Getting Your Piano Ready BEFORE the Piano Tuner Arrives

Here are a few tips on how to be ready for your piano tuner when they come to work on your instrument:

ALL THAT STUFF
Please clear the music books, candles, photographs, sculptures, toys, misc paraphernalia, live animals, etc. off the top of your piano.

KEEP A LID ON THE NOISE
Let the family know that it should be fairly quiet in the house when the piano tuner starts to go through the tuning procedure. (This is not necessary during repairs of the piano in many cases, just during the tuning session.) The quality of your tuning is determined by several factors. One if them is whether your piano tuner could hear what they were doing while tuning your piano.

So please turn down the:

• X-Box air strikes in the boys room
• Teenage diva screaming matches over clothing
• The fully-loaded, state-of-the-art John Deere lawn mower right out side the window
• The washing machine that makes "that weird noise."
• The dishwasher that whispers right over all harmonics while we are tweaking the high treble on your piano
• The hockey game on the giant screen
• The Dyson
• The toy drones
• You Tube
• And please let your Beagle out soon.

"THERE'S SOMEBODY AT THE DOOR!"
Let your piano tuner in the door, please. All tuners have a sixth-sense when it comes to hearing the "stuff" flying off the piano onto a nearby coffee table while we're staring at the "Welcome to Our Home" sign that's right next to the hornets' next at the front door (because you "never really use that door"). Let us in and we will gladly help you remove all the stuff from your piano. We do it everyday.

LOVABLE PETS
After your tuner greets the dogs, cats, chickens, snakes, parrots, guinea pigs or in my experience, wallaby's, bring them into another room and keep them there so the piano technician can move around the piano area without the boa constrictor slithering down the high treble into the toolbox. (Many tuners love animals, but need to get the job done quickly and efficiently so they can move on to the next service call so, "it's nothing personal, it's just business.")

THE "HURRY-IT-UP" FACTOR
Piano tuning sessions vary from about 45 minutes to 3 hours in some cases. On-site repairs can take seconds or hours in some cases. If your piano tech is coming for the first time, leave a little extra time for them to finish the work properly.

Yes, piano tuners can be "eccentric." 

Remember: We are a product of YOUR environment.

Help us be more normal, please.

Thank you.

Spring Cleaning and Your Piano

Ah yes, springtime. Warmer temperatures, longer days, yard work and spring cleaning.

So how does this affect your piano? Opening your windows for an extended period of time to air out the living room may increase the humidity in the room, but as long as you are having your piano tuned every six months, your piano will be fine. Yes, a change in humidity can knock your piano out of tune a little bit, but chances are it's almost time to have your instrument tuned again soon, so it's not a problem.

Renovating the house for a new look, but the piano is in the way? Here's were things can go terribly wrong.

DO NOT move your piano to the garage area. Mice, birds, insects and other critters love to make little nests inside pianos. I have pulled many, many rodent nests out of pianos that were put out in the garage, in the barn or even on the farmer's porch while the home was being renovated. It only takes a few hours for one mouse to make a huge mess or even ruin the inner workings of your piano. This can cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars to fix or even total your piano for good.

THE BEST SOLUTION is to have professional piano movers or even your piano tuner move your piano into the corner of another room inside the house. If the renovation project is going to create dust all over the place, you can go to your local hardware store and pick up some cheap plastic drop cloths and some duct tape. This will usually cost under $10.

Move the piano to its new location, drape the plastic drop cloth over the instrument and wrap it fairly tightly with duct tape. Next, drape an old bed sheet over the piano and your piano will be protected for the most part.

After the project is completed, unwrap the plastic and move the piano back to its original location.

Flip the lid open and inspect the inside of the instrument with a flashlight. In most cases, the inside of the piano will look just like it did before the project.

In the event that you see a fine coating of dust on the tuning pins and one the hammers, call your piano technician and ask about an internal cleaning and tuning.

Following these simple steps will help to insure that your piano is O.K. and you'll be ready to enjoy practicing in your newly decorated room.
 

Piano Accessory Holiday Shopping Tips - Do's and Don'ts

Piano accessories can make great holiday gifts. Composer statuettes, piano lamps and metronomes can make awesome surprise presents for the serious piano owner or student. The younger music major loves the famous piano scarf and G clef earrings. In fact, if you look online for music themed gifts, you will find thousands of clothing accessories, jewelry items and miniatures that are lots of fun.

Awkward Alert: Do not buy custom items as surprise gifts because accurate measurements are needed for many of these accessories.

For example, piano covers really can be custom made so they fit tightly on the instrument. Before you can order piano caster cups to protect floors, you will need both the wheel measurements and piano weight details so the cups don't break. Climate control systems for the piano should really be ordered by the piano technician after the piano is measured correctly. Piano benches need to be the correct height and width. Many times, the owner will want the bench to match exact finish color of the existing piano. Piano finish shades vary. Contact your piano technician to get advice on color matching a new bench to the piano.

Stick to the "sure thing." Small framed posters or paintings of the piano lesson in progress are popular for their traditional value, but spending $300 for a needlepoint bench cover is risky business unless you can sneak in and get the exact measurements of the bench lid. Let the piano tuner help with shopping for a decorative piano bench cover. 

Piano pens, pencil holders, musical brooches, barrettes, ski caps, snow boards with piano keys and even music boxes are very popular. My favorite place to buy piano related gifts is eBay. You can even find sheet music that your great-great grandmother learned from. If you're looking for new musical items online, use one of the top 10 search engines to start the process and you will be amazed at what comes up on your screen.

Remember: If it requires custom measurements, plan ahead and ask your piano tuner to help or shop for something else.

Shop eBay for collectables. Amazon is great for both new and used items and many times you can get free shipping. If they are into clothing and accesssories, use the search engines to start your search and plan ahead because there are lots of great deals from overseas, but shipping time averages about three weeks.

Shop for musical gifts make someone smile when they open their gifts this holiday season!

Do You Really Have to Wait Two Weeks to Tune Your Piano After it is Moved?

Well, that's what the textbook says, but the reality of what goes on out there in the piano service world, you may be able to cut that corner.

When the piano tuner finishes tuning your piano, it starts to go out of tune on a micro-scale within a few hours. Slowly, the top end goes out along with any strings that may have loose tuning pins and after a while, it's completely "out" again.

In  another case, where a piano has had several strings replaced, the tuner will stretch these strings and then tune them. In a few weeks, these strings will tend to go out of tune first. The tuner is called by the customer and comes out to tune the piano again and charges the customer again for another tuning.

In a third situation, the piano is placed near the front door in sunny Montreal, Canada is tuned and goes out of tune quickly as it gets a sub-zero draft a couple times per day. In some cases, the piano can be moved to a better location in the room, maybe an inside wall, farther from the front door. But in this case, "Aunt Sally" likes the piano right next to the front door because she can look out the window at the snowflakes as she's playing, "Winter Wonderland."

You see, after four piano tunings in under two years, a decent piano in good shape will "stabilize." It is at this point, and only at this point, will you as a piano owner get to enjoy a well-tuned piano for six months at a time.

Don't expect your piano to stabilize after you tune it once, two weeks after the movers leave.

Where am I going with this?

Right here:
In my opinion, the sooner you tune your piano four times within a two-year period, the sooner it will stabilize for six months at a time.

So, don't bother waiting two weeks. Just call your piano tuner, schedule your first tuning and then make sure your piano gets tuned every six months, every year, all the time and the world will be a better place.

"Tune it forward?"

Your Cat is the Only One Who Plays Your Piano?

Ah, pets and pianos.

I must admit, I am primarily a "dog person," but find cats interesting to watch and try to figure out...especially when they play their piano more then their owners.

I've probably worked on around 5,000 pianos over the years and I have seen many pianos that have been beat on by our furry little friends. Damage ranging from a minor scratch on the piano lid from a candlestick vs. cat kick-boxing match...all the way to broken keytops with deep scratches in the cabinet.

One piano had some sticking keys back in 2010 and there was about a third of a bag of "Purina Dog Chow" under the keys, in the action, in the harp and under the pedals. A few hours later, the piano was repaired, given a pitch raising and was as good as new (except for about 500 permanent veneer scratches on the fall board, cracked action parts that no longer available and disfigured music desk which I consider, "animal music-art.")

Cats like me when I tune. They come into the room and pace around behind me, rub their whiskers up against my leg and sometimes jump right up onto the keys next to my tuning wrench.

If I'm not mistakin', domesticated cats are territorial creatures (but I'm not totally sure because I am a dog person and never bothered to confirm this) so I think they are trying to tell me something.

Maybe something like,

"Hey Mister, what are you doing on MY PIANO?! No humans have even touched it in years! I'm the only one who uses it, so WHY ARE YOU EVEN HERE?"

Well "Morris," I am here because pianos are really "simple machines" in a way and they need regular maintenance.

If you don't start the lawn mower every six months, it may not start in the spring and your lawn will be two feet high causing the neighbors to stand up at Town Meeting and vote against your community pet project.

