It's the holiday season, and we've enjoyed tuning pianos for your churches, families, and Christmas parties! Christmas is always so exciting, with so many people traveling, shopping, and working hard for their loved ones. I wanted to share some of what has happened in the piano world this year, share some of the things I've seen and done, and show you some piano-themed Christmas gift ideas!
Let's start with the juicy stuff: here are some of my handmade piano decorations, using parts taken from old pianos not worth working on. The first picture shows a gift for my sister I made a year and a half ago, and I really love its simplicity. If you can find a set of piano keys to work with, I promise you will really enjoy gluing them together and putting them up on your wall. And, if you can find a piano hammer, drilling it into a wood pedestal is easy! I used a hammer from the action parts blog and revived it with my brother's help. We sanded and cleaned the wood, repaired the cracks, stained it, then replaced the hammer with a spare I use for grands, glued new felts, and drilled it into the custom pedestal we made for it.
If you're not the artsy type and looking to give a gift to someone you know how has a piano, you can't go wrong with a tuning coupon! Give us a call at (615) 787-7676 so we can personalize it for you. After donating three tuning coupons to Hermitage Presbyterian for their silent auction, I realized I like the idea of these and I'd love to do more, so if you'd like a coupon for a friend, or you'd like to ask me to donate a coupon for an event, please let me know!
Since launching NoteWorthy Pianos in May, I've gotten to service over 30 pianos in and around Nashville. I hope you enjoy looking through some of my favorite pianos and projects here. I've met people in Mt. Juliet, Lebanon, Hermitage, Hendersonville, Madison, Goodlettsville, Brentwood, Springfield, Gallatin, Donelson, and Franklin. It's been a wonderful experience tuning for churches, schools, people taking lessons, people preparing for events, and everyone in between! The majority of the pianos have been in Nashville, and the majority of pianos have been standard tunings, although many have needed extra cleaning, pitch corrections, hammer voicing, key repairs, and many pianos have even needed enough work to warrant bringing to the workshop. One special job for a client in Nashville involved a tag-team, where I worked on the tuning and action while a colleague of mine refinished the piano to repair water damage on the cabinet.
I also met many amazing people in the Piano Technician's Guild and learned some niche things about pianos! Different people in both the Guild and the Journal taught me new things, but others came from just discovering them on the job. During one of our Guild meetings, I learned about different soundboard cleaning techniques, as well as different harp restoration techniques. The soundboard techniques have helped me to get a safer cleaning while also getting more surface area covered, and the harp demonstration showed how to paint the harp while protecting the exposed pins. I've already incorporated the soundboard cleaning methods, and when I soon restore the George Steck baby grand, I'll use the harp technique as well, so you'll be able to see that in better detail later on. I also learned that some 1990's Kimball uprights can have spring-loop flanges (I had previously only ever seen Yamaha and Kawai use this style). The left picture below shows a spring-loop flange, and the middle photo shows a more common flange with the spring as a separate part. The top picture on the right shows the spring loops in action, while the bottom shows the more standard spring rail. I found this while tuning a Kimball for a client when I noticed that some hammers were not falling back all the way. I will have to replace the flanges to repair that issue.
In terms of new technology, I learned about new action designs being created in Quebec which can cut down on the necessary regulation adjustments in a piano. I hope to learn more about these in the future, although it seems like they are still in the prototype phase. I became more familiar with WNG carbon composite parts, and learned about piano models unfamiliar to me, such as the 92 and 96-key concert Bosendorfers or the recently unveiled straight-strung, curved key piano. I also became certified with Piano Life Saver and tuned a piano to A432 for the first time (more on that in another blog).
In the piano world, you never stop learning. There is no such thing as a "best" technician or pianist, as there will always be simply too many aspects of the piano to be good at for one person to truly be the best. So, we technicians and pianists are always trying to learn more, knowing that the piano technology is constantly innovating and there are always new things to try. That's why I'm so excited to have learned so much this year! I can't wait to put this knowledge to good use next year, when I tune more pianos and meet more people. If you have had us tune your piano this year, thank you! Please tell your friends or leave a Google review here if you liked the service. If you're browsing and just found this article, please consider having me come out to work on your piano.
Thanks so much for reading this. Merry Christmas!
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