To all:
Be forewarned. This is going to be fairly long, but I, and several
others, feel it is important enough to all of us to spend the time (and
money) to read through it. If you don't wish to do so, delete now:
On app. November 1, I posted a letter asking your opinion of my
posting a letter to a Piano list that is primarily private teachers,
educators and performers, asking for their ideas on improving
relations/communication between teachers and technicians. Your responses
were all positive. For example: "It's a good idea", "Good effort to
start a positive dialog & thanks for reaching out to teachers. We need
them and they need us!", "I would like to include the results in my
chapter newsletter", "By all means, do it. An intelligent discourse
between technician and teacher is sorely lacking", "Go for it! We need
to find out what piano teachers feel, want, and need".
The above is a compilation of your general comments on the subject.
Below is a more comprehensive compilation of the responses I received.
Most all are quoted in their entirety:
*******
FROM: RICHARD HIHN
Department of Music
Skidmore College
Saratoga Springs, NY
"Perhaps one problem, in my experience, is that tuners are not always
performing musicians and pianists seldom know much about the inner
working of a piano. I certainly include myself in that category. As with
my car, I can drive it, but have trouble locating the dipstick, and I
fall into a hopeless pile of jelly whenever something goes wrong
mechanically. Sort of the same for the piano. Through petition, I was
able to have a course in piano tuning instituted at the Eastman School
of Music, but it did not happen before I graduated. I believe such a
course is now required at some institutions, and perhaps should be
required of anyone who intends to follow a career in piano. Perhaps
then, a pianist won't yell if the technician can't get the piano to sing
more, and understand that it may be the nature of that instrument."
AND A LATER POST FROM MR. HIHN:
......"I would summarize the problems as follows:
1. Pianists are raised, unintentionally, to put up with pianos that are
in various states of disrepair and infrequently (and often poorly)
tuned;
2. Pianists tend to know little or nothing about either tuning or
repairing a piano;
3. Pianists often talk of doing at the piano what is not possible, and
often play with what is essentially the art of illusion;
4. Pianists often say that it's hard to find a good tuner/technician;
5. Tuners, at least the ones I've been associated with, tend to know
little about music, except in a rudimentary way;
6. Tuners tend to think pianists have tin ears.
All generalizations, of course. It would be wonderful to see
technicians at colleges and universities offer REQUIRED courses in
tuning and repair. It would be nice to have tuning/repair workshops
offered at local, state, and national MTNA meetings and other
professional organizations." (With a P.S. offering to elaborate on any
of the above. #3 might be interesting to have elaborated on. AT)
...."I fully agree with your notion that pianists and technicians don't
always speak the same language. We pianists are apt to use very
subjective, sometimes colorful, descriptions of piano actions, some of
which belie the realities of the instrument. Someone recently used the
term 'rubbery' to describe an action. No doubt this is not a logical
term from a technician's point of view, but without having played it, I
knew exactly what was meant."
FROM: PATTI RIEGERT
Private Teacher
Annapolis, MD
"I include myself in the group that was quite ignorant regarding the
inner workings of the piano. I asked my technician to present a workshop
to my parents and students. Sadly, only half of my students and parents
attended, but those of us present left with a bit more knowledge and
were able to ask appropriate questions in the future."
FROM: DAN.H. CHAQUICO
Soph. Jazz Studies Student
Piano Concentration
University of North Texas
Denton, TX
"I would like to know something about voicing. I was told that a good
piano tech could make a piano brighter, warmer, darker, heavier,
lighter, etc. I would like to know to what extent this is possible. I
realize you have to buy a piano that you are comfortable playing and
listening to, but how much can the original qualities of the piano be
altered?"
FROM: ALPHA H. WALKER
Private Teacher
Los Angeles, CA
"I am very happy to be educated by my piano technician (Richard
Davenport). He is a wonderful artist/scientist who also happens to love
to teach. Two years ago he wrote one article for each of eight monthly
editions of the newsletter for the West Los Angeles Branch of the Music
Teachers' Association of America. He has given many workshops not only
for teachers and students but often for other piano technicians,
especially those in training. I think the idea of improving
communication between piano teachers and piano technicians is terrific
and here in West LA we have a good start!" (I will see if I can get a
copy of those articles if anyone is interested. I am. AT)
FROM: M.J. SEPHTON
Liverpool John Moores University
United Kingdom
"At last, someone is realising that a lot of the "professionals" are
not actually professionals at all. Teachers who will not listen to their
technicians when such obvious problems as the ones cited occur (this
refers to something I said in my original letter to the teachers about
the poor condition of many teachers' pianos. AT), are an absolute
disgrace to the world of music. It just goes to show that they cannot
possibly appreciate music, as, if they did, they would not be able to
stand hearing it played on a sub-standard instrument. The love of music,
as a musician, is inseparably linked with the love of an instrument, and
if that instrument isn't taken care of properly, the player, as well as
the listener, cannot possibly hear the music as it was meant to be
heard."
