How to Donate a Piano

Pianos are not the smallest pieces of furniture in the house. So  when the family piano is no longer used and taking up valuable space, often the thought is to donate the piano to the school, the church or the village hall. Anywhere it can be played and appreciated.  

While donating a piano to a school or college is a generous gesture, the kind of piano and its condition might throw a different light on the gift.

Institutions need any donated piano to be up to scratch, up to pitch and ready for continual and rigorous use without the school having to spend any new money. Pianos of a certain age will never be fully up to scratch, and pianos that are ripe for being donated are often pianos that are simply unloved and unwanted by the owners. In this age of trying to recycle everything, passing on a surplus piano seems a very 'green' thing to do! But not always the most helpful thing to do.

Being given a 'grand' piano seems like manna from heaven to an institution with limited funds. Surely a grand piano can be used for concerts and recitals - what can possibly go wrong? But alas, most of the pianos I have viewed on behalf of hopeful clients, have been poor examples of mediocre manufacture.

It is better to turn down the offer of a poor piano than to be obliged to take it and be forced into paying good money trying to make good an inherently bad piano.

Occasionally there are happy endings:

One was when a parent of a child at a certain school very generously bought a piano for the school. 

Another, an 'old' parent wanted to donate their 1970s Yamaha to the school and even paid to have safety casters fitted, the piano moved and tuned! 

This is how to donate a piano!

So if you are considering gifting a piano to a school of college, be doubly sure the piano would meet the demands expected and actually be a blessing to the school.
    

Tuner's Journal

© Steve Burden