Famed high-end German piano maker C. Bechstein offers a wider range of product offerings in terms of price than perhaps any other manufacturer. From the C. Bechstein Concert Series which are among the most elite pianos on Earth, to the new Zimmermann pianos available at an affordable price, built to compete with Japanese-made grands and uprights.
Today, we’ll be taking a look at the Zimmermann S6 upright piano, an exciting new product for us, and an instrument that to this point is pretty well unknown to the North American market.
Utilizing a timeless design and Bechstein-supervised exacting quality standards, we’re excited to be carrying Zimmermann instruments moving forward and thrilled to be diving into the S2 for you here. Let’s start by checking out the action.
Zimmermann S6 – Upright Piano Action
Why Action Matters
it’s really important that whatever piano you ultimately choose for your home, you’re happy with the action and how the instrument feels.
It’s more difficult to create a good connection between player and instrument as far as actions are concerned with upright pianos because you don’t have the benefit of gravity working as the counteracting force as you do in a grand piano.
On an upright piano, it’s a little more complex to get that really nice fluid motion because it has to be done with springs, counterweights and counter-movement. Often times upright actions feel slow, and a little bit clunky, and the repetition speed isn’t quite ideal unless you’re ready to drop $20,000 or more on a handmade upright piano. Here, great pains have been expended to produce a truly dynamic action.
Bechstein’s Bronze Line Action
With that preamble out of the way, let’s jump back to the S6. We had a chance to try the S6 at Bechstein’s Berlin showroom about a year ago and were quite surprised to see a product from Bechstein that was very much in line with what you’ll pay for a Japanese product from Kawai or from Yamaha.
Naturally then, we’re of course instantly thinking about how this action, the Bechstein Bronze Line Action, compares to a taller Kawai such as a K-500, or Yamaha U3. First of all, we noticed the S6 definitely has a more robust feeling construction than a U3, and that’s obviously by design as the S6 has a heavier hammer.
There’s more power that you’re able to extract from S6, so particularly for people who already have some acoustic experience, they might really appreciate going to an instrument with such a pleasant touch that also happens to be very responsive.
Wide Dynamic Range
The geometry has been set up to produce a bigger dynamic range than what you would get out of a Kawai K-500 or Yamaha U3.
When you dig in, you feel a little bit more resistance, but it delivers this huge big tone, and then you start to understand why this is a very credible and interesting option to consider.
Action Wrap-Up
To sum up the action, we’ve got an instrument that is very responsive but also happens to have a few extra grams of resistance. The trade-off to that is if you already are familiar with how a grand piano feels or already have the muscles built up from spending lots of time with an upright, this is going to respond very naturally to you.
Let’s dive into the sound now and some of the design features contributing to that tone.
Zimmermann S6 – Upright Piano Tone & C Bechstein Design Features
Features
Our impression is that the S6 is giving us somewhere between 15% to 20% more upward dynamic range than what the K500 and U3 are able to produce. Now, whether or not you like the type of tone that it’s producing is a very subjective thing, but it needs to be noted.
The S6 simply doesn’t sound like a Japanese piano and instead sounds a lot closer to what you would normally be getting out of a C. Bechstein Academy, W. Hoffmann or some of the darker German pianos that are out there in terms of tone. Steingraeber would be another example of this general tonal profile.
Hammer Materials & Design
There are several interesting design choices contributing to this specific sound. One of them is the hammer, which as we’ve mentioned, is a little bit bigger than what you’d normally expect out of a 50-inch piano. What’s more, the hammer on here is actually mahogany. This is somewhat unusual until you get up into the $15,000, $20,000 range, though Kawai notably uses mahogany on all of their K series pianos.
Most pianos in this price range use Maple for the hammers as it’s less expensive and easier to work with. Mahogany is superior though because it’s a bit lighter and thus doesn’t stay on the string quite as long, meaning any potential distortion is cut down.
Solid Spruce Soundboard
Second, we’re dealing with a solid spruce soundboard here. Some people will assume this is somewhat of a given considering the price class, but it’s always nice to see manufacturers still putting a white solid spruce soundboard on new pianos.
We’ve got hand-wound bass strings here and nice premium-grade Roslau strings in the treble.
Designed in Germany by C Bechstein’s R & D Department
Now, let’s talk about where and how it’s made since it says right on the piano “Designed by Bechstein” as opposed to “Built by Bechstein”. Does that automatically mean that they’ve submitted the design to the factory and now they don’t have anything to do with it? Not at all.
Bechstein has designed this piano from the ground up with their own Bechstein scale design, and Bechstein-produced hammers and a technical staff member from Germany directly supervises the assembly process at the production site.
C Bechstein Quality Management
Now, a lot of manufacturers with a sub-line that gets produced in another factory make the claim that they supervise the assembly process without really being able to back it up. In this case, Bechstein’s Quality Management team has a full-time German engineer that literally lives at the factory and supervises a small group of employees who exclusively assemble the Zimmermann product in a separate area of the factory.
The factory we’re talking about is of course the Hailun plant in China. This is a factory that was set up as a western-style factory, a business experiment a couple of decades ago. It has achieved a great level of success to the point that it has set a new standard for quality control and consistency for Chinese piano factories.
You’ll notice that on all the Zimmermann products, there’s actually a badge on the left-hand side of the keyboard that says, “The Bechstein Quality Management System.” Obviously, a company with a reputation like Bechstein’s wouldn’t put a quality seal badge like that on something unless it was a high-quality instrument.
Limited Production
When some people hear Chinese assembly, they immediately think mass-produced, without much if any actual hands-on human attention. One of the most special parts about the whole Zimmermann project for Bechstein is the fact that it is actually a limited production piano.
This is an instrument that is only being outputted at a rate of between 750 to 1,000 units per year, maximum. In fact, we’re only at number 8,217 for the particular piano here that we’re reviewing. This project is a little more than 10 years old, so that gives you a sense of how much individual attention each one of these instruments is receiving.
Closing Thoughts
To wrap up, we’ve got a piano here that is a 50-inch class upright that is going to compete very well against other pianos in the size and price range like a Kawai K500 or a Yamaha U3. It is part of the Bechstein family with a Bechstein design, Bechstein components, and is assembled in China at the Hailun factory.
We think it’s delivering an extremely unique and interesting option in a price range in the size range that is usually just a binary decision between Kawai and Yamaha.
So, if you have a chance to check it out, get into a showroom close to you. Of course, if you’re anywhere near Toronto, come visit us. We’ve got the Bechstein Zimmermann product, both the grands and the uprights, like the Zimmermann S2, on the floor.