claims

[James Grebe]

Back when I worked in the piano shop in my early days we used to kid each
other about the pianos with cracks in their soundboards.  Our theory was
that would help equalize the air pressure on each surface of the board so
it could vibrate more efficiently.  :)  We also called Acrosonics
"Agrosonics and Acrostatics" and Wurlitzers (Wurlitizers).
	In the 70's I worked for a strange fellow who sold used and rebuilt
pianos.  If any potential customer came in and said something that he
didn't like he would walk away from them and ignore them from then on. He
would not sell them anything if they made hin mad.  I had many apologies to
make to many people.
	I remember he sold an old upright piano to a fellow before I had time to
work on it.  It was to be delivered the next week.  As I was working on it
I found that it had loose tuning pins.  I alerted the owner of the business
about this problem and he called up the customer and told him the piano had
a problem and asked him to come in to select another piano.  For some
reason the customer got it into his head that my employer found someone to
give him more for the piano in question.  As it turned out the fellow
insisted that he deliver the piano in question loose pins and all.
Sometimes even when you try to be honest the customer thinks you are a
crook!

James Grebe in St. Louis
pianoman@inlink.com