Piano from Hell

[Carl Teplitski]

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Once or twice I made the mistake of letting a customer talk me into
doing
work on an instrument I just knew would be trouble. Both times when I
was
done, the customer found fault with it. After agreeing that we would do
as well
as we could, without investing too much time, he now wanted it to be
much better
than was possible, without a complete rebuild.     Also, tried to make
me feel guilty
for charging . . .                                          Another
time,  I was called to do a tuning
to a piano borrowed from friends. All they had to do was get it tuned
and use it till they
were able to buy one, if they felt their child showed enough insentive
and desire to study.
Well this gem looked like it had been in somebodys garage, thru rainy,
snowy, you name
it kind of weather. I don't know if it was even a decent candidate for
rebuild. I had no
intension of getting caught,  and had told them,  on the phone,  that
there would be a service
charge, if we decided tuning wasn't a possibilty. I can't remember why I
told them this, because
I usually don't, so they must have said something suspicious during the
phone conversation.
It cost them moving money, and more to send it back,( if their friends
agreed to accept it.) plus my charge.
This particular time, I did feel a little guilty for charging, but when
I remembered how much I had paid for a
gas fillup earlier in the day, I got over it.

Carl / Winnipeg.

David Ilvedson wrote:

> Rob, You were able to walk away from it.  Remember the time when you
> would have actually tried to work on it...? David I.   ----- Original
> message ---------------------------------------->
> From: Rob Goodale <rrg@unlv.nevada.edu>
> To: Pianotech <pianotech@ptg.org>
> Received: Fri, 9 Jul 2004 10:54:40 -0500
> Subject: Piano from Hell
> I had one of my worst experiences as a piano technician this morning.
> I got a call from a guy who told me his piano needed tuning and
> repair.  I agreed to take the job.  Upon arriving I about fell
> over. It turned out to be a 90 year old "Metropolitan" full upright.
> It was the biggest pile of crap I have ever seen outside of a land
> fill.  I immediately started in how old the piano was and probably not
> worth fixing but he quickly cut me off and in a heavy British accent
> told me to "please fix it".  The "thing" had been painted white.  He
> was now in the process of painting it gold which he proudly proclaimed
> was "restoring the finish".  Chunks of wood were missing out of the
> case.  I opened it to find that the action was not even screwed in
> place, just laying in the piano.  There was one broken treble string
> and the bass strings were black with corrosion.There was a crack
> running under the bass bridge and the apron was loose.  There were
> broken bridal straps, broken hammers, and several others that had been
> previously broken and reglued with string.  most of the hammer return
> springs were out of place and some were missing.  One sharp was
> missing, the key bushings were worn out, someone did a poor job at
> recovering the keys, and the pivot pin on the sustain pedal had been
> sheared off completely and the bushing block was shattered. He
> continued on about what a "great piano" it was as I looked at the sad
> heap.  I calmly explained that there was simply nothing left to fix,
> the piano was dead and what he needed was a new piano.  He came back
> with "You Yanks, your all alike.  You throw anything away.  In England
> we would never throw out a fine instrument like this!"  Then he
> bragged about how he KNEW what he was talking about because HE was a
> pianist!  (Oh golly silly me, I should have worshipped his feet on the
> spot!)  Then he proudly announced that he bought it from an auction so
> it MUST be a good piano!  (Now there's reasoning for you). I continued
> to explain that I was trying to save him money, that it would cost him
> far more to repair than to replace it.  He demanded to know how much.
> I explained that it would cost hundreds just to make it produce sound
> again and even then it would be nothing but trouble.  "Oh no I don't
> want to do all that, I just want it REPAIRED, you know, so that it
> works"!  (Excuse me didn't I just say that?  Do we need subtitles for
> this conversation?"  I then explained that what the piano really
> needed was a complete restoration and that would cost at least
> $10,000.00.  "I'm trying to save you money, this piano is NOT worth
> it, you really should consider buying another piano".  He again
> reminded me that he was a pianist and that he knew this piano was
> worth it and that it really didn't need that much work.  Finally I
> just told him flat out that I couldn't help him and that I really
> didn't have the time to spend three days working on it.  His
> disposition continued to get worse as I made a hasty exit. Shame on
> me... after all this guy was a "pianist" and got it from an auction so
> he MUST know what he's talking about! Rob Goodale, RPTLas Vegas,
> NV

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