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@donavabdear , What a beautiful thing. Player pianos have been around forever, but that one gets the cake. 

Pianos are like HiFi systems. They will sound different in different rooms. Every one sounds different and their sound is very complex plus they are big. All this makes them hard to record. In studio recordings they use at least two mics and they split them between the channels. What you wind up with is the low keys in one channel and the high keys in the other, as if the piano is as big as the entire band. I HATE that. It totally kills the realism. In the Oscar Peterson box set, Exclusively For My Friends, is an Album called My favorite Instrument, MPS 15 181 ST. It is a collection of solo pieces. From another room it sounds as of the piano is in the room. From the listening position it sounds like the piano is right in front of you. You get the same effect with Maurizio Pollini's Chopin series DGG 2530 550, 659, and 291. The interesting thing is that they are very different sounding pianos/recordings but they produce the same effect except at the listening position Maurizio's piano sounds like it is up on a stage at a distance while Oscar's piano is right in front of you in the room. There are others but these are the ones that really stick in my mind.

@mijostyn - seems like you are into woodworking as much as hifi. The only similarity between my system and yours is the Ekornes chair I have. I had one since 2005 that was just replaced with an identical one last year. Hard to believe there have been no changes is all that time. I still have the old one that I'll give to my son when he can move for less than the value of the chair. Only reason I replaced it was because I cleaned it too aggressively and wore out a small patch of leather near where my head sat and I didn't like the fabric I had custom made to fit over the top part.

I didn't realize you were that into digital. What % of the time do you estimate you listen to vinyl vs. digital, and do you still like vinyl better (assuming you have a decent pressing of the title)?

Lastly, I only disagree with one of your statements....perfection is defined as 100%. You can't move the dial. If you want to say perfection is greater that that, it is still a fixed number, like a weighted GPA taking AP classes into account. It's like that skit saying to turn the amp up to 11, and why does it only go up to 10. However you slice it, perfection is perfection, max is max.

mijostyn Thank you for the piano recording notes, I'll listen to them with nothing else going on, the house quiet, my wife sleeping, my mind at ease, no caffeine and my tubes warmed up. 

How do you feel about my point about my piano making sound from the hammers hitting the strings and speakers using electricity and vibrating cones. This piano has changed my view of what Hi Fi is because it's real and when you hear real in a room that was designed for the instrument it's not like a recording. 

mijostyn Also, I've only done sound all my life and I've come across an interesting thing. People that are really good at it are into other things like your woodwork, many of my friends and the people that I look up to in the industry strangely enough cook, or do something else that is creative and practical. I don't have any other talents I try to play saxophone but I'm simply not as gifted as a real player.

Thank you for telling your story.

If I had tools and skills I would be all over making room treatments and maple isolation racks. You can flip them on etsy, lots of stuff there, some nice, come meh: