[CAUT] durability (was funding)

[Porritt, David]

Ed:
 
They often need a little dope on the extreme treble.  Through the rest of the scale they are better if you just let them play in but they play in reasonably quickly.  I put some on a recital D this past summer and they were a little soft to start with.  I doped them a little in octave 5 and promptly wished I hadn't.  Fortunately the dope (keytop/acetone) didn't penetrate very far because of the density of the felt.  I was able to lightly file them and remove all the dope.  I gave a couple of advanced students permission to practice on it for a week and it came around very nicely.  I did have a little "killer octave" effect from A#5 - E6 and I doped the shoulders and the sides under the strike point but not enough to travel up to the strike point.  That pretty much cleared the problem area.  (A new sounding board would have been a better fix but.....)  The pianists like the way they respond giving more brilliance with more strength.  Some of the smaller players who would rather have a brighter sound and have to work harder to play softly are less enthusiastic about them, but the ones with the bigger technique are happy.  My own (admittedly subjective) view is that they sound like NY Steinway hammers would like to but don't.  
 
I'd really recommend trying a set.  While my approach to voicing is odd, they respond well to me.
 
dave
 
__________________________
David M. Porritt, RPT
Meadows School of the Arts
Southern Methodist University
Dallas, TX 75275
dporritt at smu.edu

________________________________

From: caut-bounces at ptg.org on behalf of A440A at aol.com
Sent: Tue 10/3/2006 2:38 PM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: Re: [CAUT] durability (was funding)



Dave writes:
<< For the past 2 years I've been hanging only Ronsen Wurzen felt hammers
and I've been surprised and pleased at the longevity.  >>

Cool, I have been recently hanging some factory Steinway hammers, but some of
them are coming out of the box pretty bright. 
     What is your experience inre what these hammers sound like brand new,
and what you have done to them for voicing, and what is the sort of sound would
you characterize them as producing?  Do they have to be played pretty forcibly
to be really brilliant? Or do they "dial up" in brilliance real quick?  Or
anything else you could say about how they sound.  



Ed Foote RPT
http://www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/index.html
www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/well_tempered_piano.html



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