Utica, NY Piano Store
Utica is a real drive from Albany, and it is fairer to say so before you plan your day. If you are looking for a piano store in Utica, NY, our showroom is about 90 miles east, so the visit works best as a planned trip rather than a quick stop. When you call, ask about delivery to Utica: we deliver and move pianos, and we can talk through what that looks like for your address.
Hilton Piano Center is a family business, and Bob Hilton has run it since 1992. The floor holds digital keyboards, digital pianos, upright and grand pianos, and player pianos, all set out to be played back to back. You will find us in Colonie Center mall at 442 Colonie Center, Albany. Phone (518) 362-7920 before you set out and name the instruments you want to try, so they are ready when you walk in.
From the Stanley Theatre at 259 Genesee Street, the drive is about 90 miles and takes roughly 1 hour 45 minutes to 2 hours. Most of it runs east on the New York State Thruway (I-90), and I-87 carries you the last stretch into Colonie. Those figures are approximate, so leave yourself some margin for winter weather and make an afternoon of it.
One shop covers the whole life of a piano. We sell new and used instruments, tune and repair them, move them, rent them and give lessons. Player-system conversions with PianoDisc or QRS, silent pianos and piano labs for schools and churches are part of the work as well. Thomas R. Proctor High School in Utica fields an orchestra, a band and a senior choir, and a school with that many ensembles is the kind of place where a piano lab earns its floor space.
Hilton Piano Center is the Capital Region’s only authorized Yamaha piano dealer, and an authorized Roland and Casio dealer. Among the new instruments are Baldwin and Hallet Davis pianos, Dynatone models and QRS, and the used inventory can bring in Steinway, Kawai or Yamaha pianos.
Contact the store:
Hilton Piano Center LLC
442 Colonie Center
Albany, NY 12205
518-362-7920
Would you rather start with a message? The contact form reaches us just as well. Add your Utica ZIP code, anywhere from 13501 to 13505, and a line about the piano you have in mind.
About Utica:
Utica is the county seat of Oneida County, and the 2020 census counted 65,283 residents. On January 2, 1734, King George II granted William Cosby a 20,000-acre tract of marshland that included this ground. The city grew on the site of Old Fort Schuyler, which colonists built for defense in 1758, and it carries the name of an ancient city in Tunisia. The Wikipedia article goes into more detail.
Utica was incorporated as a village on April 3, 1798 and as a city on February 13, 1832. Furniture, heavy machinery, textiles and lumber powered its 19th-century economy, and Savage Arms grew during World War I, making the Lewis gun for the British Army. CONMED and the Mohawk Valley Health System are among the larger employers now, and Matt Brewing Company in West Utica brews Saranac beer. Union Station on Main Street opened in April 1914.
For a night out in Utica, the Stanley Theatre comes first. Thomas W. Lamb designed it, crews built it in less than 13 months, and it opened on September 10, 1928 with the silent film Ramona, seating 2,963. The Central New York Community Arts Council bought it in 1974 for $135,000, and it joined the National Register of Historic Places on August 13, 1976. A major restoration and expansion followed in the late 2000s. The theatre's own site shows what is on stage.
Two more names help place the city. The Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute at 310 Genesee Street, a regional fine arts center founded in 1919, occupies a Philip Johnson building completed in 1960. The Utica Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1932. Utica University and Mohawk Valley Community College both trace their beginnings to 1946.