Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related)
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@Rainman said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
@axtremus said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
But I know that I can replace these cheap benches 5x over by now and still not spend as much as I worked have for a Jensen bench.
Sure. And, you can buy the cheapest car and replace it 5X over, as opposed to buying a quality car. Depends on how much you like all the time and energy spent on buying the cheap car(s) and hoping the interior doesn't disintegrate, faux leather chipping off, particle board crumbling, padding underneath the carpet turns to dust, and the wonderful mental anguish as you think over and over to determine at what point you have had enough, and you'll start shopping for the next "vehicle" trying to save money.
The trick is to know how good is “good enough.” With the wonders of modern finance, one can always buy something “more expensive.” Just know that “more expensive” does not always mean “better.” A $100 bench is not “the cheapest.” A $7 IKEA stool maybe “the cheapest.” (At $7 a pop, I could replace it 100X over and still comes out ahead cost wise compared to a Jensen.) Your “cheapest car” analogy is but a cheap straw man.
And it’s actually quite easy to find $100 padded, adjustable piano benches (Amazon.com has got a lot of them). It is also very easy to find $7 stool (IKEA). So your whole point about “time and energy spend on buying the cheap” is not applicable to this product category.
By the way, do you have a Jensen bench (or, for that matter, any piano bench that costs, say, more than $500) ? How many years have you been using it? Any chipping or peeling on the upholstery or any creaking developed? I would like to get some real world data points to ascertain a Jensen (or some other “expensive”) bench’s long term durability.
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@jon-nyc said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
By the way, my main bench has a nice little touch:
I used to have exactly the same bench back when I had a Bösendorfer. I wanted to keep it when I sold the piano, but the new owner offered me so much money for the bench that I sold it. The official list price for these benches is silly. I think around 2500$.
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Ax:
"And it’s actually quite easy to find $100 padded, adjustable piano benches (Amazon.com has got a lot of them)"Sure. And what kind of wood is under the paint? Does it matter? What do you think, Ax 'ol bud? How about a solid slab of wood. Would you rather have that as a piano bench lid, or cheap particleboard with a wood veneer? Rather, cheap American-made post-Katrina particleboard (sans carcinogens).
The reverse-engineered Chinese knock-off of a Jansen bench (and yes, I am the only one that knows how to spell the name) doesn't have known problems with the mechanism, inferior as it is. Sure is easier to bend the Chinese-sourced metal, whatever it is. The problem is the frame cracks, the wood is not strong enough. It's along the length of the frame on the longest part of the rectangle. Well, there is a good chance that the wood for "your" bench will be strong enough. Paint covers everything, the good and the bad. For a joint, how important is the tightness of the wood grain? Or, in general, in cabinetry, how much difference is there in one wood over another.
Except a cabinet just sits there, where a pianist is constantly shifting their weight. Well, a good pianist that is. Constantly moving, back-and-forth, front-to-back, for years. Jansen artist benches do not have music storage, as it's just one more addition that will likely start squeaking somewhere, as every joint or contact point is a potential unwanted noise.
And for the knock-off Chinese reverse-engineered junk, when a part breaks, where do you go to get parts? Jansen has a bushing kit, so "you" can replace the parts of the bench which wear over time. And in our next class, we will discuss warranties.
Push back, Ax! You can do it!! Find something. . . anything. . . and see if you can coax it into sensibility. -
I think I just figured out what type of manufacturing and sales Rainman works in!
Me/rry/Christmas
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@lufins-dad said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
I think I just figured out what type of manufacturing and sales Rainman works in!
Don't know if it's still important what type of manufacturing and sales Rainman works in, so if I ever go visit him in person, I want to sit on his piano bench just to try it out.
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@jon-nyc have you pulled the trigger on the piano bench yet?
Look at this: https://jansenpianobenches.com/collections/clearance/products/adjustable-height-piano-bench
An adjustable height Jansen at $180.
It's 80% more expensive than my $100 bench, and it
carries the Jansen brand name andis sold directly by Jansen, so it might even come with @Rainman's approval.
EDIT: Not clear on the web page if it actually carries the Jansen brandname, but at least it's sold by Jansen. So even if it's not a "Jansen bench," maybe you'll feel more comfortable that it's curated by Jansen's merchandizer.
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@jon-nyc said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
$50 more on Amazon for the Jensen artist lookalike, plus $30 shipping.
219 + free shipping on their site.
269+29.99 shipping on Amzn.
THat's like buying an $80 insurance policy on a $220 item.
Maybe I'll just gamble on the site.
The way I think about is if you are lazy you buy from amazon. Always check non amazon sources once you know what you want. Remember that supplier is paying Amazon’s fee and that is the primary reason it costs more. Many other sources have incredible customer service and return policies.
I do it all the time with running shoes.
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@rainman said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
Sure. And what kind of wood is under the paint? Does it matter?
Not really. What's really important is performance and durability data.
What do you think, Ax 'ol bud? How about a solid slab of wood.
What sort of "solid wood" compared to what other sort of "not solid wood"? Engineered (ply)wood? Metal? Stone?
Would you rather have that as a piano bench lid, or cheap particleboard with a wood veneer? Rather, cheap American-made post-Katrina particleboard (sans carcinogens).
It's always easier when you pick the easy comparison, isn't it?
The reverse-engineered Chinese knock-off of a Jansen bench (and yes, I am the only one that knows how to spell the name) doesn't have known problems with the mechanism, inferior as it is. Sure is easier to bend the Chinese-sourced metal, whatever it is. The problem is the frame cracks, the wood is not strong enough. It's along the length of the frame on the longest part of the rectangle. Well, there is a good chance that the wood for "your" bench will be strong enough. Paint covers everything, the good and the bad. For a joint, how important is the tightness of the wood grain? Or, in general, in cabinetry, how much difference is there in one wood over another.
