First, I want to thank everyone who offered assistance on the care and feeding of fortepianos. It has been helpful and appreciated. Secondly, regarding Dampp-Chasers, several years ago I installed a number of them in faculty studios and found out that faculty ignored them and so they were ineffective. I tried filling them myself, but this was a very time consuming operation and finding a good time to get into studios was sometimes a problem. I have since taken them all out and rely on the maintenance people to turn on the humidity in the winter. This year my humidistat has held at around 50% all winter. The pianos are staying in tune rather well. The problem is not all rooms are the same. Some have too much moisture pumped in which causes too much condensation around the windows and has peeled some plaster. I'm sure the maintenance people don't like that, but violinists, bassists, pianists, and I would rather have the humidity. Thirdly, I understand from a post from vince that pianotech was down last weekend. I posted a query then and have received no response. I assume it got lost in cyberspace so I'll repeat it. We have two piano faculty positions that will be filled this year and next. I will be meeting with the first 4 candidates next month. What would be the top 5 questions you would ask prospective piano faculty? Are there any clues (signs, auras, strange behaviors, etc.) that might tip off the temperamental (no pun intented) artiste who feeds on the flesh of unsuspecting piano technicians? Richard West Naive Nebraskan rwest@unlinfo.unl.edu
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