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The Pearl River Piano Group (广州珠江钢琴集团有限公司) is China's largest piano manufacturer and has the largest piano factory in the world producing more pianos than any other factory. The company was established in 1956 in Guangzhou, Guangdong, China. Pearl River is capable of producing over 100,000 pianos a year, and exports them to more than 80 countries. Today Pearl River pianos are manufactured under a wide range of brands and levels. Each of these series have similar sizes with different scale designs, materials and vastly different sound.

In January 2016, the company took over 90% of the shares of Wilhelm Schimmel, a German piano manufacturer in Braunschweig. This purchase and collaboration is pushing the company to even higher levels of quality and tone.

Operations in Germany remain unchanged and the Schimmel factory is still managed by the Schimmel family.

Certifications

In 1998, Pearl River became the first piano company in China to receive International Standards Association ISO 9001 Certification (ISO 9001) for its complete line of grand and vertical pianos, including all parts and components. ISO 9001 Certification is awarded by an independent auditing organization, following a lengthy audit of quality systems, ranging from the procurement of raw materials to manufacturing systems, assembly procedures, and customer service. Pearl River also recently was awarded ISO 14001, which is similar, but relates to environmental standards. Pearl River is the first manufacturer in China to receive this award.

The Pearl River name

Pearl River ran a company-owned US distribution until 2000, when they turned the distribution over to North American Music. Pearl River was one of the first Chinese piano companies to market pianos in the United States under its own company name and have been well accepted by piano teachers and tuners. International concert pianist Oksana Kolesnikova is a spokesperson for the Pearl River Company.

Other instruments

Pearl River is also one of the world's largest guitar and violin manufacturers, and is a primary supplier for the popular "First Act" brand of guitars commonly found at Target stores among others. The company also sells drums, brass, and woodwind instruments internationally. In the People's Republic of China, they produce guitars with the own brand name, "Kapok Guitar" (红棉).

Ritmuller

Pearl River hired piano designer Lothar Thomma to create the new Ritmuller lines. Eventually Thomma had designed or helped design both of the Ritmuller series of pianos, Performance and Premium. The company says that the Lothar Thomma-designed Ritmuller pianos feature European scale designs and use high end European components, and smaller, slower production to allow more hand-finishing work. Some of the differences between Pearl River and Ritmuller include the Thomna designed lower tension German scales, piano felt from Filzfabrik Wurzen GmbH in Germany, Roslau higher level (than Pearl River brand) German strings, real Ebony wood sharps in place of plastic sharps and Abel German hammers in the Performance Series and Renner German Hammers in the Premium series. The Performance series also has a different action design, different rim design material spec and a great deal more hand work reflecting its position as the finest piano the company builds.

O.E.M.

Three large retail piano companies in the US use Pearl River as their OEM entry level house brand supplier: Jordan Kitts Music, Sherman Clay(now closed), and Schmitt Music. These three retail chains use their own brand name (Henry F Miller, Christofori) on the front of the pianos and in a couple of isolated cases feature slightly different specifications than the Pearl River brand models distributed by North American Music.

Connections with Yamaha, Steinway, and Hallet Davis

Yamaha

Yamaha formed a joint venture with Pearl River in 1995 to establish a factory to build pianos for the Chinese market. This factory is east of Guangzhou in an "economic development zone", approximately 35 miles from the Pearl River factory. This factory produced two models for the Pearl River Piano Group: the UP125M1 and the Ritmüller UP126R. Ritmüller brand pianos sport upgraded cabinetry, a different plate, upgraded felt and several different scale designs. Both product lines were marketed in the United States by retail piano stores and had additional branding to the side of the keys reading made by "Yamaha Pearl River".

Steinway

Pearl River also manufactures all models for Steinway & Sons' "Essex" brand piano line, including grand pianos and uprights, in their factory in Guangzhou. On May 1, 2005, Steinway & Sons and Pearl River Piano Group jointly announced an agreement. The companies began developing several new Essex models, which Steinway & Sons designed for affiliate company Boston Piano Co., Inc. The piano line reached the marketplace early in 2006. It was Steinway's first venture in China, and Pearl River's first OEM relationship with a Western piano maker.

Hallet, Davis & Co.

