[CAUT] CAUT pay, was Job Opening...

[Michael Magness]

On 10/11/07, Ronald E Engle <englepiano at juno.com> wrote:
>
>  Barbara,
> My sentiments also.  I hope this is not the mentality of most CAUT's!!!
> If it is we have some educating to do.
> Ron Engle
>
> On Thu, 11 Oct 2007 18:02:40 -0500 "Barbara Richmond" <
> piano57 at insightbb.com> writes:
>
>
> Oh, Jeff....
>
> Hmm, I just got home after preparing for a two-piano concert that is
> tonight (in a public hall).  It'd be too bad if giving excellent results was
> only for pianists performing in the academia...  ;-)
>
> Sorry, I must disagree; excellent work is necessary everywhere.
>
> Barbara Richmond, RPT
> near Peoria, Illinois
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> *From:* Jeff Tanner <jtanner at mozart.sc.edu>
> *To:* Ed Sutton <ed440 at mindspring.com> ; College and University
> Technicians <caut at ptg.org>
> *Sent:* Thursday, October 11, 2007 2:56 PM
> *Subject:* Re: [CAUT] CAUT pay, was Job Opening...
>
>
> <snip>
>   We have such people making very good money in the private sector, where
> the work isn't nearly as necessary.
>
>
>  Jeff Tanner, RPT
> University of South Carolina
>
>
> (quote)
>  -- at any given time we have some 450 students studying music here at USC
> Columbia alone.
>
>    Jeff Tanner, RPT
> University of South Carolina
>
> Hi Jeff,

I'm curious Jeff do you just assume that all of those 450 students plus the
thousands of others in other universities and colleges only have fine grand
pianos at home that they learned on? They all began somewhere! Mostly on
those old uprights and spinets that you look down your nose at! There are
those of us who have spent our professional lives taking care of those kind
of instruments, becoming intimately familiar with them so that the cream of
the crop can matriculate to your type of school.
<snip>

  We have such people making very good money in the private sector, where
the work isn't nearly as necessary.
Without mine and my brethren's "unnecessary" work where would you get the
students that support the music programs that require your skills? I believe
instead of denigrating or decrying what we do or where we do it you owe us a
debt of gratitude! The kind of work and or piano snobbery that you exhibit
with your letter is the very thing I swore I would never allow myself to
become when I entered this business 38 years ago. In the last month I have
replaced a broken agraffe on a Steinway M pitch raised it and sent them an
estimate for new hammers, shanks & flanges and a regulation. Pitch raised a
couple of old uprights, tuned a Yamaha C-7 for a church and replaced a set
of plastic elbows and bridle straps on a Winter spinet c.1950 and finally
tuned a Suzuki baby grand that the customer bought online(the only way you
can buy them, they aren't offered in dealerships). You see Jeff all of this
work had one deciding factor, they asked me to do it and were willing to
pay! Being in the private sector isn't all it's cracked up to be, I pay my
own social security, self employment tax, retirement, insurance, then
there's the overhead. My phone bill is almost $100 a month, just the one on
my desk, then there's the cell phone, vehicle cost, advertising, parts
inventory, tools all of the things the University provides for you. I have
the feeling you have never been in the private sector or if you were it was
quite brief.
I know your attitude isn't the mentality of all CAUT's because I have one
for a friend, colleague and fellow chapter member who can talk in the
rarified atmosphere of fine tuning/regulating for specialty artists in
specific venues. He also talks about/helps out the newbies with
their problems with spinets, old uprights, no-name grands with equal
authority.
I am on this list because I am the tech for a University piano a 6'7" Kawai
grand and I also maintain the pianos for 3 schools districts including the
high schools 2 of which have a Yamaha C-3 grand the 3rd has a C-5. They also
have numerous studios, some uprights and even a spinet or 2.

As I said, everyone starts somewhere, who knows some of these kids I tune
for may end up at your school, think about it.
Mike
-- 
Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing
is to not stop questioning.-- Albert Einstein



Michael Magness
Magness Piano Service
608-786-4404
www.IFixPianos.com
email mike at ifixpianos.com
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