Standard Height from floor to top of keys?

[Alexandre Vovan]

Hi,

I'd like to know what's the standard height from the floor to the top of the
keys on a concert grand piano?

Is it 30 1/4 inches?

Thanks,

Alexandre

[Gary Rimar]

If not, it is really close to that.

"Alexandre Vovan" <skry...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:TcSb8.2499$Lc2.1...@news20.bellglobal.com...

[Sonarrat Citalis]

The standard height for a piano is exactly 1 inch shorter than the height I need
for my knees to clear.

--
-Sonarrat Citalis.

Email: Remove the fish, replace the net.
Signature at http://sonarrat.stormloader.com/sonarratsig.html

"Inspiration is drunken; execution is sober." -Alexander Scriabin

[Dwain Lee]

My upright's keys sit at 30 1/2 inches above the floor, but I seem to
remember that a grand's keys were about an inch lower (?)

Oddly enough, I stumbled across a related story this evening. Frank Lloyd
Wright designed a house for a client, who then placed a Steinway grand in a
certain room (FLW recommended a SWay to all his clients). Wright was
convinced that the piano's proportions did not fit the proportions of the
room, which featured a low ceiling. So he instructed his apprentices to cut
the first four inches of the piano's legs off with a handsaw. The article
didn't say if he did the same to the homeowners.

Dwain

"Gary Rimar" <pian...@mail.com> wrote in message
news:a4osas$1olml$1...@ID-128366.news.dfncis.de...

[Rick Clark]

Dwain,

I was in a FLW house where he cut a hole in a wall so the grand piano
tail to stick through into a sort of atrium- whereas the keyboard just
peeked through into a different room, using about the footprint of a
spinet.

What seems a bit strange about your note below, is that 4 inches off
the legs on a lot of pianos would mean that the weight of the piano
would then be on the pedal lyre, not the legs.

Regards,

Rick Clark

[Alexandre Vovan]

I would like if someone could confirm that a grand's keys are lower.. It is
also my impression, but at home I only have an upright to measure that.

Alexandre

"Dwain Lee" <dl...@dlarch.com> wrote in message
news:a4pnl2$ke5$1...@slb7.atl.mindspring.net...

[Rick Clark]

I've got a 1911 grand here and it measures 29 1/4", with no caster
cups.

Regards,

Rick Clark

[Dwain Lee]

Hi Rick, yes, FLW did what you described in his home and studio in Oak Park.
In that situation, the tail protruded into a stairwell, and was suspended by
cables from above. He routinely recommended that his clients obtain grand
pianos (particularly Steinways), but he sometimes seemed to have had
problems with actually accommodating them :-)

As for the 4-inch cutoff, I assume they reconfigured the lyre also, but I
have no idea how he reconfigured the distance from the floor to the
homeowners' knees, so they could actually sit at the piano.

Dwain

"Rick Clark" <pianodoctor@mindspr*ng.com> wrote in message
news:3c7077b9...@news.mindspring.com...

[Tom Shaw]

I think that people were a lot shorter in 1911, e.g. in 1942 at 6'3" I was a
center on the hi school basketball team. Today: no way.
TS

"Rick Clark" <pianodoctor@mindspr*ng.com> wrote in message

news:3c70fea8...@news.mindspring.com...

[dw...@cix.compulink.co.uk]

Alexandre asked:

> I would like if someone could confirm that a grand's keys are lower..
> It is
> also my impression, but at home I only have an upright to measure that.

Aeolian Company "Pianola" roll-actuated "cabinet players", nowadays
called push-ups because they can be pushed up to any standard piano
keyboard, were manufactured between 1897 and 1916.

They have (older type, to 1908) 65 or (newer type, from 1908) 88 felted
wooden fingers which rest gently on the keys and a leather-padded metal
boot which rests on the sustaining pedal.

