On 15 Nov 95 at 8:30, Matthew Osborn wrote Getting started...: Hi Mathew, Lots of good questions here. > The PTG sent me a list of resources on a "Piano Technology Education and > Training list (thanks to them, by the way, for that :) ). I've started > getting information from some of these places, and I would appreciate > any helpful comments some of you experiences technicians might be able to > make -- what are some good ways to get started? Not in any particular order. Find a store or piano rental business and start doing floor tunings, join your PTG chapter, go to the Pace Classes, connect with a few technicians who are willing to show you how to tune or answer questions, work in a shop as a low paid apprentice sweeping floors and listen to the owner or other technicians talk to each other or on the phone to clients, buy books suggested by folks in the chapter, take out the chapter's library books, read the Piano Technicians Journal, buy a used piano and start practicing tuning, 30min to 2 hours a day (octaves, unisons, temperament, intervals), do some ear training, listen to records (CDs these days), carry a 440 tuning fork around and rind it in your ear a few hundred times a day. Hmm, I am sure there are other things you can do, but I will move to the other part of your post. > The booklet from the North Bennet Street School looked really > great, romantic even <G>... but coming up with $10,000 plus living > expenses for a year would be a real challenge. > The material from the Randy Potter School, correspondence course > seems pretty persuasive; and of course it's a lot easier to pay for. > Could a person *really* be a practicing, client-pleasing technician, > ready to attain professional credentials, after using this course? No, I don't think so. I do not know the particulars of the schools, but it is like any school, you can learn the basics and then have to get a job to really be able to put it to practice. I am sure they are great places to start and you can learn a lot. A person continues to learn, hopefully all their life. Tuning a piano is so much more than twisting pins or being knowledgeable about music. > I'm still waiting for some other places to send information, but > in the meantime, what advice could you give to someone interested in > learning the craft? If you really want to learn piano tuning, stick with it. I believe I once heard that the profession is one of the highest in job satisfaction and I can vouch for that. I started learning woodwind repair in a shop and was hooked by the owner telling me that the instrument repair person is one of the most highly thought of people in town. To be able to interact with folks at home and pianists on the concert stage, around the piano and music, is still a joy for me. Good luck, Ken Hale khale@oro.net CIS 74633,2474
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