Coo-ee, Mister Shifter...

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Me & Leo in the back of the truck after loading the piano in the final clear-out of Lou's place. Moving a piano is a pretty intimidating prospect for the uninitiated, but in practice is not too bad. Admittedly, the average, old school iron-frame upright weighs in at around a quarter of a ton or so, and consequently can be a bit of a handful; but moving them around is more a question of technique than brute strength, although you do need a bit of muscle to bring to the party.

A great design feature of these old pianos is the ability to take a bit of weight off the total before you think about shifting them. The front panel, lid and lower panel all come off easily, as does the entire hammer assembly, with minimal effort, lightening the beast by quite a few kilos off the bat. Thereafter, it's a question of lifting the remainder and placing a dolly - a small trolley - under the thing and manoeuvring it gently to your vehicle - in this case a tail-lift truck - of choice.

Knowing how to shift one of these things is just a matter of experience, in my case: I grew up in a house where we always had a piano, and which was often moved between rooms; and Jane & I had an upright gifted to us for our first flat together, which we subsequently gave to a friend when we moved home the first time. The trick when moving stuff this weighty is: don't put your back out and avoid dropping the thing on your toes: dynamic lifting training and steel toe-caps are helpful in this respect. Still, another old musical instrument rescued can't be all bad, can it?


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