To achieve the correct level, the instruments have two retractable leg
mechanisms, one at each end, each with two castored legs on, which can be
raised or lowered using a worm drive gear cranked with a portable handle.
The whole body of the machine plus its fingers falls or rises accordingly.

Such machines are still used for piano-roll recitals in Europe (and
occasionally in the USA) and the leg settings for upright and grand
pianos are normally around 1.1 inch (27mm) different, the keyboards of
grands being that much lower - except of course for those which are kept
on concert-hall triangle trolleys.

This requires a great deal of cranking if a machine is changed from one
height of keyboard to another, and there is a tendency for the worm
drives to fail, so one performer, Michael Broadway, has fashioned a
stepped castor receptor one of which is slipped under each player castor
and provides four different levels of finger height. The fine adjustment
can then more easily be done by cranking.
===
| \
| \ dwi...@cix.compulink.co.uk
| [] D Dan Wilson (Friends of the Pianola Institute, London)
| / antispam: remove 2 if emailing
| /
===

[charles sibirsky]

Its 29 1/2 on my Steinway d.

--

http://charlessibirsky.com

Alexandre Vovan <skry...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:TcSb8.2499$Lc2.1...@news20.bellglobal.com...

[Alexandre Vovan]

That's weird, I finally went to measure my Petrof 9'3, and it's 28 1/2 from
floor to top of WHITE keys. Is that low? The piano is on its normal factory
casters, not on a piano truck.

Thanks,

Alexandre

<dw...@cix.compulink.co.uk> wrote in message
news:a4ru60$4ei$1...@thorium.cix.co.uk...

[Welltempered]

I just purchased a wonderful Jensen Artist bench and .... I am going nuts
with the height adjustment. The keyboard on my Kawai grand is at 29' from
the floor. Since I got the new bench, I have developed a pain in my right
elbow. I measured the elbow height last night and found that it was at 23'.
The literature on correct position at the piano says that the elbow should
be at the same height as the keyboard - I think. So I raised the seat by 4
inches. Now my elbow is at 29', but I feel like I am way too high - I think
I actually have less control. I tried different things last night. I ended
up going to bed very confused and frustrated about the whole thing. Now I
don't feel comfortable in ANY position!!
Can anyone suggest a practical way to find the "correct" position at the
piano, before I develop an injury?

BTW, I know about Glenn Gould and his chair. He actually developed serious
injuries from sitting so low. What a beautiful sound and control though....

Thanks
WT

Tom Shaw <a000...@airmail.net> wrote in message
news:4F0121F560DCC976.184D7F19...@lp.airnews.net...

[engelbrecht-wiggans richard]

On Wed, 20 Feb 2002, Welltempered wrote:

> The literature on correct position at the piano says that the elbow should
> be at the same height as the keyboard - I think. So I raised the seat by 4
> inches. Now my elbow is at 29', but I feel like I am way too high -

For many years, I've set the top of my bench 8 1/2 to 9" below
the top of the white keys; since standard paper is 8 1/2" wide and
much sheet music is 9" wide, this has been a convenient rule of
thumb. On checking just now, it turns out that that puts the
bottom of my elbow at the same height as the top of the white keys.

Richard E+17.

Richard Engelbrecht-Wiggans, U of Illinois, Champaign, Illinois
email: epl...@uiuc.edu; (217) 333-1088

[Radu Focshaner]

Welltempered wrote:
>
> I measured the elbow height last night and found that it was at 23'.
> The literature on correct position at the piano says that the elbow should
> be at the same height as the keyboard - I think. So I raised the seat by 4
> inches. Now my elbow is at 29', but I feel like I am way too high - I think
> I actually have less control.

First, sit on the edge of the bench and keep your back straight while
leaning forward. Sitting straight migh give you a few centimeters of
"height" so you can lower the bench. Morover, beware of compensating
elbows height by raising the shoulders. Again, I stress, not sitting
close to the edge might give you "low back" pains.
One more problem is that the proportions of people's body largely vary
: with the same arms length, people might have long legs and short
trunks and viceversa. Go figure what to do !

r.

