1904 Steinweg Nachf (Grotrian-Steinweg)

The following is an excerpt of an email message Frank S Macchia sent the piano's owner upon completion...

Rebuilding Commanded by: A-1 Piano Service, Crown Point, IN

Grotrian-Steinweg History (brief) ...

In 1835 Heinrich E. Steinweg (1797-1871) began making pianos in Germany. He emigrated to New York in 1850 with three sons, changed his name to Steinway and founded Steinway & Sons. Heinrich's oldest son, C. F. Theodor Steinweg, remained in Germany. He began to make pianos under his own name. Freidrich Grotrian (1803-1860), one time owner of a musical instrument company in Moscow joined Theodor in 1858. After learning two of his brothers had died Theodor sold his business to his three employees, Wilhelm Grotrian, Adolph Helfferich and H. G. W. Schulz. Theodor then moved to New York and joined Steinway & Sons as a partner in 1866.

The sale of the business to Messrs. Grotrian, Helfferich and Schulz included the right to use the name "C. F. Th. Steinweg Nachf. (Successors to C. F. Theodor Steinweg)" for ten years. The name later was changed to "Grotrian, Helfferich, Schulz, Th. Steinweg Nachf.". the present corporate name.

Grotrian thereafter registered the trademarks "Grotrian-Steinweg" and "Steinweg" in Germany. The latter mark was cancelled as a result of a suit by Steinway against Grotrian. In December 1918, the Grotrian family, owners of the firm, petitioned German officials to change its name to "Steinweg, or at least Grotrian Steinweg". One of the principal reasons was to aid in the export of its product. The petition was granted to the extent of changing the name to "Grotrian-Steinweg".

Important: We are not photographers by any means. In an effort to improve the brightness of the pictures we stood cardboard around the piano. This really helped illuminate the interior pictures.

The finish was one of many challenging steps in your piano's rebuilding. Countless hours were spent gluing loose and cracked veneer throughout the entire piano, after which special epoxy was used to seal the surface; all before the priming and finishing stages could be started.

The bench was originally designed not to store music. We closed off the bottom and added hinges to make it more functional.

These are the original casters and will be installed on the legs prior to shipping. We prefer not to keep original casters on a piano during rebuilding as they become damaged from the hard concrete floor.

The legs were originally threaded into the piano with wood threaded dowels which after years of seasoning and moving deteriorated and broke. We installed 1 1/2" steel threaded rod and steel retaining nuts to insure maximum strength.

Another extremely challenging step was replacing the original wrest plank (pin-block). The original was 2" thick (very rare) and oddly shaped to fit the cast plate. Besides having to locate 2" wrest plank material, special machining was necessary to duplicate the original.

Three generations: Allen (my son), Frank (me), and Brian (my grandson) all played a part in completing the rebuilding.