A RESPONSE TO THE ABOVE, ALSO BY RICHARD HIHN:
"Although I agree with the basic sentiment of the importance of
knowing one's instrument, "cannot possibly appreciate music" is a little
too strong, I believe. Certainly pianists are more often at "fault"
here, as not every pianist has the luxury of having their own Steinway
piano, or access to a "good" technician. As a group, I think we tend to
ignore, or at least try to deal with, the shortcomings of pianos which
come our way in the course of performing."
signed: Dick (remembering 4 years of practicing on Knabe upright
"pianos" at Eastman)
FROM ANDY O'BRIEN:
Concord Community Music School and
St. Paul's School
Concord, NH
"All pianists and piano teachers should own a copy of "The Piano
Book" by Larry Fine," etc. (with ordering information I don't believe is
needed here. AT).
AND A LATER POST:
"I took a course once called 'The Care and Feeding of the Piano'.
It covered grand and upright actions, tuning, etc...Owning an older
Steinway, I was able to make my own emergency action repairs and damper
regulation. I stay away from tuning as I do not feel qualified. Since
the action was rebuilt and hammers replaced I have left the piano alone,
feeling that it is my technician's work and he should be responsible for
maintaining it. With my technician living an hour and a half away, it is
most useful to be able to diagnose action or other problems over the
phone. I have also read every technical piano book I can find."
FROM: AMY McDONOUGH
Private Teacher
Minneapolis, MN
"At the university that I attended, a Piano Technology Class was
offered every four years by the school's Piano Technician. We used "The
Piano Book" by Larry Fine as our textbook. Each week one person would
"dismantle" the piano we were working on. The teacher would show us
something that needed fixing, and then we, as a class, would decide how
to fix it (with guidance, of course). As homework, we had to pick a
piano from the practice rooms and fix something on it. Since our music
department had an extremely small budget for piano repair, (as if
anywhere has scads of money) we were able to fix small problems on our
own just by borrowing a screwdriver from a janitor. Anyway, by the end
of the semester, the practice pianos were in much better shape, and the
piano majors were able to communicate exactly what was wrong with the
pianos to the technician."
FROM: WENDELL HURST
Elementary School Music Teacher
Salt Lake City, Utah
"What I know about pianos has helped me immensely. I prefer to have
my own tuner work on my Mason & Hamlins, but I have replaced broken
strings and reglued loose hammers from time to time. One time I played a
recital, doing 'Die Schone Mullerin' with a baritone who was one of the
finest musicians I have ever had the privilege of working with.
Beforehand, there was a click in the Kawai, which only happened in some
parts of the keyboard, but which was quite annoying. I happened to have
my tools in my car, for no particular reason, so I was able to figure
out the problem and fix it before the program started. The singer
recorded the whole program in stereo and gave me a copy. When he
unexpectedly died a year or so later, the value of that tape to me went
up immeasurably."
FROM: ROB HORTON (referring to the above-mentioned click. AT)
3rd year Student @ Cornell University
Presently studying @ Stanford Japan Center
Kyoto, Japan
"It's always a good feeling to have a small tool set with you before
you get set for a performance. I played a recital with a clarinetist one
time and the final piece of the first set was "Hydre A Cinq Tetes" by
Alain Louvier. During one of the forearm crashes, I knocked one of the
black keys clear off the wooden base. The audience loved the effect of
seeing part of the piano fly off and clatter across the stage but,
during the intermission, we had to run out to a local convenience store
and buy some super glue to fix it back on (then pray that it dried
before everyone came back in). Luckily, it held for the second
half...but lesson learned, it's nice to have these things at hand."
FROM: DANIEL PAUL HORN;
Assoc. Prof. of Piano
Wheaton College Conservatory of Music
Wheaton, IL
"..... Even though I've used some first-class ones, I've never been
quite sure of myself in dealing with them. (I had a venerable
technician...."(location omitted, AT) "working on my Kawai at home until
it seemed that some of his mechanical work, especially the shaping of
hammers, seemed to get a bit shaky with age. It was difficult to know
for sure whether to switch technicians, and I haven't found anyone since
who is quite so knowledgeable about so many aspects of his craft.)"
********
As you can see, the responses pretty well ran the gamut, from
humorous, to thoughtful, to school experiences, etc., although there was
a surprising, to me, lack of "horror stories" about technicians.
To partially quote from one of the pianotech responses I got:
"BEWARE! You are entering a territory of the black arts. Many teachers
know just enough about their instruments to make them dangerous and I
have been told not to speak to them about anything technical---lest they
'pop the hood' and go to town".
But this same technician also said that "an intelligent discourse
between technician and teacher is sorely lacking...it may open some
doors of insight". This type of attitude, as he and most of us realize,
both from teachers toward technicians and technicians toward teachers,
is what needs to be addressed and improved upon. Then maybe some
constructive things may be accomplished; i.e., some type of required
classes for piano majors, the articles for newsletters, the classes at
the various piano and music teachers conventions.
One area I would like to see technicians try to improve on is in our
musical education. It might really be an eye-opening experience for a
non-pianist technician to study privately with a piano teacher for a few
years. From my own experiences here at UH and other places, I've found
that if one has studied and plays piano, it is usually SO much easier to
understand and interpret what a pianist is trying to ask us to do.
I sincerely appreciate those of you who took the time to encourage me
to attempt this and I particularly thank those of you who will spend
their time reading the results. Hopefully, it will generate some ideas
and motivate some of us to try and accomplish some of the things
mentioned in the letters from the teachers and we can all learn and grow
in the process.
Respectfully submitted, with any comments/suggestions, etc. welcomed.
Avery Todd, RPT
Piano Technician
University of Houston
Houston, TX 77204-4893
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