Purchasing a Piano Online

Buyer Beware!

I would caution customers also about purchasing a piano online. There are just too many structural and mechanical issues involved with any piano that absolutely cannot be appropriately checked over the Internet.

Some piano dealers from around the country will have multiple listings of pianos for sale online, which, for various reasons, they have not been able to sell to their customers who have personally visited their showrooms and played these pianos. These pianos may appear to look perfect, but could have structural and mechanical problems. Sometimes these problems are inherent to that particular instrument, or the seller did not have the skilled expertise to fix them.

Every piano has both a slightly different sound and feel to the way it plays. The ONLY way to determine this is on the piano bench with the piano in front of you. Even if you are a complete beginner, some pianos will sound and feel more comfortable to you than others. For this reason, I do not sell any pianos over the Internet. I look forward to servicing in the home every piano that I sell, and in this respect the purchase of the piano is just the start of the business relationship. Every piano that I sell includes a FULL 5 year warranty.

The Global Piano Market

One cautionary note about the global piano market: Prospective customers should be reminded that there are "entry-level" new pianos available that visually (the cabinet and the keys) look identical to higher priced pianos. Many of these pianos have serious manufacturing defects and the quality is far from uniform.

It may be difficult, as a non-piano-playing parent, to appreciate how important a good sound and responsive action mechanism is to your child's musical progress. Be assured, it is next to impossible to make substantial progress if the piano is a clunker. The action mechanism of any piano is an intricate involvement of tiny parts made from wood, felt, leather, and buckskin, which all need to be in excellent condition to reward the student's practice commitment. Battling a piano in poor condition can be very discouraging at any level of ability.