Talk:List of piano manufacturers

Remove word "famous" from title
I would remove the word "famous" from the title of this list. I think it would be better if it could become a comprehensive list of all piano makers. Or perhaps merge it with this page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Piano_manufacturers Opinions?
 * Yes, "famous" seems kind of redundant. I think the category can't show dates, and adding their location might help to improve the list. - Mireut 18:48, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I renamed it - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Lists_(stand-alone_lists)#Naming_conventions
 * The name or title of the list should simply be List of _ _ (for example list of Xs). Do not use a title like: Xs, famous Xs, listing of important Xs, list of noted Xs, nor list of all Xs. - Mireut 15:58, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

To Do
I cleaned this list up and created a sortable table. It can be informative to sort manufacturers by region or by age. (Until data is normalized, sorting won't work perfectly, but this is a good start.)


 * 1) Should individual artisans appear in this list along side corporations? Alternatively, should there be separate lists for piano corporations and the piano artisans that worked for those corporations?
 * 2) I did not create links to New York because of ambiguity. In some cases it should link to cities inside of New York state but in other cases it should link to the city New York, NY.
 * 3) I added the 'Acquired By' field in the table because so many of these companies/brands have merged.
 * 4) Data should be cited if possible.
 * 5) There are several other aggregations of piano makers/manufacturers on Wikipedia.


 * I discovered that this List of piano makers gets 10 times more traffic than either of these two pages:
 * Category:Piano manufacturing companies
 * Category:Piano_makers


 * I also discovered that the german version of this page, Liste von Klavierbauern, has substantially different content. It leans more towards listing individual artisans at the time of this writing.


 * I'm not sure what the next steps should be?


 * Should the german Liste von Klavierbauern be synchronized with the english List of piano makers? I would say yes depending on the answer to point #1 above.
 * Should data from Category:Piano manufacturing companies and Category:Piano_makers that does not appear in List of piano makers be added to the List of piano makers? See point #1 above.


 * Finally, there is this very extensive List of piano brand names. Would it make sense to merge that list into a field of List of piano makers as a cross reference?


 * Even more categories
 * es:Categoría:Fabricantes de pianos


 * eo:Kategorio:Pianokonstruistoj


 * it:Categoria:Costruttori di pianoforti


 * sv:Kategori:Pianotillverkare




 * Does anyone have any input on Wikipedia policies and guidelines for synchronizing Lists and Categories?

--Chris Murphy (talk) 04:55, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Style Guide
I propose this style guide for updating the table. I've cited these points when possible but your suggestions are welcome. For convenience and reinforcement, I added these tips in an invisible comment just above the table in the wikitext.


 * New entries should be added in alphabetical order to the table. Alphabetize by last name in cases where there are two names —e.g. August Förster is listed in the F section. Do not introduce comma delimited naming conventions like Förster, August


 * Use the full name of the company instead of abbreviations. —e.g. Steinway & Sons instead of just Steinway.


 * Add a period onto Co. (abbreviation for names ending in 'Company').


 * Date ranges should be specified with an en dash (not a hyphen) and no spaces: like this 1900–2000 not like this 1900 - 2000.


 * Research and cite your dates. For approximate dates, to ensure proper presentation and sort order in the table, use the c. template with the sortable flag like this c. 1930


 * If a company is still in business, don't simply write '1900–present' instead write —e.g. 1900– (Be sure to replace 2024 with whatever the current year is). This mark up will, in coming years, alert editors to verify that the company is still in business and thus prevent this data from getting stale. If you find an entry where the  year is older than the current calendar year, it may be time to check if the company is still in business.     (See the comment by User:Wwoods here )


 * Only put dates in the 'Years active' field. —e.g. don't write text such as 'died 1892' or 'unknown–1900' or '?–1900'.


 * Avoid the use of centuries and decades dates such as 1800s or 1840s.


 * Locations should be linked to their wikipedia article. Major USA cities don't need a state or country, but lesser known cities should. —e.g. Lenoir City, TN, US (The link contains the article name, followed by the display name, followed by the two character state abbreviation in caps., followed by US)

--Chris Murphy (talk) 05:37, 31 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Looks good to me. However, I'm wondering about the company names, for instance, should Currier Piano Co. be listed as such or just as "Currier"? Chevsapher (talk) 23:47, 29 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Let's use the full name of the company to disambiguate similar company names (e.g. Cable Company, Hobart M. Cable, and Cable and Sons). This will also give readers an accurate and unambiguous name with which to do further research. I'm updating the style guide above to reflect this suggestion. Chris Murphy (talk) 02:46, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Schulzendorff pianos
Schulzendorff pianos are not on the list.

Heinrich Schulzendorff, Berlin. Produced pianos between 1922 and 1926.

I have such a piano. 1.121.105.126 (talk) 23:26, 29 April 2015 (UTC)

Proposed rename?
It seems to me that the name "List of piano manufacturers" would be a better name rather than "List of piano makers" -- thoughts?--Paul McDonald (talk) 12:50, 24 November 2015 (UTC)


 * Being bold with no comment in over 1 year 3 months and 2 days, I'm going to go ahead and do it.--Paul McDonald (talk) 13:10, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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Piano Building in Canada
The article "Piano Building in Canada" in The Canadian Encyclopedia at https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/piano-building-emc lists some manufacturers that might be notable by Wikipedia standards and worth adding to this article. Additional sources (links updated by me in 2024) in that article include:
 * Heintzman & Co., a Canadian manufacturer, from Heritage Toronto
 * Additional manufacturers are listed on other pages of this archived website.
 * Also (not mentioned in the encyclopedia article) Lesage & Fils, a former manufacturer in Sainte-Thérèse, Quebec. (click on "Ancienne usine des pianos Lesage" at . I think there were several other piano manufacturers in Sainte-Thérèse (all closed now).
 * Also (not mentioned in the encyclopedia article) Lesage & Fils, a former manufacturer in Sainte-Thérèse, Quebec. (click on "Ancienne usine des pianos Lesage" at . I think there were several other piano manufacturers in Sainte-Thérèse (all closed now).

Лисан аль-Гаиб (talk) 08:09, 14 June 2024 (UTC)
 * There are some useful lists of manufacturer names in the other language editions of Wikipedia. For example, there's a list of manufacturers (possibly derived from an earlier version of this one) in the French article fr:Piano and in the Italian category it:Categoria:Costruttori di pianoforti. Check the "other languages" link on the category page for links such as es:Categoría:Fabricantes de pianos (Spanish) and zh:Category:鋼琴製作者 (Chinese). You might also want to improve the corresponding articles in the other language editions of Wikipedia.