Coffee spill on the Bridge

[Dave Nereson]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Richard Brekne" <Richard.Brekne@grieg.uib.no>
To: "College and University Technicians" <caut@ptg.org>; "Newtonburg"
<pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: Saturday, April 17, 2004 11:40 AM
Subject: Coffee spill on the Bridge


> Hi folks
>
> I need some advice.
>
> Today I found that one of our practice grands, a Bluther which was in
> quite good shape, had taken a rather nasty hit.  Upon entering the room
> I noticed a plastic coffee cup sitting on the top of the piano.

    It's Bluthner, actually Bluethner, but Outlook doesn't know how to put 2
dots over the 'u'.
    I hate the way students slide their trumpet and violin cases onto the
tops of pianos, with no consideration that they are musical instruments, and
not furniture or unique shelving for their books, keys, backpacks, lunch,
drinks, etc.   And musicians are often more lax about this than
non-musicians, especially with expensive grands.
    But if you were to set something, especially liquid, onto their violin
or guitar, they'd have a fit.
    I drew a cartoon poster once with a violin that had sitting on top of it
a burning cigarette, a cup of coffee, pens & pencils jammed into the
f-holes, etc, and a caption that read "If people treated other instruments
the way they treat pianos . . . ."
    Also had a similar drawing with the same caption, but the picture was of
a box car or baggage cart that had a keyboard.

    Anyway, I think some type of large sign or poster should be in every
practice room, forbidding liquids, food, instrument cases etc. on top of the
pianos.  Other posters with either photos or cartoon drawings could be
printed up with captions such as "Would you want someone to pour Pepsi down
your $3,000 French horn?  Or to dump tacks, clips, pens, pencils into your
violin?"  Or "Pianos are musical instruments, not furniture or shelves for
your junk."  etc.   And the university should have a stiff fine for
infractions, though I know something like that is extremely hard to enforce
without resorting to nazi/big brother tactics.  Padded covers (does anyone
make them?) for all piano lids, both grand and vertical might help preserve
the finish, but then the kids would think, "Oh, it's padded -- I can park
anything here and it'll be OK."

    Many schools now require signing up for pianos and practice room times,
and even have hotel-type magnetic cards to open the doors.  That way you can
see who was in there last and possibly find the guilty party.

    Yeah, I would overstate the damage and print up handouts about how to
treat pianos and have them distributed to all the music dept. classes.

    If the problem persists, have the nice pianos taken out and old beater
uprights
and cheap spinets put in instead!

    --David Nereson, RPT