WHAT! is wrong, exactly?

[Lawsonic Pianoforte Services]

Had a callback today on yesterdays job, a regulation and tuning of a Knight
upright, having apparently been serviced by a tuner about a year or so ago.
When I left the son of the family really enjoyed playing it, having been
playing an unregulated out of tune piano since he began the piano 6 months
ago.

I was told by the wife (who plays) over the phone that some of the notes
are wrong (an immensely useful description), then when I spoke with the
husband (who doesn't play) was told the piano sounds terrible (lovely
generality).

I went back, there was admittedly a genuine problem with bad resonance, the
notes ring on, checking down bearing - bass ok but at tennor break there is
next to nothing until mid treble area (no treble break on a knight) and
even there it is poor. So, I'm hesitent on how to advise on correcting a
downbearing problem which I would like list help on. The wife said that the
piano had a very tinny sound that wasn't there before - before I came the
piano was out of tune, and has been so for a couple of years and so they
had become used to THAT sound. I voiced down a few of the treble notes and
that sounded better to her. I got her young son to play and found that they
were really upset with a couple of notes in the bass that were harsher - so
voiced those and the rest, went over the tuning (which I had done a bit of
a pitch raise on) even so there was not much wrong there. 

I left with them agreeing to call me on Tuesday, after they've played it
over the weekend "to see if anything else is wrong"

And so, other than the downbearing problem I have a PR job to get them to
agree on what the piano should sound like. Knights I have worked with
before have had a fairly bright sound. With the piano sitting in a corner
of the room perhaps the acoustics of the walls add to the sound.

Suggestions, comments & opinions welcome.

Brian Lawson
_______________________
Lawsonic Pianoforte Services
PO Box 751097
Garden View
Johannesburg
2047
South Africa

Voice Mail +27 (0)88 127 6584
http://www.bigfoot.com/~lawsonic
ICQ: 28573941