I just inherited a min baby grand piano. Love it in my living room. it has the most beautiful wood finish...who cares if nobody can play it well, it just looks so darn good.

A painted instrument is a tip off that its owners aren't serious musicians. You don't have to be good to be serious. Paint is not good for the instrument or its sound. Treating it as a decor element makes me snicker.

We've had 3 different pianos in the past 4 years. We continue to upgrade pianos and sell our old one on craigslist. 2 out of the 3 times we've sold pianos the owners bought the piano sight-unseen.

They didn't care if the piano sounded good at all, or if it could be tuned. They only wanted to HAVE the piano in their home to look good.

WEIRD, if you ask me.

We proudly own and play our unpainted grand piano every day.

Sometimes old pianos are un-tunable and when trying to get rid of our old upright piano, we discovered there is no market for them and they're essentially worth nothing. Because of that and how difficult they are to move and get rid of, I totally understand painting a piano so that it at least looks interesting if it serves no other purpose.

Oh let me tell you about the theatre I work for and pianos. People donate their old pianos to us despite us begging them not to. One was dubbed the cat pee piano because the former owners cat wouldn't leave it alone. Another was a darling little Victorian upright that was in such bad shape antique and piano dealers alike told us it was okay to "make it disappear." They promised us it was never a fabulous instrument. We finally had to clean house. Have you ever tried to store multiple pianos? One was given away on Craigslist. Yes, given away. Hopefully a budding piano prodigy who couldn't afford a piano got it. And if it was a painting project, believe me it wasn't a crime.

And the Victorian? Please don't crucify me, it really was this bad. Veneer was half off or in shards. We dismantled it and kept the good parts. I still have the candleholders and I salvaged the carved legs by making them into 2 darling endtables/plant stands.

Ladies and Gentleman please make sure your donation to any organization is an asset and not an albatross!

Musician here. Painted pianos? Oh dear. For the record I am also troubled by violins on walls and cellos leaning artfully in corners to lend a bohemian vibe, because no serious cellist (and I agree with Barefoot that you don't have to be good to be serious) would leave their instrument out of its case and in a precarious position. I suppose I can understand people using old pianos that are no longer musically useful as art or something. Pieces of defunct Victorian pianos can make great decorative items. But picture 2 - that looks to be a very good and very expensive musical instrument that's in great peril from that vase of water balancing where it could easily be spilled over the keyboard or inside the piano. Clearly owned by non-musicians with too much money.

"A painted instrument is a tip off that its owners aren't serious musicians."

???

Wow.
So because I created a great piece of modern art in my home using my piano, through primarily painting, I am not a serious musician?

I've played for 25 years, and continue to play several times a week... On the same piano, now painted orange and pink to match a piece of art hanging above it.

In my opinion, the serious musicians could make the most of music be it on a $100K Grand, 40 year old rotting spinet, or a $30 keyboard.

Man makes the music, music doesn't make the man...

That being said.... Great pianos! Great rooms! Keep up the great posts AT!

Sorry, I meant picture 3.

To each his own but tis better to be a painted (teal) prop in someone's home, than to be a decomposing wreck at the landfill.

We pondered that Victorian upright for about 2 years before we sighed deeply and dismantled it. I agree that taking something beyond repair and repurposing it is a great idea. But be it a musical instrument, a piece of furniture or an entire house, maintain what you've got so we don't have to have these discussions.

AT-you did a whole month on how to clean your home, do one on maintaining and fixing things!

Does anyone know a good and reasonably-priced piano tuner in NYC who I hope CAN tune an old upright??

@Elizabeth ll: You could try the Piano Technicians Guild (www.ptg.org) or Angie's List.

I lump these "You should NEVER paint a piano" people in with the "You should NEVER paint brick" and "You should NEVER paint wood" people.

My goodness...here's a news flash. You know those brand new grand and baby grand pianos that you purchase from piano showrooms that are WHITE and BLACK? Guess what...those are PAINTED. I guess the message here is that SERIOUS musicians would only have pianos that are PAINTED white or black, but any other color means that they're not serious musicians, and they don't respect the instrument. lol...

Elton John has played a bright red grand piano. I guess he's not a serious musician. Liberace had a grand piano covered in mirrors. I guess he wasn't a serious musician either. It's really amazing how a coat of paint makes some people seemingly lose their minds.

Pianos do not improve with age and even new ones will lose their ability to hold a tune within a few decades if they are machine made. Or so I was told when I bought ours. We also learned that.

Uprights, unless they are very large, will never sound very good. Grands sound great and are fun to play. The bigger the better as far as sound. The new electronic pianos sound better than a cheap baby grand or upright. How a piano sounds makes a huge difference. One that it worn out and won't hold a tune is basically a doorstop.

On the other hand, my mother bought someone's discarded out of tune upright when I was very small and she played it for me every evening (she couldn't hold a tune either). I also used to spend hours exploring it. I never had lessons but learned to adore music and play some by ear. I also learned to like microtonal music. It didn't impair my ability to appreciate tonal music either, contrary to what some might had warned. But if I had taken lessons I would have needed a decent instrument.

I have a painted black piano that perfectly matches my living room decor. I'm not going to feel bad about it, especially when my 4 year old daughter gets the biggest smile just sitting at it and playing along with the music in her head. As Addicted2Decor said, any piano that isn't in its natural color is painted....and even then it's stained. I see guitar players with painted and marked up guitars. I have seen a fiddle player playing on the most gorgeous teal fiddle ever, too. I don't think painting an instrument makes you an unserious musician. Perhaps it just means you care enough to give your instrument a few more years of life with a face lift!

A query to all those "it's wrong to paint a piano" people: if you have an old piano, good enough to play a bit or learn on, given good ones cost a bomb, how can the paint damage it? We dont seem to be painting top level ones, just home & children playing. These are often the ones covered in the sort of veneer that looks like melted chocolate - I dare say that that's not brilliant for sound either...

No no no, the black (or white!) pianos that you see in a proper piano showroom are NOT painted. The old ones are lacquered. The modern ones have a hard glossy polyester or polyurethane finish. No paint involved.

As for a teal fiddle, if that was DIY painted it will certainly have affected the sound of the instrument. It might have looked good but someone serious about sound would only consider having an instrument coloured by a professional luthier.

I must say I'm far less distressed by people painting beaten up old pianos than I am by people putting drinks and vases of water on decent musical instruments. Never mind the finish - water + wood-and-felt hammers and metal strings?? Not a good combination.