Finding the right Piano Technician

If you are searching for someone to work on your piano who knows what they're doing you may want to read on. I know this can be a difficult task as you cannot always be sure that the guy in the phone book really knows what he is doing. So what is the best way to insure that your next piano technician will be able to fix that squeaky pedal or better yet give your piano a real makeover. The kind of makeover you may have been dreaming about giving yourself every time you thought about going to the spa or spending a few days just pampering yourself.

First, a baseline requirement should be a Registered Piano Technician (RPT). This is a technician who has at least passed the minimum requirements to be considered a professional in the piano technical industry. An RPT may or may not be able to solve all of your problems or even offer you that great service that you may be hoping for, but we are really talking about a minimum competency here.

Next, you should consider what services a technician is willing to offer you. A technician who says you only need your piano tuned regularly is one to steer far and clear from. Look for a piano technician who is willing to offer you a full service and can explain to you what their approach is. For example, I like to tell my customers that I offer a half-day or full-day service which includes a comprehensive set of procedures. I don't differentiate between your piano and the $150k concert grand I service up the street. I approach them basically the same way, starting with tightening screws, lubricating and aligning moving parts, regulating, tuning, and voicing. There are roughly 50 steps I like to go over on my list and I start with step one and continue until I run out of time. I almost always run out of time and rarely get through my list completely due to the usual lack of maintenance which has been done on most pianos. That having been said, a day or two is usually enough on a newer instrument to get through most everything at least once, depending on how refined you want to get.

To continue, don't always think you will be saving anything by price shopping your piano technician that is unless you are looking for the most expensive guy out there and even that can be dangerous as there are a few who have figured out that they can sucker people in by jacking up there price, knowing that you will naturally think they are the best. BE CAREFUL! Some of the best technicians I know are somewhere in between on their price point. They are typically not the least or most expensive but are always worth every last penny.

Last but not least, don't be afraid to ask the piano technician you are talking to for a referral. A confident technician will usually give you the names of some of the better technicians in the area without hesitating. A really good piano technician doesn't need every customer they can get. They are usually booked out in advance and aren't scraping around looking for new clients. After giving you that great referral for their competition a superbly gifted and humble piano technician, who has any brains, should conclude by selling themselves as being the best at what they do whether that is tuning, service, voicing etc. They should sell you on their strengths and educate you on their abilities allowing you to make the ultimate decision as to what you want and need. And after all of that if you still haven't found who you're looking for call me! I'd me happy to help!

Piano Tone Regulation

There is nothing like taking a piano that needs a great deal of service, doing the work that needs done, and witnessing the changes take place in tone, color and timbre. It is as if you can begin to quantify the change that each turn of the screw has on the focus and power, control evenness and sustain that is waiting to be revealed.

Every instrument starts with a true potential. No matter what is done, aside from changing parts or redesigning things, only what the instrument is capable of achieving will be possible. That having been said, the possibilities are nearly endless as to what can be accomplished with any instrument given enough time and effort.

First comes foundation. A piano must have a solid foundation on which the player can rely. A player can sense this foundation throughout the dynamic range, and a good player can quickly learn where the piano's limitations lie.

For example, a pianist may play quietly and find it difficult to control this end of the dynamic range, or play fortissimo and get less than is to be expected. These feelings translate into the player not getting out of the piano as much as is being put in.

My job as a piano technician is to "get the instrument out of the artist's way." If the player is thinking mechanism; i.e., the pedal is squeaking or this note feels different than its neighbor, then concentration is being taken away from the performance and musicality and is being applied to a distraction.

On the other hand, if a player is getting out of the piano exactly what is being put in then the piano begs for more and more as if seducing or coaxing the player to go farther than ever before.

The foundation of the piano is literally the connection between the player's fingers and the earth. Any flexibility or elasticity between these two points is sensed by the player and affects the transfer of energy from the players finger through the mechanism and into the air. There are so many parts to a good piano foundation that with fear of missing some I will only name a few.

In no particular order I divide the piano into four distinct parts:

1. The case
2. The action
3. The tonal center, which includes the soundboard, bridge, plate, pin-block, and strings,
4. The lyre and back action, or damper system.
   
   To Be Continued.