Steinway hammers

[Mark Graham]

Regarding the voicing job I wrote about, on a Steinway M:

I dissolved 2 keytops in a quart of acetone. I did use hypo-oilers -- what
are they, 8 oz.? I used about two and a half on the whole set.  I applied
the solution at two and ten o'clock on the shoulders, soaking to the core.
On most of the hammmers, this meant that the strike point was also soaked.
You can tell when the acetone is still evaporating by the coolness of the
hammers. After an hour, I played the piano and found that certain sections
were still weaker than others, so I doused those again. Because the
solution was "light" to start with, this wasn't overkill.

36 hours later, I came back and single-needled a few notes -- less than 20
-- to even things out. Mostly on the crown, plus a little deeper on the
shoulders and sides on a few really strident ones. I played it and played
it, and when it all sounded even I stopped.

Hope this helps,
Mark Graham