(Reprinted from Reuters news article)

By Hyun Oh Hyun Oh – Wed Aug 12, 1:28 am ET

TOKYO (Reuters Life!) – A 77-year-old piano that survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and has become a symbol for peace is heading to New York next year as the city marks the ninth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

When the United States dropped the bomb on the Japanese city on August 6, 1945, the Yamaha upright piano was in the blast radius. It still retains very low levels of radiation and shards of glass are forever embedded in the black lacquer.

“During the bombing of Hiroshima, everything within two kilometers from ground zero was burned and destroyed. This piano was within that boundary and miraculously survived,” said Mitsunori Yagawa, who restored the instrument and tours across Japan, playing it at peace concerts.

“I’m planning to bring this piano that was exposed to radiation to New York in the coming year, just in time for 9/11 in hopes to spread awareness about the atomic bomb and the preciousness of peace to the world,” Yagawa told Reuters.

Yagawa’s father was exposed to radiation during the bombing, inspiring him to hold these concerts which he hopes will drill home the value of peace to the younger generations.

He held his first concert on the piano, one of five to survive the blast, in Hiroshima’s Peace Memorial Park in 2005.

On Sunday, the 64th anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki which came a few days after Hiroshima, acclaimed composer and pianist Kansaku Tanikawa took to the piano’s tarnished, ivory keys for a moving performance at a memorial event in Tokyo.

He also marveled at the quality of the piano’s sound.

“The piano sounds so good that it is hard to imagine that it was damaged by an atomic bomb,” Tanikawa said.

(Editing by Miral Fahmy)

We’re not using these words lightly. Roland is closing out a very unique digital piano model. It’s called the VIMA RK500. This is a feature packed digital piano that retails for $8995 and we bought Roland OUT of the product in order to get the pricing so that we can sell it for over 60% off. Availability is very limited.

Roland VIMA RK 500

The RK500 has unique and remarkable features that no other digital piano has. For a demonstration, click on the below YouTube video. Wait till you see these features — NO other digital piano offers all this…

It’s unequivocally the best deal anywhere on a digital piano right now — even moreso if you can benefit from the unique, advanced technology packaged in the RK500. It’s admittedly a little too advanced for the average family user (the target audience for these types of models), which contributed to Roland’s surplus that in turn has created this great deal.

Even if you can’t benefit from all of the features, it’s not like you’re paying for them, so instead of spending the money on similar digital from Roland or another manufacturer that DOESN’T have many features, why not get them for free?

Please call 773.383.1734 for more information!

Cordogan’s has the largest selection of pre-owned Kawai & Yamaha pianos in Chicagoland and they’re all on sale now!

If you’re looking for a “looks like new, priced like used” Yamaha or Kawai piano, this is the sale for you!

If you’re planning on visiting our west-suburban Geneva megastore, please use the directions listed here.  Navigation and online map services do not work with our address. 

Thank you!

This Saturday, June 20th, the President of the Estonia Piano Factory is coming to Chicago for a limited-seating performance. Dr. Indrek Laul received his PhD in piano performance from The Juilliard School in New York and he is also he owner of the factory which creates the handcrafted Estonia piano.

This will be an informal, intimate setting where you can also meet and greet the artist and ask questions about the pianos Dr. Laul designs and produces. He will perform on a 6′3″ Estonia model 190. The performance is at Curtiss Hall downtown Chicago and it begins at 3:30PM this Saturday, June 20th.

If you would like information about this private concert, please email pcoleman@chicagopianos.com or call Pat at 630.584.5000 for available seating. There is no charge for this event.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – MAY 28, 2009

ManorCare of Westmont Welcomes Pianoland donation “with Grace”

WESTMONT, IL – It was a match made in heaven! Grace and Peace Chaplaincy, a Christian team ministering with older adults – and a piano store owner with a huge heart! The chaplaincy team of Rev. Rita Kay Lochner, Glen Ellyn resident and Evangelical Covenant Church minister, and musician Ruth Comfield of Warrenville, bring church to those who cannot go to church. They have been conducting monthly worship services at ManorCare of Westmont for a few years, but the piano in the meeting room was “on its last legs.”

