Wives tales ...

[David Nereson]

    It's always amusing or mind-boggling to hear some of the things people believe, or think they believe, about pianos.  Even smart, educated people will sometimes come out with the most absurd statements.
    I don't know how many times people have told me their piano has a cast-iron soundboard, or they'll point to the plate, even in a grand, and ask if that's the soundboard.  You'd think the word "board" would suggest wood, not metal.  
    And why they think a vertical has to be moved out from the wall in order to be tuned, I still don't know.  I asked someone once, and they replied, "Well, you know, in order to tune it."  They've seen guitars and violins being tuned, but somehow never imagine that a piano may have a similar arrangement of strings wound around pins that you turn to raise or lower their pitch.  Others can't imagine why you'd have to open it up or lift the lid in order to tune it.  They obviously have no clue as to what tuning entails -- it's just a mystery box to them, I guess.  
    And of course they know for sure that any time a piano is moved, even across the room, it has to be re-tuned.  They never question it.  Same with the "outside wall" myth, the jar of water in the bottom, and the  belief that it went out of tune because nobody's been playing it, and now that it's been tuned and they're going to play it (even tho' it just underwent a half-step pitch raise), it'll stay in tune better.  
    Off the top of my head, I can't think of any other household objects about which so many myths and misbeliefs are maintained. 
    --David Nereson, RPT
    
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Carman 
  To: Pianotech Archives 
  Sent: Sunday, June 29, 2008 1:20 AM
  Subject: Wives tales ... 


    
    One of my clients was a family whose old grand piano desperately needed new strings.  
  They informed me, with unswerving conviction, that removing the old strings would cause the plate to explode.

  Carman Gentile RPT
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