A friend of mine, who I had taught was asked by a customer, "How is my piano"?. He thought a moment, then replied, "Let's put it this way ma'am. If your piano was a horse, it would have to be shot?. Ted Sambell ________________________________ From: Paul T Williams <pwilliams4 at unlnotes.unl.edu> To: caut at ptg.org Sent: Sat, December 11, 2010 9:39:45 AM Subject: Re: [CAUT] Reality check...Big Time! OK Del, You win this time! I have on occasion back on Whidbey Island have had to tell the customer that their piano is untunable. Some have even teared up since it was grandma's wedding present in 1920. Paul From: "Delwin D Fandrich" <del at fandrichpiano.com> To: <caut at ptg.org> Date: 12/10/2010 08:17 PM Subject: Re: [CAUT] Reality check...Big Time! ________________________________ Oh, don’t complain—either one of you! For reasons I can only speculate over my wife arranged for me to tune a piano for a woman in a nearby assisted-care facility. Turned out to be a Kimball spinet built in the mid-1970s. When I asked when it had last been tuned the owner, now in her eighties, said it was tuned just after it was delivered. Thinking she must have misunderstood my question I repeated it a different way. No, turns out she understood me quite well; the piano had been tuned right after it was purchased and, since the salesman had told her some story about how the soundboard (or something) didn’t move in this piano it would never need tuning. But lately she’d been wondering about that since it hasn’t been sounding quite right the last couple of years. This was only the second piano I’ve ever tuned that was well over a full step flat—the middle was down a full step and a half. Sigh. ddf Delwin D Fandrich Piano Design & Fabrication 620 South Tower Avenue Centralia, Washington 98531 USA del at fandrichpiano.com ddfandrich at gmail.com Phone 360.736.7563 From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Keith Kopp Sent: Friday, December 10, 2010 2:42 PM To: caut at ptg.org Subject: Re: [CAUT] Reality check...Big Time! Oh how I wish I could say this type of thing has not happened to me. My horror story this week is the call from the party that bought a square grand from us a couple of years ago. Please don’t ask why we had it. I had hoped it had disappeared forever. Now it needs a tuning and guess who they called? We sold it so obviously we should be excited about tuning it. Keith From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Paul T Williams Sent: Friday, December 10, 2010 3:28 PM To: caut at ptg.org Subject: [CAUT] Reality check...Big Time! Wow, after going to one of our Vise Chancellors house today for a private tuning, I'm really glad to have my job in the School of Music. I forgot just how ugly Whitney spinets are especially when not tuned for many years (in Nebraska weather). The chancellors wife "thought" maybe it had been 4 or 5 years since tuning, but a quick check on the tuning fork says over 1/2 step flat! I remember my mentor, Steve Brady, saying if the customer can't remember how long it's been, double what they say!! :>( Every key rattles and buzzes and plays like garbage!! Since it is for a Univ. party with our Dean playing, I agreed to just tune it for my usual discounted faculty fee. Really bad idea! I left the shop at 12:30 and here it is, 4:30 just back!! Why oh why did I get myself into this one. All I did was quick PR and tune and fill follow up with a warning to the Dean! I now remember how horrible spinets are and won't tune one again, unless I'm laid off and have to go back to the self employed status. Even makes our icky 1098's look pretty nice! How spoiled we get with a decent inventory that are all kept up! Remember this you folks! Paul -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/caut.php/attachments/20101211/a11b9454/attachment.htm>
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