Hallet, Davis & Co. Boston (HD&C), is a piano line commonly referred to as Hallet & Davis or H&D. The original Hallet, Davis & Company was formed in Boston in 1841 by George H. Davis, Russell Hallet, and other partners. It was reconstituted by Davis with another Hallet (Benjamin Franklin Hallet) in Boston in the 1850s. The W. W. Kimball Company acquired Hallet & Davis in the early 1900s. In 1905, the Conway Company, a holding company, acquired the Hallet & Davis name from Kimball.  In 1927, Conway disposed of its piano business.

There has been confusion over the Hallet & Davis brand name and its origin of manufacture for well over a century. In the December 1904 edition of the Piano and Organ Workers’ Official Journal, the editors stated: “It may be of Interest to our readers to know that, despite the removal of the Hallet & Davis factory to Chicago some years ago, and merging with the Kimball Company, the so-called trade papers continued to announce the Hallet & Davis piano as a Boston make of instrument, thus aiding and abetting a criminal deception, a fraud.”

In the mid-twentieth century, the Hallet & Davis name, as well as many other U.S. piano brands, were consolidated under the Aeolian-American Corp., which declared bankruptcy in 1985.

An attempt to revive the Hallet & Davis brand, and appropriate its Boston association, was made in 1998 when a trademark for “HALLET, DAVIS & CO. BOSTON” was applied for by North American Music, Inc. The application was “Refused/Dismissed or Invalidated” by the U.S. Patent and Trade Office (USPTO). The very next year, in 1999, North American Music applied again for a Hallet & Davis trademark, but this time simply as “HALLET, DAVIS & CO.” (removing “BOSTON”), which was ultimately granted in 2001 by the USPTO. Although it is not part of the registered trademark, Pearl River Piano Group puts "Boston" under the H&D stencil, despite the fact the their H&D pianos have no connection whatsoever to Boston, MA.

The Pearl River Piano Group has produced the H&D line since 2014. Prior to 2014 the name was made by the Dongbei Piano Co. For a while the line consisted of pianos from both makers at the same time. Hallet & Davis today is an OEM line of pianos manufactured for North American Music to distribute. While today all H&D pianos are made by Pearl River over the recent years this brand had a sketchy manufacturing past with vastly different designs and quality levels sold under the Hallet & Davis name but made by multiple piano makers including Beijing HsingHai Musical Instruments Corporation, Dongbei Piano Co., Silberman Piano Co., Parsons Music, and Peal River Group.

The Signature Series for a while was made simultaneously by both Pearl River Group or Beiijing HsingHai Musical Instruments Corporation depending on model and size of both uprights and grand pianos. The largest grand piano in regular production at 6 ft 2 in (a 7-foot Signature Series Grand Piano is available upon special order) The Imperial Collection with ornate woods and finishes was made by Parsons Music.

References

1. ^ Pearl River Archived 2009-08-27 at the Wayback Machine Pearl River Pianos's USA site. Retrieved on September 29, 2007.
2. Hompeage of Noerr company, retrieved on 2016-02-27
3. Oksana Kolesnikova website, Pearl River.""
4. Clinkscale, Martha Novak (1999). Makers of the Piano, Volume 2: 1820-1860. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. p. 169. ISBN 0198166257.
5. Dolge, Alfred (1913). Pianos and Their Makers, Vol. 2. Covina, CA: Covina Publishing Company. p. 107. ISBN 1527808947.
6. Piano, Organ & Musical Instrument Workers Official Journal. Piano, Organ & Musical Instrument Workers International Union of America. 1904.
7. "Trademark Status & Document Retrieval". tsdr.uspto.gov. Retrieved 2018-05-13.
8. "Trademark Status & Document Retrieval". tsdr.uspto.gov. Retrieved 2018-05-13.
9. https://www.pianobuyer.com/Resources/Piano-Brands-Profiles/Detail/ArticleId/75/Brand/HALLET-DAVIS-CO

External links

• http://www.pearlriverusa.com
• http://www.steinway.com/essex
• https://www.forbes.com/global/2002/0513/040.html (article about Pearl River on Forbes.com)
• http://halletdavispiano.com/

• Chinese brands
• Companies established in 1956
• Piano manufacturing companies
• Manufacturing companies based in Guangzhou