If you don't go to the dentist and get your teeth cleaned every six months, you will eventually be asking your local grocery store associate where the "Polident" is.

AND...if your human friends let their piano sit for years without regular maintenance and tuning, it will cost hundreds of dollars to correct the problem when Aunt Trudy comes to check on her piano this coming holiday season.

So attention all pets with pianos:
Move your fuzzy ball-thing, tell your doggy brothers to get the rawhide bone out from under that pedal because it's time for the semi-annual piano tuning which needs to be done, even if your the only one who plays it!

The Final Score:

Piano Tuner...1
Pets.................0

(See you in six months.)

Cat plays piano

Dog playing his favorite tune on the piano. (Hit it boys!)

The Craigslist Piano Reality Check

So the piano you got on Craigslist doesn't REALLY play that well?

As Texas Gov. Rick Perry would say, "Oops!"

Well, it happens to the best of us.

Here's a plan to "unscrew" that piano problem. Contact your local piano technician request a piano repair estimate. More often than not, the best course of action is to plan on paying to have your piano tuner come out to your house, open up the piano and find the problem. It's well worth the money. Most tuners will do this for around $100. If the problem is a minor in nature, the technician may offer to stay and repair the piano and then tune it on the spot without charging you for an estimate. This is the best scenario, so take advantage of it.

If the piano needs major repairs, you should ask what the charges for an inspection, appraisal and repair estimate. Many pianos need action overhauls, string repairs or key repairs which can give the piano a new life. These repairs usually run several hundred dollars. Have piano inspected to get a list of the repair problems, get an appraisal to find out what it's worth and a repair estimate to find out exactly how much it will cost to bring it up to speed. Pianos are like cars; when they need major repairs, you need to make a decision as to whether or not they are, in fact, "economical to repair."

The Reality Check Part:
Don't just let the piano sit there. Sometimes, pianos cannot be repaired unless completely rebuilt costing thousands of dollars. Most often, free and cheap pianos found online usually cost a few hundred of dollars to fix, so "bite the bullet" and plan on paying for a repair estimate. Then schedule your piano technician fix it and you will be playing, "I Can See Clearly Now" in no time.

Miking the Piano for Live Performance

Miking the piano to present a crystal clear performance can be a bit tricky. It is best have two people work on this setup, so find an assistant if you can. Also, you may want to work closely with the sound tech on this and ask them to mark the settings after you get the clear, full sound that you are looking for.

Every piano is different in many ways. They have different shapes, different age strings, different cabinets, etc. Some pianos have new bass strings which are loud and bright, while others have older strings which are usually quieter and sometimes present a "tubby" or short sustain sound. Plan your time wisely when miking your piano.


Miking the Grand Piano (in stereo if possible)

First, lift the lid and prop it up with the longer stick. Grab two mic stands equipped with booms and place the first mic about 12 inches above the bass strings. Now, aim the mic at the string in the middle of the bass range at a point about halfway down the string.

Now place the second mic about 12 inches away from the middle of the treble string set and about halfway down the length of the strings.

Set the bass strings' mic to the left channel and the treble strings' mic to the right channel.Run a test performance by playing the piano and adjust both mics as necessary.

In noisy stage situations, adjust the mics to about six inches away from the strings, instead of 12 inches away. This will help to minimize the stage noise and bleed problems from other instruments. Also, feedback can occur when mic placement is in a given spot or the record level is too high. Do test recordings until the noise settles down. Make sure you have people walk by the piano to change the acoustic field so you can see if feedback could occur.

An instrument mic with a switchable bass cut/rolloff filter is recommended for most piano miking situations. If you find that the volume with these two mics is too low, then add a dynamic mic near the treble strings.


Miking the Upright Piano:

Grab a mic stand equipped with a boom and place the mic about six inches from the back of the piano a right around middle C. Do a test performance by playing the piano. Move the mic a foot to the left, play and listen, then move the mic one foot to the right of middle C and play and listen. Pick the best position with the best sound and then fine tune as necessary.

You may want to add a second mic if you cannot get the full range of sound. Every stage setup is different.Once again, a mic with a switchable bass cut/rolloff filter is recommended.

Testing, adjusting and retesting is the key. Get people to listen with you from different parts of the room. If you have a half hour or so to experiment, you should achieve the sound your looking for.

Remember: Feedback will knock Jerry Seinfeld's PEZ dispenser right onto the floor and THAT could get ugly. DON'T LET IT HAPPEN TO YOU.