may displace it).

What a gracious host. I'm jealous.
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Red Rice
HOLY CARP!!!
What a wonderful tour and pics, plays! Thank you for sharing, I'm so envious! That veneer with the dramatic grain looks like macassar (or maybe jacaranda).

Btw, you look gorgeous! :hearteyes:
Civilisation, I vaguely realized then - and subsequent observation has confirmed the view - could not progress that way. It must have a greater guiding principle to survive. To treat it as a carcase off which each man tears as much as he can for himself, is to stand convicted a brute, fit for nothing better than a jungle existence, which is a death-struggle, leading nowhither. I did not believe that was the human destiny, for Man individually was sane and reasonable, only collectively a fool.

I hope the gunner of that Hun two-seater shot him clean, bullet to heart, and that his plane, on fire, fell like a meteor through the sky he loved. Since he had to end, I hope he ended so. But, oh, the waste! The loss!

- Cecil Lewis
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Mikhailoh
Member Avatar
If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
Lookin' good, Susan!

What a fun day that woudl be.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
RosemaryTwo
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
I'll be sure to check out his store if I'm ever the area -- neat!
"Perhaps the thing to do is just to let stupid run its course." Aqua
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Free Rider
Member Avatar
Fulla-Carp
What a fun way to spend the afternoon! I wish I could have played on those pianos....wow!

Great photos as well, thanks for sharing.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
plays88keys
Pisa-Carp
I forgot to mention that Rich is also an amazing tenor, and I had the privilege of hearing him sing. He's also very popular, as lots of his friends just stopped in to say hello to him during the time I was there. I was introduced to a friend of his named Bill that he has known for decades; I met one of the members of Patti LaBelle's choir featured on Clash of the Choirs last December on NBC and several others.
You can never get enough of what you don't need to make you happy.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Daniel
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
Posted Image

Wow!

Posted Image

Beautiful.

Thank you. :)
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
big al
Member Avatar
Bull-Carp
Plays, thanks for the vicarious visit to Cunningham's. I hope I have some opportunity to visit there one day. Rich was clearly a very gracious host, not that his job was all that difficult in presence of two lovely ladies.

I like that Arizona Arnie Palmer lemonade/tea drink (both the regular and green tea varieties) quite a bit myself. It's very refreshing.

I smiled to see the John Thompson book in the background of one of the pictures. My father taught a lot of students with that series.

Big Al
Location: Western PA

"jesu, der simcha fun der man's farlangen."
-bachophile
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
justme
Member Avatar
HOLY CARP!!!
Very nice, Plays! BTW, you look great!

Thank for sharing.

Aside to Big Al: I remember years of John Thompson :biggrin:
"Men sway more towards hussies." G-D3
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
VPG
Member Avatar
Pisa-Carp
I love starting sentences like this, 35 years ago when I ran that place,
it did'nt look as good as it does now. Rich, Tim, RJ, and all the other folk
there at Cunningham's have done it proud.
I'M NOT YELLING.........I'M ITALIAN...........THAT'S HOW WE TALK!


"People say that we're in a time when there are no heroes, they just don't know where to look."
Ronald Reagan, Inaugural, 1971

Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Cathys
Member Avatar
Senior Carp
Plays
Wonderful pics, brought back memories of our quick visit there on our marathon road trip from Colorado :) . But I'm jealous we did not get to meet (nor hear sing)Mr Gallassini while we were there, although the other R was very gracious. Beautiful shop. Beautiful smile, you must have had a wonderful time & visit!!

Cathy
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
« Previous Topic · The New Coffee Room · Next Topic »
Add Reply