Believing that somewhere there was a good, used piano that needed a new home, Rev. Lochner contacted her alma mater, Wheaton College. There she spoke to Susan Brinkman, assistant to Dr. Tony Payne, Director of the Conservatory of Music. Brinkman was unaware of any immediate piano available but suggested Lochner call John Cordogan, owner of Cordogan’s Pianoland (chicagopianos.com), who supplies the college with pianos. Much to Rev. Lochner’s surprise and great pleasure, Mr. Cordogan explained that his company has a donor program whereby pianos are given a “second life,” which means that used pianos are paired with nonprofit groups with need.

PHOTO CAPTION: Rev. Rita Kay Lochner and Ruth Comfield of Grace and Peace Chaplaincy at the donated Pianoland piano with Dave Nichols from ManorCare of Westmont.

For a qualifying piano, Cordogan’s Pianoland in Geneva, Illinois, will pick up the piano at their expense, provide the donor with an appraised value for tax purposes, will tune and provide any necessary repairs. They will then review their list of not-for-profit institutions who have expressed a need and deliver it to them free of charge, — services which can easily exceed $1000 per piano. They will even provide a donor plaque for the piano.

Within a month of the request, Cordogan’s Pianoland delivered a lovingly used and expertly repaired piano to ManorCare’s upstairs dining room. At the monthly Grace and Peace Chaplaincy worship service, Chaplain Lochner dedicated this beautiful used piano with walnut case as God’s special gift of music. Resident Dave Nichols acknowledged divine intervention and received this donation with a prayer of thanksgiving. Pianist Ruth Comfield exclaimed, “It’s beautiful, all the keys work, it’s in tune and has a warm, bright sound. It’s such a joy to play!”

ManorCare of Westmont, a medical and rehabilitation center on Ogden Avenue, Westmont, is one of nearly thirty residential senior homes which have been served by Grace and Peace Chaplaincy since 2005. Maria Diver, Activity Director, commented, “These women who truly care about others have provided non-denominational worship services and enhanced our program’s ability to meet spiritual needs of all residents.” Executive Administrator Lisa Ulm added, “The facility truly appreciates this generous gesture on the part of Grace and Peace Chaplaincy and Cordogan’s Pianoland. Music is a gift all our patients can enjoy.”

Steely Dan hits the road again!
Iconic rock ‘n’ roll Hall of Famers Steely Dan are gearing up for their 30+ date U.S. “Rent Party ‘09 Tour.” Founding members Walter Becker and Donald Fagen will be traveling with a Yamaha C2S grand piano.

Since the ‘70s, Steely Dan has steadily built and maintained a cult-like following, and they’ll be appealing to those die-hard fans with some special set list engagements in four metropolitan markets, giving the band’s audience an unprecedented opportunity to hear both classic albums in their entirety as well as deep cut fan-selected favorites.

Sarah McLachlan Goes for the Gold
Yamaha artist Sarah McLachlan will be playing a Yamaha 7′6″ C7 MIDI piano for the upcoming filming of an Olympics commercial. This is the Canadian singer/songwriter’s second promotion with the 2010 Winter games; she also headlined the one-year countdown concert on Feb. 12. The Winter Olympics will take place in Vancouver, Canada Feb. 12-28. Stay tuned for more details on the commercial!

Collective Soul and Gavin DeGraw Take a Road Trip
Yamaha artists Gavin DeGraw and Ed Roland with Collective Soul are hitting the road for a co-headlining summer tour. The 13-city tour starts on June 22 in Cleveland, Ohio’s House of Blues and ends on July 15 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida’s Revolution. Collective Soul and Gavin DeGraw have other dates that they will be playing solo, directly before and after their co-headlining tour. Gavin plays a CLP175 digital piano.

Cordogan’s Pianoland is proud to announce that Roland is back at Cordogan’s! This gives our customers an exclusive opportunity to compare Yamaha’s Clavinova and Roland SIDE BY SIDE! No other area retailer carries both product lines so come experience the two top brands under the same roof!

We are heavily stocking the new Roland product line and we can’t wait to get the their two newest products in — the LX-10, Roland’s top-of-the-line upright digital piano and the RM-700, Roland’s top-of-the-line digital entertainment piano.

The pianos will be arriving soon!

