Voicing

[Barbara Richmond]

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Hi Dave,

Definitely with permission.  But I don't wait for the customer to say =
something--I'll bring up the subject.  (Voicing is my "thing"--perhaps =
because I'm a pianist.  I'm no Andre, but deal well with day to day =
stuff & did well on staff at a university.)  Depending on the situation, =
I may say:

"Do you find it difficult to play softly on this piano?'

or

"Have you heard those old uprights that sound like tin?"  (Your piano =
can sound like that, too!)

or

"Can you hear how much brighter this section is compared to others?"=20

Of course, there's voicing up, too.  But very often on the pianos I see =
that is a power or regulation issue.

A major voicing issue to me is, would I have trouble tuning the piano =
with the way it sounds now.  Perhaps I have delicate ears.  If there =
isn't a major voicing issue or just an overall adjustment to be made, I =
will go ahead (without permission) and even up some notes when I'm done =
tuning or do some string/hammer mating while tuning.  Of course, I'm not =
changing the character of the tone-just smoothing things out.  That has =
never come back to "bite" me.

I'll explain in whatever terms necessary to get the message =
through--there are a multitude of angles.  Either I'm fairly good at =
communicating with folks or I'm really lucky, because I've always been =
allowed to do the voicing I felt was necessary.  Maybe it's the way I =
get business (no ads, only referrals, I just work part-time these days). =
 Currently, I find myself doing mostly institutional stuff and I've =
usually been told to do what I think is best (my usual service call time =
on these pianos has been 4-5 hours including a bunch of different =
stuff).  Of course it's true, sometimes just removing the action and =
tightening the screws improves the sound by leaps and bounds--but that's =
not the voicing I'm referring to.=20

Well, it's time for me to go out and shred some leaves.

Barbara Richmond


  ----- Original Message -----=20
  From: David M. Porritt=20
  To: pianotech@ptg.org=20
  Sent: Sunday, October 31, 2004 6:37 AM
  Subject: Re: Voicing


  Barbara:

  Do you voice the piano with or without the owner's ideas?  When I was =
still doing in-home tuning, I never voiced a piano unless the owner said =
something about the sound.  On extreme pianos I'd ask them if they like =
the sound and let the conversation go from there, but just voicing =
without their saying anything usually bit me in an inappropriate place!

  dave

  __________________________________________
  David M. Porritt, RPT
  Meadows School of the Arts
  Southern Methodist University
  Dallas, TX 75275
  dporritt@mail.smu.edu


   
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