Emergency Tuning

[Joey Recker]

	Wanted to tell ya'll what happened to me this evening.  As I sat
at home watching the NASCAR race preparing to leave for church the phone
rang.  It was the Mayor of our little town (Plains, GA).  It seems that
a former president had invited David Osbourne
http://members.aol.com/osborne88/page2/ of Cesar's Palace to play piano
at his Church (just down the road from my house).  It was 5:30...  The
piano (a rented Steinway "B") arrived at 5:00 and was "grossly out of
tune"  (His words).  The performance began at 6:30.

	I quickly changed and drove the church.  It was packed with
tourists (Jimmy was attending tonight) and they were all talking.  I had
a seat at the piano and checked it out.  David came by and said "please
help".  I can't hear the "high harmonics".  The bass is muddy, and there
are two sluggish dampers.  I told him I would do my best.

	I did my best to block out the noise and began.  It was about 6
cents low.  I was told by another person that the piano was "uncrated"
just a week prior and had never been tuned except by the factory.  I
decided to leave it 6 cents low and try to get it in tune with itself
since I only had about 45 minutes.  I zoomed through the middle section.
When I got to the top, I found that it appeard to have almost no stretch
and sounded flat.  I stretched it a bit in the treble and bass.  I
looked for those sluggish dampers for a few moments and couldn't find
anything that seemed out of the ordinary.  I finished at 6:20 (not my
best work...  Probably my fastest).  

	David sat down and did a few runs on the piano as I packed up my
tools, and told me I was a "magician"!  He even commented about how
quickly I fixed the dampers (I didn't tell him any different!)  I didn't
stay for the performance, as my own church was waiting for me.  I've
been tuning publicly for about a year, and although this is probably
"small potatoes" to many of you...   It made me feel pretty darn good
that I was able to pull this off with some degree of perceived
proficiency.  

	Didn't mean to brag, but my wife wasn't interested.  <grin>

Joey