The relevance and important of all these should be reflected through data. Load testing data, long term durability data, etc. I have two adjustable benches so I have two data points, and thanks to Jon I also have a third data point for his Bosendorfer bench. If you or anyone else have more data points to share, I will appreciate it.
Except a cabinet just sits there, where a pianist is constantly shifting their weight.
Well yeah, that's why I do not use the $7 IKEA stool for piano playing.
Jansen artist benches do not have music storage, as it's just one more addition that will likely start squeaking somewhere, as every joint or contact point is a potential unwanted noise.
By that logic, getting rid of the height adjustment mechanism would further reduce the potential sources for unwanted noise, wouldn't it? Height adjustment could have been done by choosing a big enough book of the appropriate thickness. You always trade things off. For Jansen, it thinks convenient height adjustment is a worthwhile trade for some additional sources for unwanted noise. For some other folks, maybe convenience storage is a worthwhile trade for some additional sources of unwanted noise.
And for the knock-off Chinese reverse-engineered junk, when a part breaks, where do you go to get parts? Jansen has a bushing kit, so "you" can replace the parts of the bench which wear over time. And in our next class, we will discuss warranties.
Again, data. Hopefully there is publicly available data to quantitatively show the Jansen advantage (if any).
Push back, Ax! You can do it!!
Since you asked, sure!!
Find something. . . anything. . .
Found a $180 adjustable bench sold by Jansen. Do you know for sure whether it carries the Jansen brandname or not? Can you comment on its type and solidity of wood, strength of its metal, tightness of wood grains, its sources of unwanted noises, etc.? Why would Jansen sell such a bench?
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@jon-nyc said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
I’m more likely to do it the other way normally, willing to pay for far superior logistics.
That’s what I thought until I discovered these other companies and maybe they are the minority but kick butt. Live American voice, have exchange shipped before you even send the reternal. Don’t get me wrong amazon is still the baseline for me.
The big thing now is watching UPS ship so so so much faster than USPS.
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@loki said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
The way I think about is if you are lazy you buy from amazon. Always check non amazon sources once you know what you want. Remember that supplier is paying Amazon’s fee and that is the primary reason it costs more. Many other sources have incredible customer service and return policies.
Sometimes I do that -- for the same product, compare what offers are available from Amazon.com and what offers are available from "other sources", including the original manufacturers and/or their authorized distributors/resellers. And it baffles me that quite frequently I find the Amazon.com prices lower than the prices offered by the manufacturer/distributor/reseller.
I was looking to purchase a specific software title, for example, and regardless of whether I choose buy a physical CD or digital download, for some reason the price for the exact same title is over 25% cheaper on Amazon.com than from the original developer/publisher.
I suspect maybe some of these manufacturers/distributors/resellers figured out that it's more advantageous to them to leverage Amazon.com's distribution infrastructure than to build and maintain their own.
I do not like monopoly, so on the macro level I do not like to see Amazon.com taking over so much of retail. But I also do not see any near term free market based solution to Amazon.com's quasi monopoly. Maybe given enough time this will become another big antitrust case that will need the government busting Amazon.com into multiple smaller companies to restore competition.
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@axtremus said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
@jon-nyc have you pulled the trigger on the piano bench yet?
Look at this: https://jansenpianobenches.com/collections/clearance/products/adjustable-height-piano-bench
An adjustable height Jansen at $180.
It's 80% more expensive than my $100 bench, and it
carries the Jansen brand name andis sold directly by Jansen, so it might even come with @Rainman's approval.EDIT: Not clear on the web page if it actually carries the Jansen brandname, but at least it's sold by Jansen. So even if it's not a "Jansen bench," maybe you'll feel more comfortable that it's curated by Jansen's merchandizer.
@Axtremus Be aware that site is not Jansen nor does it have anything to do with Jansen at any level except that it sells Jansen products as well as others. That particular bench does not look to be a PL Jansen Product.
Me/rry/Christmas
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@lufins-dad said in Question for LD. And anyone else. (piano related):
@Axtremus Be aware that site is not Jansen nor does it have anything to do with Jansen at any level except that it sells Jansen products as well as others. That particular bench does not look to be a PL Jansen Product.
Thanks for the heads up, @LuFins-Dad. Yes, the website and the retail operation may indeed be a different business entity separate from Jansen the piano bench manufacturer.
Still, mighty nice of Jansen to let that site use the “Jansen” name in the domain name, and spot these lines on the site:
- “JansenPianoBenches.com is an official retailer of Jansen piano benches and piano accessoriess” ... fine, there can be many official retailers for Jansen.
- “Prices on all Jansen benches are GUARANTEED by Paul Jansen to be the lowest you will find on or off the Internet!” ... OK, who is Paul Jansen and might there be multiple Paul Jansens?
A website domain name like “JacobsYamahaPiano.com” or “JacobsYamahaMusicSchool.com” would be fairly clear it’s “Jacob’s” rather then “Yamaha” as the business entity (and even then I’m not sure if Yamaha allows something like this). Calling yourself “JansenPianoBenches.com” without authorization by Jansen the piano bench manufacturer seems deceptive even if it’s not strictly illegal.
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Janssen distributes this bench - which quickly allows one to adjust height. In some ways, it looks to be superior to the regular artist bench they make. It also looks like a good match for the Yamaha.
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10 days later it arrived. Not bad over Christmas.
Some comparisons to the Jansen (at least I assume the Bosendorfer branded bench is a Jansen).
Top, CPS Import on right:
Front:
Underneath, you can see the quality difference but the cheap one isn't really that cheap.
In more detail. First the Bosie/Jansen:
Now the new one:
In place:
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DON’T let them eat cake.
- RFK Jr