…And we couldn’t be any more proud! To this day, 9 years after we began our downloadable song library for customers, we are still the the only piano retailer to offer a service of this kind. If you are in the market for a http://www.chicagopianos.com/yamaha_disklavier.html or any sort of player piano…or even a CVP Series Yamaha Clavinova, you will instantly inherit a 4500 song library — worth thousands of dollars — for absolutely free, just for doing business with Cordogan’s!

And that’s not all. It keeps growing. Your membership is free and permanent too, so our online library is a great backup system for your CD’s, disks and USB thumb drives. If you ever lose them or they become damaged, all you have to do is log back in and re-download.

We also have “Listen & Learn” files, where you can download classical selections AND print out the listening guide so that you can learn the history of the piece you’re enjoying. It’s like stepping back into Music Appreciation 101, but this time, it’s not just for the credits! It can also be a great educational experience for the whole family. NO player piano manufacturer’s software library even offers this — only chicagopianos.com.

Our player piano customers are from all over the country, much of which is due to our free exclusive software library AND our competitive pricing. Get a taste of it here!

It was announced last week that the Kemble piano factory, the UK’s last piano manufacturer, will be closing its doors to manufacturing their pianos in Great Britain.  This ends a tradition in England that dates back to the late 1700’s, the efforts of which defined the piano industry worldwide for hundreds of years to come.  The very first established piano manufacturer was Broadwood of England, and throughout the next 200 plus years, the British made beautiful pianos that were highly regarded worldwide, including Kemble. It is our understanding that Kemble will continue to exist as a company — just not with pianos made in England. We will update this entry when we have more information on Kemble’s future.

Cordogan’s Pianoland began carrying the Kemble piano line in the late 1990’s and have enjoyed tremendous success with the brand.  Positioned (and rated) as a piano that is slightly better than Kawai and Yamaha, Kemble pianos offered American consumers a choice to Japanese pianos that will now no longer be available.  There is no other brand to fill this void.  That choice involved a piano that had all the engineering and technology of a Japanese piano, but had the character — both aesthetically and musically, of a European piano.  Kemble offered beautiful, timeless cabinet designs that the Japanese manufacturers have never offered.  And the soundboard material in a Kemble employs Bavarian spruce — a higher grade soundboard than their Japanese cousins, resulting in a warmer tone than Japanese pianos typcially offer.

It’s perfectly accurate to call the Japanese pianos “cousins” to the Kemble, because Yamaha owns over 90% of the Kemble company and they use the English factory to build the Yamaha upright pianos that are sold throughout Europe.  The musical designs of the Yamaha piano are absolutely shared with Kemble pianos.  In some instances, the Kemble scale design (which is to say the iron frame and accompanying string configuration) is identical to the comparable Yamaha model.  The actions and action parts are also identical.  Other models involved scale designs that are indigenous to Kemble, but the parts and quality are all Yamaha.  Again, the case design, soundboard materials and British lineage are what really makes the Kemble piano special.

With Yamaha’s recent decision to build their pianos in factories outside England, so ends the factory in Bletchley and the Kemble pianos that have been produced there for many decades.  Cordogan’s has only a few Kembles left. We have no reason to believe that the factory warranty is threatened but in any case, Cordogan’s is offering a 5 year parts and labor warranty on each remaining Kemble piano.  That’s the same warranty length that Steinway offers on their new pianos.  And considering that Cordogan’s has been in business longer than both Kemble AND Yamaha in the United States, our warranty is more solid than that of any piano manufacturer.

Please contact us at www.chicagopianos.com for more information about our remaining Kemble inventory.

Please visit our “Buying Tips” link at chicagopianos.com for up-to-date, useful information about buying a piano. In particular, we recently added a Buying Tip (#1 on our list) that discusses some of the current caveats to buying a piano on craigslist, ebay or other online services where physically viewing the piano may not be easy.

In the interest of fairness, we wish to remind our readers that it is certainly possible to find a good deal on craigslist or ebay, but in the absence of becoming a piano buying expert, you may find yourself simply searching for price since the tools needed for you to gauge VALUE are far more complicated. And it is in this arena where piano buyers can get tripped up with the Buying Tip we’ve just added. We hope you find this useful!