Folks, I go with John, with a small addition. If it is at -200¢, THERE IS PROBABLY A GOOD REASON! Some confession and anecdotal reason to follow: Many years ago I was called out to do a tuning on an old piano which hadn't been tuned in years. That was an understatement. It was an exquisite birdcage from the 1840s and probably hadn't been tuned in decades, if not a century. They wanted it "to play". I learned a lot about regulating a birdcage that day and, with no broken or missing parts, I was able to get everything to work. The tuning, however, was a different story. I checked pin tightness of the flattest strings and found very little. I explained the situation with the customer and we agreed that I should tune it as high in pitch as the loosest of the pins would hold. That wound up being at -400¢. I set C# to my A fork and went from there. In the years since, I've had to tune several others at low (really low) pitches, but always at even dollars so that, if they are adept at transposing, they can play pieces without jarring those with "perfect pitch". If I find a piano at even dollars flat, I naturally suspect someone previously had done the same thing. YMMV, of course. On 8/5/09, John Formsma <formsma at gmail.com> wrote: > > However, you should first determine if the piano is structurally sound > before doing the pitch raise. For this reason, many tuners would start by > tuning A4 to A442 (not going higher than that) on the first pass. By the > time you finish, you'll know if strings will break, or if the plate has > cracked. <slight grin> Seriously, you might be dealing with a piano that > can't be tuned at A442 for various reasons: wasn't designed to be tuned > there, the plate could be cracked, or the pinblock separated from the back, > etc. > JF -- Conrad Hoffsommer, RPT - Keyboard Technician Luther College, 700 College Dr., Decorah, Iowa 52101-1045 1-(563)-387-1204 // Fax 1-(563)-387-1076
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