--
========================================
I really have no life...
I go around reading posts and,without having any original thought,
or adding anything to the subject,simply make short simpleminded
remarQs.

[Eric Gloo]

Dwain Lee wrote:

>Hi Rick, yes, FLW did what you
> described in his home and studio in Oak
> Park. In that situation, the tail protruded
> into a stairwell, and was suspended by
> cables from above.

How would this piano be tuned? Was the lid down? How was it raised?
Don't break a string or you're in serious trouble.

Eric Gloo
Piano Technician

[Gary Rimar]

"Welltempered" <carl.nott...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:zvPc8.14262$BR3.8...@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...

[snip]

> The literature on correct position at the piano says that the elbow should
> be at the same height as the keyboard - I think. So I raised the seat by 4
> inches. Now my elbow is at 29', but I feel like I am way too high - I
think
> I actually have less control. I tried different things last night. I ended
> up going to bed very confused and frustrated about the whole thing. Now I
> don't feel comfortable in ANY position!!
> Can anyone suggest a practical way to find the "correct" position at the
> piano, before I develop an injury?
>

It is actually simpler than I'm going to make it sound here:

1) Your fingers should be curved so they are pointing down while the back
of your hand is level (to the point that you can balance a penny on the back
of your hand while playing scales).

2) A flat edge should be able to be lain across the back of your hand and
your forearms, making a straight line (yes, I'm being redundant).

3) Your sitting posture and butt height (bench position) should support this
positioning of your forearms relative to your hands.

Gary (33 years playing, 100+wpm, no carpal tunnel) Rimar

[Joseph Kubera]

It's 28-1/4 on my Mason CC.

The casters on this thing are large, and they are not the originals (those were
smaller, so keyboard was even lower). I'll bet some of the variation we're
seeing is because of different size casters. And don't legs have different
heights too, to match the case proportions of different manufacturers?

Haven't measured my older piano yet...report forthcoming.

Joe Kubera

[Christof Pflumm]

"Welltempered" <carl.nott...@worldnet.att.net> writes:

> I ended up going to bed very confused and frustrated about the whole
> thing. Now I don't feel comfortable in ANY position!! Can anyone
> suggest a practical way to find the "correct" position at the piano,
> before I develop an injury?

Perhaps you have to sit further away from the piano. In the beginning,
I was sitting to near. That impedes free arm movement.

Bye,
Christof

[Gary Rimar]

Good point I missed in my ergonomics lesson (see earlier post). While your
forearms should be level to the floor, your upper arms should be either
perpendicular to the floor, or darn near perpendicular.

Gary (I think between the two posts I've covered it) Rimar

"Christof Pflumm" <lti...@ltihp89.etec.uni-karlsruhe.de> wrote in message
news:tplmdnf...@ltihp89.etec.uni-karlsruhe.de...

[Welltempered]

Thank you all - I am going to try all of the above and let you know

Gary Rimar <pian...@mail.com> wrote in message

news:a54iul$4jg66$1...@ID-128366.news.dfncis.de...

[JM]

This comes up all the time. Here is the post I did a couple years ago:

"Thanks John. A piano teacher I know said the same thing when I asked
her.(elbow/forearm position)
Anyway, we were going to see a friend at his piano store, so while there, I
measured a disclavier grand with a tape measure,
and it measured 29 inches from the floor to the top of the white keys, and
18 inches for a bench. So I measured my KX88, and it is that high. I
adjusted the throne, but it was too low at 18 inches, so I raised it. I like
to sit sort of "high" anyway."

Dispite what peoples preferences, or opinions are, I've found that the
typical acoustic piano measures about 29 inches from the floor. Then I
suggest that you adjust the bench/stool to your desired hight.

Alexandre Vovan <skry...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:TcSb8.2499$Lc2.1...@news20.bellglobal.com...