Gulbransen
Gulbransen Piano Dates Gulbransen 2102 Hancock Street San Diego CA 92110 (619) 296-5760 www.gulbransen.com 1915-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-2-2-2-2-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-333000. To find out the age of your Gulbransen piano, you will need to know the piano's serial number. The serial number can be found stamped somewhere on the frame or soundboard. On grand pianos the number may be found on the key stop rail and/or the soundboard. The number shown is the last serial number manufactured in that year. By 1917, Gulbransen had become the largest manufacturer of player pianos in the world. The Gulbransen Registering Piano was unquestionably one of the best-known instruments of its class. Its trademark, Easy-at-the-Pedals, and slogan, 'Easy to Play,' were impressed upon the memory of millions of people through national advertising. Many piano manufacturers placed serial numbers in a variety of places. Pianos also have other numbers printed on them such as part numbers and many other pianos do not have a serial number at all. Many pianos will have a 4, 5 or 6 digit serial number to identify the age of the piano.
Gulbransen Piano Dates
Gulbransen
2102 Hancock Street
San Diego CA 92110
(619) 296-5760
www.gulbransen.com
| 1915-90000 1916-101000 1917-110000 1918-120000 1919-130000 1920-140000 1921-150000 1922-165000 1923-182000 1924-195000 1925-218000 1926-240000 1927-265000 1928-282000 | 1929-300000 1930-301000 1931-303000 1935-304500 1933-306000 1934-307900 1935-308900 1936-312000 1937-322000 1938-333000 1939-338000 1940-344000 1941-349000 1942-354000 | 1943-354500 1944-355000 1945-357000 1946-358000 1947-366000 1948-380000 1949-395000 1950-405500 1951-416000 1952-420000 1953-428000 1954-435500 1955-443500 1956-452500 | 1957-461000 1958-470500 1959-479000 1960-488300 1961-497000 1962-506000 1963-515000 1964-524000 1965-542000 1966-551100 1967-559400 1968-565000 1969-571000 | |||
| Information courtesy of Gulbransen | ||||||
Company Information
1904
Gulbransen, Inc. founded in Chicago, Illinois by Axel Gulbransen.
1917
Gulbransen, Inc. grows to be the world’s largest manufacturer of player pianos.
1928
Gulbransen produces its first organ (reed pump organ).
1942
Steinway and Gulbransen selected as the only two manufacturers of pianos for government use during World War II.
1957
Gulbransen introduces the world’s first all transistor organ.
1962-72
Gulbransen leads the high-tech home organ industry with many firsts: first electronic theater organ; first built-in automatic rhythm; first realistic piano voice in an organ; first instant playback; first automatic-walking bass plus many others.
1973
Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) purchases Gulbransen, Steinway and Sons; Rodgers Organs; Gemeinhardt Flute; Lyon and Healy Harp; Fender Rhodes and others to form the world’s most prestigious musical instrument company.
1986
Gulbransen acquired from CBS by a California music company. Gulbransen continues the effort started at CBS to create high quality wave synthesis of instrumental sounds with enough oscillators to be used on organs where many different instruments must be available simultaneously.
1987
Gulbransen produces its first wave synthesis ASICs and enters the technology business selling complete designs of digital pianos to manufacturers in Asia.
1988
Digital pianos using Gulbransen technology take over more than 50% of the market in Korea. Gulbransen patents an optical sensor strip which detects velocity of piano keys for use with MIDI devices. Elton John, Billy Joel and others choose the Gulbransen MIDISystem for use in their acoustic pianos.
1992
Gulbransen re-spins its ASICs increasing the output accuracy to 20 bits and installs 18 bit DACs to eliminate all vestiges of background hiss.
1994
Gulbransen begins custom designs to penetrate the PC integrated circuit market with low-cost, high-quality wave synthesis, full custom chips, which are backward compatible with existing software. Additionally, Gulbransen introduces a high quality portable digital hymn player containing over 5,000 songs for the church market.
1996
Gulbransen introduces the G392, the first PC sound chip with the capabilities to play 64 simultaneous voices through a hardware based synthesizer engine.
1997
World renowed keyboard manufacturer, Baldwin Pianos, selects the Gulbransen MIDISystem as the foundation component in launching its Concert Master piano line.
1998
Gulbransen sells the assets of its chip design division to National Semiconductor. Gulbransen continues its musical instrument manufacturing business. The company’s highly regarded MIDISystems line and the Gulbransen Digital Hymnal remain defining, state-of-the-art, music products.
(The above is from the ” Gulbransen Web site” )
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One of the primary ways you can begin to investigate the value of your piano is by locating the serial number. The serial number is considered your piano’s birth certificate, and it is the way the original manufacturer assigned it a unique.
However, locating it can be tricky. We provide our customers with the following real-life diagrams to quickly help them find the serial number on their grand or upright piano.
Grand serial numbers like on the Steinway pictured above may be found in many different places. The various places on the diagram point to some possible locations.
Typically, a serial number has 5 to 7 digits, but in some cases, it may have fewer or more and may also include a letter. This is a view of the grand with the lid open and the music desk removed. It may be necessary to clean dust off the harp or soundboard before the serial number can be seen.
Upright or vertical piano serial numbers can usually be found by lifting the lid and looking inside on the gold harp or plate. It is usually not necessary to remove the upper front panel to find the serial number (as in this picture).
By locating the serial number, you can begin your research to know the value of the piano. The first thing the serial number tells you is the age of the piano. Paired with the who made the piano, the age is a key piece of information, and many piano experts can begin to assign a value quickly after assessing the condition and a few other criteria.
Sometimes, however, a serial number can be nearly impossible to find, even to professionals who know where to look and have identified thousands of serial numbers in their years of expertise. If you are running into this problem, feel free to give us a call, and we’ll be happy to work with you to locate your serial number.
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Original image sources:
Grand piano: https://www.amromusic.com/
Upright piano: http://www.steinhovenpianos.com/