Pianos by Fandrich & Sons

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Home of the one and only Fandrich Vertical Action that plays like a grand.

Fandrich & Sons Pianos opened in a small store in Seattle, WA in 1993. It is family owned and operated, since 2000 at our home on 5 acres in the woods near Stanwood, WA. The rise of the internet allowed us to move home, where we have our 2000 sq.ft. workshop and our studio with the finished pianos on display.
	Darrell Fandrich, RPT studied violin and piano as a child. He became interested in how pianos worked, and at age 16 studied piano technology at the University of Minnesota's McPhail School of Music, which began a lifelong fascination with how to make pianos more musical. He has put his degree in mechanical engineering to use in developing several innovations that have received significant recognition. See Darrell's resume for more details.
	Heather Fandrich began piano lessons at age 5. She studied piano for 8 years, but with less and less diligence, which she now realizes was largely due to an uninspiring practice piano. She got her BA and master's degree in social work and worked in the juvenile justice system for 28 years. She and Darrell met because her father, Robert Jenny, wrote Darrell's first two US patents. Only after she and Darrell were married did she learn that pianos were in her genes--her great, great grand-father was Frederick Mathushek, a noted piano designer and builder in the late 1800's. Her first experience with a musical piano was playing the prototype of Darrell's Fandrich Vertical Action™. Now she fervently wishes she had grown up with a musical piano, as she knows the results of her musical studies would have been quite different.

"My piano was delivered this Wednesday and it is beautiful with a beyond belief gorgeous sound. I am totally delighted. I've played the piano since the age of 7, except for the years I spent living on a boat and then finishing my doctoral work. Now I am 70 and feel that I'm gaining back a major part of my life, only this time with an instrument that sings in a way I've never experienced! My training is classical but I've always loved playing "by ear". Perhaps I will find someone to teach me chords now that I can hear every note singing even through those chords I spontaneously make up! The harmonies are luscious because each note 'speaks'. I've played on many pianos and not one with as beautiful a sound as this."

-- Ann Jennings
June 2007, Maine