Local pianos hit the right note

After he had been learning the instrument for two years, Cao Rui decided it was time to buy her 7-year-old son a proper upright piano.

Everyone told her to buy an affordable Japanese instrument, but Cao set her sights on a W. Hoffmann, a spinoff brand from the German piano maker C. Bechstein, that used to be assembled in China.

"You don't really understand until you hear it with your own ears. The sound is sturdier and richer, the keys more firm and steady," Cao says. "And it offers the best value for money."